Kitchen garden plans

I do get homesick for Australia at times. Mainly the wonderful local markets that make weekend shopping so much fun. It doesn't matter where you are in the country there is always super fresh local produce, more than likely organic from small local growers; ready made foods from all corners of the globe depending on the mix of population; as well as clothes, jewelry and crafts.
SO every so often I sit down to a super session of Maggie Beer and Simon (and Ziggy the dog) series 'the cook and the chef'. I get my cooking hit as well as having a tour around the farms and markets of the Barossa Valley in South Australia (it is 6 years old but who cares). During such a session this week, my partner Jim sat down for a 5 minute watch and was hooked when the pomegranates came into view 'why cant we grow those here'? Thank you Maggie, I have been talking about Quinces, pomegranates and other 'exotic' trees for sometime and now he has seen the fruit being used he understands why I want them. The climate here is perfect for them, although we will have to keep up the watering during the dry periods. I have seen ornamental pomegranates so 'real' ones should be available, we will have to ask around all the 'garden centres' (enterprising guys who set up by the side of the road and have everthing from daisies to citrus trees). So this weekend is being set aside as house and garden time. The vege garden needs lots of organising with the very cold weather starting to set in and the honey suckle and scented geraniums are still in the plastic bags I bought them in at least 2 months ago. The mulberries are fruiting and need netting to protect them from birds and our fig tree is groaning with fruit which will be heading to the preserving pan. I have to dig out the recipe from South Africa for preserving these small middle eastern style figs - and hunt out the slake lime needed. The jar of lemon and orange seeds sitting on the kitchen window need ot be popped into yoghurt pots and encouraged to germinate. They are from imported fruit, which an agricultural friend tells me are to susceptible to pest here but I am determined to try even if I only get one tree from 50 seeds. The lemons are the most important as we already have local oranges and they give lovely fruit. Oh and we also still have to investigate the fate of our bees.