[My Potatoes]

Yesterday's dinner was dover sole served with courgette salad and lemonolatho dressing, and of course, potatoes.

The potatoes were red and white duke of yorks, from the garden.
The courgette salad consisted of courgettes, parsley and chives, all from the garden. The lemonolatho dressing was made with garlic, spring onions and mint, all from the garden. (Alas, the lemon and olive oil was from the grocers).
The dover sole was the least fresh item on the plate.
A perfect august dinner. No need for a trug, just in and out thru' the back door.

[tagwex]

Sounds scrumptious. Any leftovers? We had three nice juicy steaks cooked and left out on the table, went outside to pick the side shoots off the tomatoes and when we went back in there was only one left and that was on the floor. That b****** dog had a distended belly though - and a sore arse!

[sgmgarden]

Sounds lovely, wish I could have had a bit!

[Dirt Digger]

20th Aug-6th Sept.

We have returned from foreign climes, and have harvested a lot of produce that ripened in our absence:
4 lb Tomatoes
5 Cucumbers
6 Peppers
And finally Aubergines, 3 of the loveliest, shiniest, blackest Aubergines you’ve ever seen… OK, so guess whose never grown Aubergines before, and so another 1st chalked –up..
And 1 celeriac, all of the rest had bolted earlier in August, but 2 specimens seem to be holding their own, so we had to have one…

[Dirt Digger]

Sept-October 31st

about 7kg of parsnips
4 heads of Red Kale

Busy Busy Busy, and as such have not been keeping an accurate account the last few weeks, but we are now using the parsnips which are coming on song, and we are more than happy with the pickings so far: good sized, firm roots and most of them in good condition. Gladiators, again. The odd one or two bruised specimens, but full of flavour...we've also be using up the Red Kale and this also has gone down a treat: Mrs Digger came across a recipe for Red Kale, Chorizo and Garlic soup, and as we'd grown 2 of the 3 main ingredients we thought, why not? Talk about a winter warmer.
We also managed to get next year's garlic bedded; this year we've gone for a variety called Marco, so, as always, just as we empty out most of the beds for the winter we are also preparing for next summer's harvest, and on and on and on it goes...

[Good guy]

I was pulling up some parsley today and was about to dump it in the skip to go to the compost heap when I remembered that the Russians use the roots. Scraped clean and chopped or grated, they use them in soups. I've tried some, before, and they gave good flavour. So I've saved some bigger pieces and will freeze them.
All I have left available fresh from the garden are a few white turnips, some purple radishes, two kinds of chard, some lettuce and some spherical carrots. ( too lazy to get the seed packet and find their name!)
But ready for next year are leeks, onions and garlic. And I'm waiting in anticipation for my purple sprouting broccoli to start cropping.
And now it's time for bed!

[Dirt Digger]

November 12th

4 Bell Peppers

The last of this year's produce from the polytunnel; set about clearing up the pots of old compost and composting the dying and dead plants and unexpectedly managed to get 4 peppers from one of the Arianne pepper plants, and there's nothing like a little surprise.
Not much left on the plot now: although the Bright Lights chards looks a treat, and after this it's all down to the last of the parsnips which should certainly see it through till Christmas, and hopefully a few sprouts which didn't really do that well, but we're leaving the surviving few plants in the hope of being able to harvest a few of our own next month...

[Dirt Digger]

Sunday 1st December


4 kg = 6 of the finest parsnips
1 head of red Kale
Handful of Chard Leaves
and helpings of rosemary and thyme
[/b]

[Dirt Digger]

Saturday 12th January 2014

Well Saturday saw us harvest the last of the available produce from
plot 49; but what a haul of parsnips, 10kgs of fine good sized roots,
with very few discards and little or no bruising. but we picked a good day to empty out our beds, for as we were doing this the girls from the Irish Beekeepers
were down checking on the hives of sleeping ladies; and from some of their previously obtained honeycomb we were treated to a number of helping to bring home with us, and so we duly replied with some parsnips for the girls.
Huge big smiles al round...and that, as they say was that, all harvested.
And so, we've begun again.
And as we plan to grow our own onions from seed this year, we've made a start with Bedfordshire Champion and Ailsa Craig seeds...I know it's early, but if things don't work out there's still oodles of time

10 kg of parsnips = 17 parsnips

[Good guy]

Cleared the ground of the last of the bok choi, some very tasty purple radishes (good sliced in stir fry and raw) and some little spherical carrots. I'm feeling too lazy to get up and find out names of varieties! Still have spinach beet available for occasional picking and I'm eagerly awaiting the first purple flowering brocoli.

[Good guy]

Cleared the ground of the last of the bok choi, some very tasty purple radishes (good sliced in stir fry and raw) and some little spherical carrots. I'm feeling too lazy to get up and find out names of varieties! Still have spinach beet available for occasional picking and I'm eagerly awaiting the first purple flowering brocoli.

[Dirt Digger]

Saturday 24th January

Liar Liar, plot on fire...
Yes, on Saturday 12th January I posted that we had harvested the last of the produce from plot 49; but I was mistaken. We had forgotten about the forlorn and bedraggled looking plants we sowed last July, and which only come into their own in winter anyway...Witlof Chicory.
So we've dug up and potted some roots, and we covered completely to exclude light and brought them indoors. We'll leave well enough alone now for 4 weeks or so and hopefully we'll have some chicons to try...