September 2018 in pictures

We had an abundance of tomatoes of many colour, sizes and shapes and some of them heritage varieties. Jersey Devil is one that we shall definitely be growing next year long with Orange Banana. Both are substantial, meaty tomatoes with a great flavour.

Runner beans and climbing beans were also doing well.

We grew radicchio for the first time this year and had  several plants dotted around the garden. One, however, was overlooked when it came to gathering heads and leaves, and it quickly went to seed.  We also had a range of swiss chard varieties popping up in various spots, some of it self sown.

The squashes were disappointing partly because I was late putting them in but also, I suspect, because of the long hot, dry spells we had. Not sure is more regular watering would have helped much 

February 2018 in pictures

February is always a relatively quiet month in the garden, so it's a good time to do some stock taking. We have enough jam, marmalade, chutneys and pickles in the cupboards to keep us going for most of the year or at least until harvest time when more will be prepared. We're down to two bottles of elderberry syrup but they should see us through the rest of the winter and any coughs and colds we might develop.

It's also a good opportunity to tidy up the bookshelves and take an inventory of what we have and note what is still to be read! 

Meanwhile, outside the celery that I grew from the remains of a bunch I bought in the local supermarket has survived the bad weather and I found an overcrowded clump of spring onions. I suspect a whole packet had dropped out of my pocket some time in the autumn and was then mulched and covered over with compost. Time to thin out and eat!

We are now down to our last home grown squash. It's the second monster squash, which weighed in at 3.2kg. We may be eating it for some time! We are still harvesting some kale, cavolo nero and Babingtons leeks, and we have had the first pea shoots of the season (grown on the window sill). 

One of our lunches this month: squash and leek risotto, accompanied by puy lentils with leek and cavolo nero and pea shoots as a garnish.

And finally, the daffodils are coming out in what we call our "front patch". One could almost believe that spring is around the corner but the forecast for the beginning of March is not good.We could be seeing some heavy snow.

December 2017 in pictures

This month saw the first snow of the winter and some heavy overnight frosts. 

We are steadily eating our way through the winter squashes, but it looks as though we shall still have some for January at least.

The Babington's leeks are ready for harvesting and, after three years in the ground, a few clumps now need thinning out.






There are plenty of brussels sprouts in the garden, a few parsnips and some "volunteer" potatoes that were found lurking around the edge of the compost heap. I had hoped to have more from some late plantings in the growing sacks, but the foliage was completely flattened when the fence panels came down in the September storms. Better luck next year!




December is when I place my orders for fresh seeds and new varieties, but first I have to organise my existing stock so that I can see what I already have. That took half a day to do and then I could work out what I needed to order from the seed suppliers. My next task will be to create my sowing diary for the coming year.

October 2017 in pictures

The autumn harvest from the garden continues: squash, cauliflower, herbs, carrots, tomatoes and courgettes. 

The sweet chestnuts came from a tree next to The Church of Our Lady and St Anne in Caversham. It is a well established tree and there is always a good crop, although the quality of the chestnuts does vary from year to year. This year they were really plump and a great addition to stews and casseroles.

 

We gathered in the last of the tomatoes, some of which were still green but may ripen indoors. They are usually eaten before that happens, though, chopped and fried with a little garlic, onion salt and chilli. It was not the highest yielding year we've ever had but a good one and we did manage to avoid the blight that afflicted so many vegetable gardens and allotments in the area. The photo on the left is a sample of some of the varieties we grew this season.

A friend gave me a bag of quince from their garden. I poached some in a honey syrup along with some foraged apples and the rest I incorporated into marmalade (recipe to follow in a separate post).

We harvested the two monster squashes that were growing against our kitchen wall; they weighed in at just over 6lb each in weight. I found the label at the base of the plant and it said "Harlequin". I've been collecting seeds from our squashes for about three years and so far the harlequins have all been small to medium sized yellow/orange specimens (see the one on the right in the photo). I initially thought that there had been cross pollination to produce the green giant on the left but on checking my seed catalogues I see that Harlequin is an F1 hybrid. It's amazing that my collected seed generated so many "true" harlequins. Some of the green giant was made into chutney and the rest eaten over two weeks in risottos, curries and roasted veg recipes. Its twin is waiting to be eaten. We shall probably tackle it at the end of the year!

