Old Belailie Farmhouse with Lisa in the Mid North region of South Australia

On the back roads near Jamestown you'll find Old Belailie Farm House. Here the days move to a slower rhythm - a bit like the sheep spend their days picking over the dry plains in search of feed. The day we popped in the winter rains had yet to arrive to add a green tinge to this part of the mid-north.

But inside the kitchen of Old Belailie there's plenty of colour. When you drop in for Devonshire Tea you are presented with an amazing and colourful array of jars and bottles packed with jam, pickle, sauce, chutney and other country fair.

There's tomato and pineapple jam, fig ginger and walnut jam, lime marmalade, crab apple jelly, quince jam, tomato and ginger, strawberry and even banana jam.

The 200 strong range is a joint effort between husband and wife team Michael and Annette. When customers aren't knocking at the door, Michael's knocking at the side of a saucepan as he cooks up another Old Belalie concoction.

When we were there he was bottling a batch of strawberry and apple butter.

"I love the jams," he said. "As a boy Mum used to hide them and I would still find them."

Now he's making them along with the sauces, cordials and pickles, which line the rows and rows of shelves in the shop. You'll also find an assortment of pottery whipped up by Annette in her few quieter moments in one of the farmhouse's converted outbuildings.

"This was the old shearing shed," said Annette. "And this is where they kept the buggies."

Thanks to Annette and Michael, Old Belailie has been given a new lease on life. For many decades after the descendants of the original property left, what is now the pottery studio and restaurant were in ruins.

"It was empty for about thirty years with just the animals and sheep living in it." said Annette.

It was a sad demise for a farm first established in the 1870s when large South Australian pastoral properties were being broken up into smaller holdings. John and Helen Coles took up one option and established a 640-acre property alongside John's brother Henry Cummings and his wife Grace. By all accounts it was a prosperous and productive arrangement.

"They had adjoining properties here and it's said throughout their whole life they never had an argument." Said Michael.

Now Old Belailie is again humming along very nicely as Annette and Michael churn out jams and sauces that old John and Helen Coles would have been proud of. And word has certainly spread throughout the mid-north that this is the place to come for some classic country cooking and a gold old-fashioned chinwag.

Old Belailie Farmhouse is about ten kilometres from Jamestown on the Orroroo Road. The restaurant is open daily and a vast array of condiments is available from the store. If you have any further questions please email info@postcards-sa.com.au

Old Belalie Farm House
Off the Orroroo Road 10 kilometres ex Jamestown
Look for the signs
Open daily 9am - 5pm
Ph (08) 8665 2002