Showing posts with label mangetout. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mangetout. Show all posts

Friday 4 August 2023

Talking in Tones

On 1st August, between rainy days, we planted 60 leeks. I think that’s the most we’ve ever planted but they’re such a handy Winter vegetable.

We planted them in the usual way; topping and tailing and dropping them in a deep hole so they hopefully grow with a substantial white bit, then fill the hole with water. They’re spaced so that a hoe can get between them.

Apart from dealing with the leeks, we’ve mostly been sitting and watching. 
The weather is dealing with most of the watering, we just do a bit for the weekly feeding and the items in the polytunnel.
Talking of the polytunnel.. it’s been a welcome shelter a few times this holiday! There are lots of peppers, tomatoes and aubergines forming but the plants aren’t as wild as they usually grow.
The sweetcorn has developed its male flowers, rather pretty pinky ones ones on these Incredible plants, though the cobs are expected to be standard yellow.
Talking of yellow, look at the lovely rudbeckia - we have several of these, all offspring from one plant my niece gave me probably 10 years ago. Beautiful.
And, talking of beautiful, here’s the female bullfinch. We hear their hooting call before we see them. Both parents are with their young at the moment. So lovely to see.
Talking of lovely… I did the Big Butterfly Count by the HAHA Wildlife plot yesterday. The numbers were rather low, less than we’re seeing on our buddleja at home:

















I was pleased to see that someone else had reported a count from the site on 23rd July - interesting to see the different species.

















Talking of interesting … yesterday was our Flying Ant Day. When the ants fly off to start new nests - see this link for more info. We have so many ants nests in the grass paths on site, I think they’ll have a long flight to find a new nesting site!
And, when did black ants start biting? I’m sure it used to only be the red ones.
Talking of biting … <ahem> here’s a couple of recent tasty meals.
Baked halloumi, courgette, tomato bake with potatoes and asparagus pea
Stuffed courgette with cheese, nuts and carrot with mangetout
And talking of mangetout… I pulled the remaining plants but have left the frame so the Cornell’s Delicata squash can grow up it. It’s gone a bit crazy, but that’s good as it’s the only Winter squash we’re growing.
And finally, talking of frames. We’ve picked our first French beans today which we’re growing up the old polytunnel frame. The Borlotti beans on the other side are winning at the moment.
The Charlatans provide the song title which is why I’ve been ‘talking’ a lot in this post. Enjoy!

Monday 24 July 2023

Blowin in the Wind

This beauty was on our butterfly bush at home along with two others, a white and a couple of peacocks! I’ll be lucky to see that many when I do my Big Butterfly Count on the allotment later this week.

It’s late July but the weather really isn’t playing fair! It’s been extremely windy and wet, so it’s not great for gardening but it’s good growing weather. 

I’m pleased to report that the only victims of the wind were a nasturtium and part of a bean plant - amazed (and relieved) that our sunflowers were still standing. Luckily most of the Yin-Yang dwarf beans are protected and I’ve secured them with string now that the beans are developing.

The courgettes are coming thick and fast now. They’re featuring in most meals - mainly just sliced and fried in chilli oil. They’re delicious eaten hot or cold. I may get the spiraliser out for our gnocchi meal this evening.
We had left a couple to get a bit bigger (honestly, it was a plan!) for stuffed courgettes with grated carrot, nuts, garlic and mature cheddar cheese yesterday - so delicious. 
The chantenay carrots have grown well. The mangetout and asparagus peas accompany nearly every meal even sandwiches for most of this month! They’ve been prolific this year. The asparagus pea are a pretty plant. The Cornell’s squash (I thought it was a bush variety) is going to swamp them soon though.
Winged peas
I’ve started harvesting the Florence fennel. I’ve kept it under netting in an attempt to stop it going to seed but some of the bulbs are beginning to elongate rather than bulb more.
They’re so tasty and the smell -mmm, delicious! I made this meal from a trugful of goodies the other night.
Frying the courgette chopped tiny like that was a nice addition and the courgette was almost hidden in the passata sauce 🤭
Not satisfied with just our own veg, we’ve also enjoyed some of plot neighbour, Neal’s. The turnips are a lovely peppery addition fried, roasted or raw. I may sow a row myself.
And Ivan’s fruit bushes have given me a little job to do this morning, until the rain stops.
The song title is brought to us by Peter, Paul and Mary - a blast from the past.

Saturday 8 July 2023

What’s Going On?

I’m a bit out of date, I haven’t posted in nearly 3 weeks. Well, it’s been a busy time and I have a rotten cough/throat infection which is hanging round too long. But, apart from that whinge, it’s a great time of year - look, fresh veg for lunches and dinners!
We enjoyed quite a few strawberries, but not as many as we'd hoped. One of the peat-free compost bags was clearly a bit dodgy as the plants were not at all happy.
We’ve been living on broad beans for a while now, so many different ways to enjoy them but they’re just about finished as we’ll be moving on to courgettes. The leeks will go in the ground once the broad bean stalks go to the compost bin.

We had our Open Day on one of the hottest days of the year, it was a great success with plenty of visitors and lots of chit-chat. So exhausting organising and setting up on a sweltering day but there were plenty of volunteers and it’s always fun running the tombola.

Photo courtesy of Forbes

And the after-party was good fun too, with Ivan’s wine followed by a game of horseshoes - definitely need more practice!

