The Sweetest Things

My my my. I've never tasted carrots so sweet, so delicately flavoured, so perfumed, so peppery. Every little crunch an explosion of orangeness.

I can guarantee that I will definitely, absolutely, most wonderfully be growing carrots every year.

The Hungry Caterpillar

Well, would you look at this cheeky chappy. Low and behold our Basil has been munched again! All of our Basil is indoors to try and stop it continually being bombarded by our little crawly friends and somehow this little fella has stowed away on the tray and has been happily munching away night after night.

I first noticed that a couple of the leaves had been eaten and thought maybe it was a couple of ants, as at first there wasn't too much damage. Then Saturday morning I came downstairs and he'd literally taken the tops of about 12 plants!
Look at the poor things! So I had a little scout around and the hungry caterpillar was hiding right at the back (well technically he was anything but hungry after a night of feasting on our Basil!). He was duly popped out into the front garden where he can much what he likes, plenty of weeds and ivy out there. Although I doubt they taste as good as young fresh basil! Well I hope he enjoyed it while it lasted.

The Basil seem to be recovering and I can see a few little green shoots this morning so hopefully they'll be fine. If anyone is Basil muching round here it's going to be us!

The Potato Saga Continues....

We harvested most of our potatoes this weekend just passed. Not because we wanted to, ideally we would've left them until August time but out of our 12 or so plants not one of them looked even remotely healthy. Originally we were just going to dig up the one plant we had in a container to see what was going on...
This is what the foilage looked like. On first glance it just looks like he's been munched a little (well a lot really...) but all of our plants were displaying similar traits and seeing as this plant was nowhere near the main patch we were a little worried that maybe our seed potatoes had been harbouring some sort of disease so we investigated by pulling this fella and this is what we found.
Euw. What's that? Well we had a look in a few books and we think it's Potato Scab. We're not sure which type though, there's the Common Scab or the Powdery Scab. We think it might be Powdery Scab. Here's a more detailed shot.
Still edible though which is good as it just affect the skins, just need an extra bit of peeling. Bit of a shame as I was looking forward to making some potato wedges but nevermind. Anyway, on pulling this lot we were now thinking that maybe our whole patch was suffering from scab so we decided to pull some plants from the main patch. Now this patch had been decimated, I mean truly decimated, we thought maybe by snails but honestly I can't see how a few snails could possibly cause this much devistation... but maybe they can?
As this was our first year of growing we didn't really plant the potatoes in a way that made them very accessible (lesson learnt for next year). Ideally we wanted to pull the plants at the back but we couldn't get to them! So we had to go for a couple at the front first.

We didn't really hold out much hope as a lot of the stems had actually withered away. But the first couple of plants had a few potatoes, some of a fairly good size. Not quite bakers but a good roasty. And surprisngly no scab, which was good. But the problem we did have that as huge as these plants once were, at their peak nearly 5ft tall they only had maybe four or five potatoes each. Very odd. So we thought that seeing as most of these plants were not going to survive much longer then what the heck, let's pull the majority of them and leave the healthiest ones to hopefully crawl along to August when we can hopefully get some bakers off them.

So there you go. Our first year of potatoes. Not terribly successful. But then again, not a complete disaster.

This time next year.... watch this space.

Carlsberg don't make deformed radishes. But if they did...

Possibly the ugliest radish ever? Maybe? I would say definitely. I know as organic gardeners you'll get a few mis-shapen veges and there's n0thing wrong with them but I dunno.... this just seemed a little wierd to me, it had roots starting to grow out of the fruit body.

Sorry. We couldn't bring ourslelves to eat it.

If anyone else has some deformed vege pictures, send them over, would love to see them! There's gotta be some funny carrots out there somewhere...

Bumper Harvest!

Check this out. We had a huge harvest yesterday! What a great looking bunch. In no particular order we had: lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, french beans, spring onions, parsley, chives, shallots and potatoes. A small selection can be seen above. Those carrots, they may look small (give em a chance! they are the baby variety) but my word they pack some flavour, they were divine, some were flowery, almost perfumed, some had a hint of pepper not unlike a radish but I can safely say all formed some of the best carrots I've ever tasted and we've got a load more outside!

