C is for . . .

. . . cucumber!!  Our very own, home-grown (you can tell by the knobbly bits!) cucumber and it is sooo sweet and soooo delicious - its definately on my list of things to grow next year.

I've been thinking about my veggie growing this year and had been quite depressed by slugs eating my courgette plants, deer eating my beetroot and beans, tomato blight etc etc.  Then I realised I had been focusing on all the negatives and thinking that I hadn't done very well at all but completely forgetting all the truimphs, my lettuces that just kept growing, the one sugar snap pea plant that produced so many peas!  My bean plants who managed to keep going even though all the lower leaves had been eaten and produce lots of green beans.  My lone courgette plant who valiantly produced courgette's non-stop and is still going.  My one rocket plant which gave us some lovely peppery bursts.  I need to be thankful for these small successes, learn from my mistakes and who knows what will happen next year!

Glut and blight

Oh the highs and lows of one weekend.  I had a wonderful time with the kids picking all these beans and we seem to have courgettes coming out of our ears at the moment - at last a glut or something resembling one at least!  My shopping basket is now quite empty as we have all this glorious veg to eat at home.  The favourite courgette recipe's of the moment are 'courgette dollops' for the kids - which we've now managed to introduce to other families too (!) and 'courgette and lemon risotto' - lovely and yummy - that's my favourite - although I wouldn't say no to a dollop either!

 

Then we discovered, or rather had confirmation that all our amazing tomato plants had succumbed to potato blight.  I was so upset as I quickly picked all the green tomatoes and realised we would have had a bumper crop.  Sadly the only thing for it was to make green tomato chutney and quick.  So yesterday evening I chopped 6lb of green tomatoes, 3lb of apple and 3lb of onion (which certainly had me in tears by the end!) - it was a bit touch and go as to whether I had a big enough bowl to put them all in!  But I did and the chutney is made and bottled up - 15 jars in all - watch out family and friends - there's chutney coming your way this Christmas!!

Grandpa on the other hand has been growing prize winning beetroots and had one very happy helper to pull them all up.

Garden Round Up

Well, I thought it only fair to give you a quick catch up on all things gardeny.

The allotment has been coming along beautifully, entirely due to the friends we are sharing it with.  S is the driving force behind it's appearence, I would be just happy to grow a few things to eat but I'm always happy to be associated with something gorgeous!!

Meanwhile, back in our greenhouse, DH has fashioned a couple of raised beds for our tomato plants out of an old bed of ours - I love the upcycling/recycling aspect to it.  Our tomato plants are now completely out of control and have taken over the greenhouse.  We will have a bumper crop this year if only they will ripen, otherwise there's going to be a lot of green tomato chutney - watch out family and friends . . .!

My little helper who has been doing a lot of watering this year.  It's been a funny year in the garden.  We have been inundated with slugs at home so very little outside has survived.  We've had better luck at the allotment but I think we are just getting used to the whole idea of growing  veg and a lot of the plants were put into the ground quite late in the season so we haven't had as good a crop as we could have.  But the whole community spirit of the allotment is just wonderful.  I spoke to one chap - who has offered to lend anyone who needs it his wheelbarrow - about general vegtable growing and he takes a very scientific view of working out exactly how many plants he needs in a growing season - how many parsnip plants he needs if he is going to have 2 parsnips a week for 6 months!  I have a feeling I need to learn a bit more about this and think more about quantity and timing.  We've been having some lovely things to eat - but certainly haven't produced enough to feed two families!!

My first year of growing sugarsnap peas - very exciting this is too!

Ah, and finally some courgettes - now where did I put those courgette receipes . . .

Allotmenting

We've just taken on a new 'little'(!) venture with another family.  Our village has just made some land available for about 30 allotment plots and already it is beginning to feel like a little community as everyone tries to get their plots into a fit state to plant something for this year.  It's very exciting although a bit daunting too, but as we are sharing the plot we hope it will be manageable and we will be able to grow more vegetables and fruit than we can currently.  Of course the mummy's priorities have been painting the shed, thinking about bunting and curtains - oh and a spot of veg growing too!!

We've also had a bit of wildlife excitment already. This grass snake was hiding under a pile of wood and for a moment we thought it might have been an adder.  Luckily fearless DH rehoused him and the little ones were very excited about the whole thing and spent hours looking at the patch of ground in case they got another glimpse!!

We managed to plant some pototoes last weekend and this weekend will see a lot of seed planting, beans, peas, beetroot.  Then there are all the seedlings I have coming along in our green house - which includes the potential glut of lettuce plants - I have 64 currently that all look set to mature in the same week - eek - I should have sown them little and often I know!