The Open Day was the day after the Hungerford in Bloom allotment judging, so the plots were looking their best. Plot7 was included so we had a LOT of weeding to do beforehand. It did look tidier than ever and I even cleared and weeded behind the polytunnel. 

We got 3rd place in our class 😊 mostly I think because there are quite a variety of different items growing on that plot. The plot looks better now after a couple more weeks with some heavy showers between sunshine but still much more growing to do to cover all that bare earth - otherwise a weed will find it! I’ve been filling gaps with lettuce seedlings.

The Incredible sweetcorn that Nia gave us is growing at a pace. I had to stomp the earth around them as they’ve had some really strong winds to contend with. The four tiny plants are the Lark variety that we managed to germinate - they shouldn’t be affected by cross-pollination apparently.

A few more flowers are appearing but our plots are definitely looking mostly green at the moment. The larkspur and nasturtium are the brightest spots for the many hoverflies and bees that have arrived with the warmth. 
And I’m pleased to have noticed a lot of ladybirds over the last week. The HAHA Wildlife plot has plenty of colour for the butterflies that have turned up too.
So, as new veg is emerging, the earlier planted items are giving way. The radish are all eaten, but the radish rats tails provide a spicy addition to salads, along with the delicious peppery nasturtium, which caterpillars haven’t found yet. We ate the scapes from our garlic a couple of weeks ago. They were a very tasty mild-garlic addition to a halloumi meal.
And, I gave the garlic a couple more weeks in the ground but not long enough for the bulbs to properly form into cloves because the foliage was looking so dead and rust- covered. As a result we’ll have to eat it as ‘wet garlic’ and it won’t store for long which is a shame.

Oh, I finished my Best Foot Forward challenge for the National Kidney Federation - Thankyou if you sponsored me! I managed over 176,000 steps in June - a lot of watering was involved in those steps! So much watering!

Alfie very kindly gave us a Bokashi Composting kit. It literally ferments the green waste, rather than composting, and as it ferments we can use the ‘tea’ as a plant food. Seems interesting and all our broad bean waste has been going in there over the last few weeks - the Bokashi bran needs adding for the process to work.

Apart from the lovely plot visits I’ve been working (obviously) and prepping some documents for the BIG HAHA SUMMER SHOW. It’s our first year of running the show ourselves and it’s going to be in the Town Hall, so we really hope there’s a big turnout. I’m not involved in the organisation, but you know me, I do enjoy doing the posters, etc ☺️
Full schedule is available on the website if you’re local. 
So, that’s me caught up. We’re hoping for a thunderstorm this morning then we can go to the plot this afternoon. Song title and sadly relevant question,  provided by Marvin Gaye.


Monday 12 June 2023

Last Nite

Petrichor - that's the word of the day after we eventually had some rainfall last night. Aah, the smell of earth after rain - it really is a feel-good smell. And rain is so much better at watering than we are - having said that, the watering regime has certainly helped me keep my steps up this month so far!

This photo was taken at the HAHA Plant Swap & Picnic on Saturday. Not many people turned up as it was extremely hot and clashed with various other events in town. Having said that, those of us who stayed for the picnic were over the moon to be drinking Ivan's wine - there, on the table in the demijohn. Made from grapes from his Marsh Lane grapevine - it is delicious and rare to have a red grape wine made in England. It was a lot of fun but the walk home was quite a struggle!

The Plant Swap was more of a success, even if people didn't stay for the picnic. I couldn't resist taking a pink jasmine climber (probably Jasminum beesianum), which I've planted at the end of the polytunnel; a couple of Heavenly Blue morning glory, which I have seen on other plots before and it's so beautiful, some spinach and two aubergine plants. I spent Sunday planting out the flowers and also planting the Nicotiana and Verbena Bonariensis that I've grown from seed. Hoping the flower bed will burst into colour quite soon...at the moment it's still looking rather bare..Slightly concerned that the rain will have brought out the slugs and snails to polish off my seedlings.

The HAHA Wildlife plot is looking much more flowery with lots of these huge daisies, which bugs really like.
HAHA Wildlife Plot

I'm pleased that my mangetout have finally developed some flowers. We've all debated it and are convinced that the cold nights have been the cause of slow growth this year - but they're on their way now. And this week we're working out different ways to enjoy broad beans. I do have quite a few recipes that I know we've enjoyed before and I love them cold in salads.

I've transplanted some lettuces from their grow tray into the ground and we've started eating our radishes - I wanted them to get big enough to roast them, but I may need to wait for the Chinese Dragon radishes for that meal. You can see that the pollen beetles are making a mess of the leaves as usual.

On my final day of annual leave last week we had an engineer come to sort out the site's composting toilet - what a relief (hoho) that it wasn't as big a fault as we thought. Kate and I dug out and prepared a proper soakaway so that the blockage doesn't repeat itself. Jamie and I were wandering the site searching for suitable stones - that's a first :-)

On Saturday, thunder was rumbling around, the sky went quite dark but we only felt about 10 drops of rain but last night (Sunday) we got the rain although the thunder & lightning was mostly further north and east of Hungerford - more may be expected today.

So, back to work now, looking out at the sunshine and wishing I was on the plot - but we'll have a lunchtime visit today to see how much rain actually fell. Here are The Strokes not singing about last night's rain!