Yesterday was probably the biggest harvest so far and we were both really chuffed with everything we'd picked. This is the best bit of the year, when all your hard work starts to pay off.

Long may it continue!

Red Red Red!

Horrah! Look at these beauties! Remember we were having trouble remembering which colour tomatoes we'd planted in the hanging baskets, well I would say this is pretty much conclusive evidence! I think a salad is on the menu for lunch today!

Corainder Seeds

If you've been reading our blog you're realise we've had abit of a non-Coriander year this year. When I say non-Corainder, that's abit of a fib, not completely, I mean we do have some Coriander, just not really edible Corainder. Our plant was looking wonderfully healthy but still a little on the small side so we decided to leave it a couple of weeks so it could flesh out a little and wouldn't mind being munched by us so much and in that time it decided it would run to seed. Ho hum... well not as bad as it sounds becuase Coriander seeds can still be used in cooking, particularly in middle-eastern receipes, curries and the like. Super.

It seems we harvest the seeds when they're just starting to turn to brown, cut the stem at the base of the plant and hang upside down in a brown paper bag until the seeds have dried then you can just shake them off the plant.

So all is not lost.

To Eat or Not to Eat

This is Borage, looks wonderful doesn't it. We planted these from seed, originally for the bees as we'd read in a few places that they're rather fond of these lovely purple flowers. It also happens to be an edible flower, you'll find the seeds in the herb section at the shops.

We thought they'd be dainty little plants but my goodness, they're rather thick and ungainly and I'll be honest, not that pretty as a plant. The flowers look lovely but they're tiny in comparison to the rest of the big huge thick stalked body!

So the question, to eat or not to eat! And when do you eat them? After they've been pollinated? It would seem silly for us to take all the time and effort to grow these for the bees and then gobble them all up before the bees get a look-in!

A google or two later...

• obviously, never use pesticides or any other chemicals on flowers you intend to eat.
• pick them just after they've opened and early morning is best when their water content is at it's highest.
• remove the stamen and pistal if any (the long wavy bits in the middle with pollen on the end) it's mostly the petals that are the edible part.
  
• wash carefully in cold water, adding a small amount of salt will help get rid of any insects who've made a home there.
• place them on some kitchen paper and allow to dry naturally. once dry they'll last up to 3 days if stored in the fridge.

Borage apparently has a cool cucmber taste and is great for punches, lemonades, G&T's, sorbets, chilled soups and dips.

Not that I ever need an excuse for a G&T...

The Prince's Rainforest Project

OK OK, so not technically a post related to our garden but it is a garden of sorts and an important one at that.

We watched Charlie delivering a great speech for the Dimbleby Lecture series on BBC last week. It was well scripted, expertely delivered and passiontely believed in. I think Charlie has sometimes been seen as a bit antiquated, he regularly speaks out against modern architecture and agricultural practices but he actually makes alot of sense, I think he's sometime seen out of context. He has some brilliant ideas that marry old and new.

Here is one of his current projects, please sign up.

Thanks

A Golden Touch

Some small compensation in light of yesterdays news about the potatoes is that the tomatoes have started to ripen off! I was getting a little worried as these fellas here have been growing for about eight weeks now. We still can't remember whether the ones in the hanging basket are the yellow or red variety but I would say from this picture maybe the yellows? We had trouble last year with the tomatoes not ripening but it seems that all is good this year.

If you do have trouble with your tomatoes not ripening there are a few tricks you can try;

• Put them into a paper bag with a ripe banana. The ethylene from the ripe banana will start them off.
  
• Store them in a cardboard box, in a cool moderately humid room. Cover them with newspaper and they should start to ripen off. Try not to overcrowd them as this might cause bruising and they'll start to rot.
• You could always make green tomato chutney, never tried it but is meant to be delicious!

