Miscellany

A few final images from 2009. The medlar tree yielded nine kilos which we bletted - basically left to rot - and then made into a 'meh' medlar cheese. A good harvest of beets, especially Cylindra, but Egyptian Turnip Rooted were the finest tasting so I'll grow more of these next year. It was a first for Yacon and Oca, the latter seems the most versatile for cooking as it is very like a lemon flavoured waxy potato. Yacon is sweet and quite tasty raw, I just don't know what else to do with it. I'm overwintering the crowns in the potting shed so will hopefully have shoots for anyone wishing to try growing them. Thanks again to Belgian Frank and German Klaus Peter for sending me cuttings.

In A Bleak MidWinter

I'm off to the fens for a week to chill out.

Wing-ed Things

Herds (Mutations?) of song thrushes have been passing through the garden, feasting on the fruit of our Cotoneaster frigidus. As many as 20 to 30 at a time. I was out in the snow briefly today foraging for some kale and parsley and unearthing a few tubers. Unbeknownst to me, the robin, never far away when I'm digging, followed me back into the potting shed. How different it looks indoors, and how different the room looks with something wild trapped in it.


Song Thrush, Starling, Wood Pigeon and Magpie from the Featherbook (Il Bestiario Barocco) of Dionisio Minaggio, Chief Gardener of the State of Milan, 1618

Cordial & Restorative

"For delicate persons, who find it best to dine in the middle of the day on plain foods, an excellent supper vegetable is a fair-sized Carrot boiled whole so as to retain its aromatic properties; then split into quarters, and warmed afresh for being served hot. It acts as a nervine sedative, whilst being cordial and restorative. A sense of mental invigoration will follow, and the digestion of the estimable root will be readily performed, without preventing the sleep."
Meals Medicinal W.T.Fernie, M.D.

Bent Cucumbers

Last year I grew 'Kyoto Three Foot' cucumbers in the greenhouse where the fruit hung down from the rafters thus.


This year I let them meander along the ground outside and this was the result.

Oxford '09

Yesterday was the 2nd (annual?) get together of garden bloggers in Oxford organized by Patrick. Vegplotting, Alternative Kitchen Garden, Ben from Real Seeds, Vicki Cooke from Heritage Seed Library and Dr.Simon Platten/British Homegardens each spoke about their projects/interests for 20 - 30 minutes. Most of the afternoon session was reserved for maverick potato & tomato breeder Tom Wagner - father of Green Zebra, Banana Legs and Schimmeig Creg tomatoes, to name a few. This was the final stop for him on a 2 month tour of Europe - giving workshops on breeding techniques and just spreading around his enthusiasm. Very inspiring!


This year I had a go at growing potatoes from true seed, and the results were unremarkable but I've had a lot of fruit set on both Verity and Skerry Blue so I'm thinking I'll sow some more next year. And I got a few pointers for increasing the yield.

Krautfest

My first really successful year for growing cabbages - 10 heads of Mammoth Red Rock - the one on the left was 7 lbs. A few slug holes on the outer leaves but the netting was pigeon proof and excluded all but the most persevering cabbage whites. The pantry shelf now groans under the weight of a gallon of sauerkraut and three quarts of Rotkohl, the yield of the five pictured. (If you want to try making sauerkraut for the first time, this youtube video demystifies the process. Watch and feel empowered!)

Happy Thanksgiving Day...

...eh.
The weather continues to be mild and fair, but after last week's rain I shifted my drying chilies to the airing cupboard. There's feathers everywhere as Doris and Gladys are in moult and just about one egg a day is all we get from the five of them. Tomatoes continue to ripen in the greenhouse (mostly cherry tomatoes now - Riesentraube and Peacevine), 32 kilos to date.

Next Year...

Nights are drawing in, and I'm already sending off for seeds and planning next year's crops.

Potato Cakes for Tea

A few nice white potatoes must be cleanly pared, and all the eyes cut out, boiled until quite soft, and then strained from all the water; the potatoes must be well mashed up with some flour, sufficient to admit of their being rolled out to a paste. The paste must be well rolled out several times until about half an inch thick, then cut into cakes with the top of a tumbler, or into squares of a similar size. The best way to bake them is on a girdle, or, as it is called in the North, a "griddle". The cakes must be very lightly done and not allowed to become crisp. They require turning once or twice. When sufficiently baked they must be split open and buttered, and then laid together again as muffins are.
from Our Wartime Kitchen by Tom Jerrold


I lifted 21 lbs. of Pink Fir Apple potatoes today, the return on just 7 seed potatoes (I think that's good). There are two maincrops - Arran Victory and Verity - still to harvest now. So far it seems to be a better than average haul this year.

Hot Peppers

Both hot peppers have been successful this year. Compact and well suited to growing in a pot in the greenhouse they are yielding dozens per plant.

Portugese Cabbage

Two varieties of Brassica that I am trying this year for the first time are fattening up nicely under some pigeon proof netting. The friend who gave me the seeds has promised to give me her mother's recipe for caldo verde.
Yesterday I defoliated most of the beets in the back garden in an effort to halt the spread of rust which has inhibited the swelling of the roots. I then sprayed with dilute milk as this seemed to work on leek rust. Happily there is no sign of it at the allotment.

Vegetable Morals

"...But I have no doubt at all of the advantage of giving up meat. I find already much good from it in lightness, and airiness of head; whereas I was always before clouded, and more or less morbid after meat. The loss of strength is to be expected. I shall keep on, and see if that also will turn, and change into strength. I have almost Utopian notions about vegetable diet, - begging pardon for making use of such a vile, Cheltenhamic phrase. Why do you not bring your children up to it? To be sure, the chance is that after guarding their vegetable morals for years, they would be seduced by some roast partridge, with bread sauce, and become ungodly."
Edward Fitzgerald writing to his friend Donne (September 1833)

Menaced by Monsters...

Pictures by Brendan Amphlett at the Lemon Monkey Mezz Gallery, 188 Stoke Newington High Street until September 27th.

Time for a Corn Boil

"These novel tongs provide a sanitary means of holding hot roasting ears. Made of stainless steel, they permit the ear to be grasped securely without the fingers touching the corn. Claws on the ends of the tongs are shaped in 'fish hook' manner so that the corn cannot possibly slip."
(from ModernMechanix)

Mess O' Tomatoes

Here's this summer's assortment. (last year's are here) They are coming thick and fast now but still to ripen are a late start Peacevine and outdoor-reared 'Off the Vine' Brandywine. Taxi has now finished fruiting and I've replaced them with rooted cuttings, taken late May, of Riesentraube and Purple Calabash. Note to me: Grow more Copia next year.

Eggplant!

Plum Marmalade

Take two Pounds of Damsons, and one Pound of Pippins pared and cut in pieces, bake them in an Oven with a little Ginger, when they are tender, poure them into a Cullender, and let the syrup drop from them, then strain them, and take as much sugar as the Pulp doth weigh, boil it to a Candy height with a little water, then put in your pulp, and boil it till it will come from the bottom of the Skillet, and so put it up. Hannah Woolley 1670
A bumper crop of plums this year on the wild thorny tree by the garage, I've made a double dose of the above.


The Queen Mother Plum from Tradescant's orchard (Bibliodyssey)

Cabinet of Curious Tomatoes (con't)

Today's Pick

Tomato with piles.