Our other main harvest was that of runner bean seeds. We have been growing runner beans and collecting our own seed for many years and have long forgotten what varieties they are/were. It doesn't really matter as they are well adapted to our garden conditions, are prolific and taste good. I may, though, try out one or two new "bought-in" varieties next year.

Some of the brassica and swiss chard seedlings have been planted out in areas that won't be trampled on when our storm-damaged, dividing fence is replaced (hopefully in November). They have all been covered with fleece, not to protect them from frost but to stop the pigeons getting at them! The brussel sprouts that you can see in the background are big enough to take care of themselves. 

September 2017 in pictures

The autumn harvest started in earnest including an interesting range of varieties of squash and tomatoes. 

Unknown variety of monster squash growing
against the kitchen wall

Black Krim tomatoes

Brown Turkey figs

Cherry Bomb chillis

The recent storms had already weakened two of the posts of the fence between us and one of our neighbours. Heavy winds overnight on September 12th/13th resulted in three of the panels coming down flattening the potatoes in the growing bags and seedlings in the adjacent ground. This is not going to be fixed for several weeks, which means we won't be able to plant out all of the winter and spring veg seedlings. 

Typical autumn lunch! Pie from Reading Farmers' Market and veg from the garden

August 2017 in pictures

Cauliflowers not huge this year but at least they survived the cabbage white caterpillars.

An interesting looking squash emerging from the compost spread under some of the runner beans.

Tomatoes are doing well this year. First time we've grown Brandywine and Costoluto Fiorentino.

A good crop of runner beans across the garden.....  

...and  the grapes have excelled themselves this year.

Plenty of wild fruit for foraging: elderberries, damsons, blackberries, apples and plums.

Winter food

I'm finally catching up with postings, harvest summaries and photos from the last few months. Many of the photos I've posted on Flickr and Facebook but have not yet got around to uploading them here.

I love winter food and this meal is an example of how wonderful veg can be at this time of year: vegetarian haggis with veg from the garden and Reading Farmers' Market. Cavolo nero and mashed squash from the garden; red cabbage, potatoes, leeks and celeriac (mixed in with the squash) from the market.

At this point in the year we were down to our last three home grown squashes. I called them traffic light squashes because of the colours and I am always reluctant to cut into the last of our autumn harvest. Pretty though they are they are grown to be eaten so it was the orange one that went into the haggis meal.

November 2016 A few surprises lurking in the undergrowth

We usually gather in the remains of the summer and early autumn annual crops by the end of October at the latest but leave the squash and courgette foliage for a few weeks more. This is mainly to provide some continuing ground cover while we sort out an overwinter mulch for the beds. There are generally a few surprises lurking in the undergrowth, and this year's prize goes to a queen squash that was hidden amongst the branches of the cherry plum tree. Not exactly a monster but a respectable 482g. 

Elsewhere and at ground level we uncovered a small patch of carrots and beetroot. This was at the bottom of the main part of the garden and an area that has only just been brought back into cultivation after the removal of the three sycamore trees from the other side of our boundary. This part of our zone 2/3 has not been used for about 4 years because of the shade from the trees and the mass of tree roots that were close to the surface of the ground. 

We are steadily building up the soil level with compost and mulch and earlier this year I scattered some leftover carrot and beetroot seeds at random over the ground. Leaves from a nearby squash in a pot quickly covered the ground and I forgot about them. There were enough for a meal and it shows that the soil is becoming productive again. 

The main crops at this time of year are swiss chard, curly kale and cavolo nero. The brussels are maturing nicely and we should have enough for Christmas and the New Year, with a second variety due to come to maturity later in January. 

Indoors, we were drying the tea bags and soil samples that had been retrieved from the garden and preparing them for despatch to the Tea Bag Index project at the University of Reading. The project aims to measure the rate of decomposition of organic material in garden soils across the UK. 

Details of the project can be found on the TBI website and Facebook.

An interesting alternative to the Tea Bag Index has been tried on pastures in South Dakota. See Tighty Whities Can Tell You About Your Soil Health « On Pasture for details :-) 

November 2016: Inventory of chutneys, jams, jellies and pickles