So, hopefully the news this week will continue to be good, we'll have some lovely juicy tomatoes to eat with the lettuce that looks due to harvest this week and the potatoes will make a miraculous recovery? We shall see, watch this space.

Utter Devastation

My goodness. Our poor potatoes. Only last week I was telling everyone how healthy and green they were and look at them today, what a sorry state they're in.

Oh, and who per chance do you think the culprits are?! Our ever friendly garden snails who for some reason, seem to have it in for us.

I'm pretty gutted actually, I mean some of the plants are just decimated. And this has happened in the space of about a week. They've been munching at the leaves below everything so we hadn't really noticed what was going on and then all of a sudden there's a big gaping hole where literally the plants at the back have collapsed. I think we'll loose some, two plants if we're lucky but maybe more. Not sure what to do with them because if they've got potatoes under the ground they'll just rot. So I guess we'll have to dig them up, not going to be easy though because they're right at the back.

I've just picked out about 25 snails and was going to put down some organic pellets but I think I'll wait until the thunderstorms finish.

I hate these things more than ever now. I thought I'd got them under some sort of control but it seems they've just moved to a different part of the garden.

Yeah. So pretty gutted right now. And I'd really really like it to stop raining please, the snails don't need anything else to tempt them out of the dark danky holes they live in. If you could sort that for me that would be great. Thanks.

Flowering Coriander

Oh dear... this isn't what Coriander is meant to look like, is it?! Well I've just being doing a little research into it and this is what I found out.

• It's actually an annual plant so will usually germinate, flower, and die in one year
• It has a tendency to run to seed if stressed; this is where it flowers prematurely and develops seeds instead of growing lush foliage.
• It also doesn't like full sun as the heat triggers it to seed, I guess the incredibly hot past two weeks haven't helped then....

Oh what a shame, we were waiting for the plant to get abit more foilage before we started to pick at it but instead we've just waited too long and it's seeding. I've read in a couple of places that you can cut it right back which may help or alternatively we could collect the seeds as they can be used in cooking too.

We've got another 4/5 plants growing that are only small at the moment so maybe we'll use this one for seeds.

The leeks get a makeover

Believe it or not there is a row of leeks in this picture, you'd never guess! They've been overrun of late with nyjer seed from the bird feeder. I'm afraid Gary the Goldfinch is a little messy and the seeds get everywhere, give them a few days, some nice bright sunshine like this week and they thrive. This was our nyjer jungle just an hour ago, after about three weeks without a weed. So on come the gloves and hey presto, look at the leeks now, pristine!

Amazing what an hour can do. Give it three weeks and it'll be back to the first picture again. I've always had this issue with bird seed but never found a way to get round it. Our feeders are on a pole and we thought maybe putting a conical contraption at the bottom of it to catch the seed could maybe help but then the wind just blows it all around the garden. I guess it's just one of those things you have to put up with if you want to feed the birds. I'm not complaining, I love watching the birdies from my window, an hours weeding seems a small price to pay.

Oh and in the picture as well you can see lots of garden canes which we've dotted around the leeks to stop the local cats from digging them up. Works really well.

Busy Bees (and Wasps)

We only moved into our house in September of last year so the current plants in the garden were abit of a surprise, none more so than the wonderful rose we have growing along the whole length of the garden fence. It's just beautiful, I thought for the past 2 weeks that it's actually our neighbours! But no, it's ours and lovely it is too.

It's absolutely bursting with flowers and the bees and wasps are having a brilliant time collecting little bundles of pollen.


You can see the little balls of pollen on his legs. I'd never seen this until a few weeks ago, they actually carry it around on their legs! Brilliant. So I was standing outside this morning watching them all go about their business and wondering whether you could see when a flower has been pollinated. On a closer inspection you can, it's pretty obvious, well I think anyway.

Here's a shot of flower that's had it's pollen collected.

And here's one yet to be harvested.

Well that's what I think anyway? I would say this is a pretty good assumption? Either way, our little buzzing friends are being kept busy and very happy they are too.