Paranoid

I’ve just enjoyed a lunch of celeriac soup. Very tasty with rose harissa and tarragon for additional flavour. 

I used my new hand blender and wish I’d grown the ingredients, but only the garlic was home-grown. We’ve grown celeriac before but never a giant like this! It’s a bit tricky to grow and to be honest I think I’ll stick to buying the occasional one rather than trying again. This giant has made 4 days lunch and a quarter was also included in a root vegetable stew which covered two days meals. I think I’ve had enough celeriac for a while!

I did have some tarragon growing on the plot, but am not sure if it’s still there. It has a slightly aniseed flavour which I love, so I’m seeing if I can root some of the fresh stuff I bought - I only thought to do this after it had been in the fridge for a few days … so it may not work…

You can see the grey sky in that photo - it’s been dull, cold and grey like that for a few days now so we’ve stayed inside. I’ve been working on the planting plan - it’s bound to change and needs a bit more work.

The climbing beans are going to grow up wigwams this year and I’m going to very carefully label them after last year’s mix-up between climbers and dwarf plants 🙄

The squashes are going to provide a squash tunnel again. I’ve bought some Sharks Fin Melon Fig-Leaved Gourd seeds. They sound interesting don’t they, they’re a courgette rather than Winter squash. We’ll probably grow two kinds of climbing Winter squash and two other types of bush courgette.

I wonder if the weather will be more conducive to growth this year….time will tell…

Talking of weather, we had a bit more snow a week ago.

We visited the plot the next day, to drop off some compost and see how things are faring. The garlic and leeks are looking rather sad, but hopefully they’ll recover. And we were sorry to see some of the broad beans have been frosted - should have fleeced them - but they are pretty resilient (usually).

The ground was solid and the snow was covering the hills. We didn’t hang around!

We didn’t visit site for 10 days. Work has started the year busier than 2024 ended so I’m back staring at my screen for 8hours most days. I don’t mind as long as I have my hot water bottle, blanket and the curtains pulled 🤭 And I have my celestial mug (thanks George) and space-themed desk cover to keep my mind on why I’m creating spreadsheets!

We popped to the allotment on Friday and were shocked to see what appeared to be Round-Up (weed killer) footprints leading from the top of site directly to our plot. We don’t think we have any enemies, but the footprints literally tracked around plot 7, onto plot 8 and down to plot 3 stopping at our compost bin!

The worst thoughts enter your head when you think you’ve been sabotaged so I emailed Nia, our chair. She pointed out that it could be frost damage if someone had walked that way when there was frost/snow on the ground. Ah… that would be us then! 🤪 No wonder the route was so targeted!! A perfect opportunity for Black Sabbath to provide the title song. Look at Ozzy Osbourne!