Monday 2 March 2015

Harvest Monday - bit of a fail? And a seed swap

Not much to report on the harvest front this week - I haven't been down the plot to pick anything as I had a busy weekend. So I thought I'd share this harvest fail instead!

Last year I grew gherkins for the first time and they were REALLY prolific. I wanted to try a couple of different ways of preserving them, and one was the natural fermentation method. You basically mix up a brine solution to a specified ratio (that I don't remember right now) and pour it over your gherkins/ chopped onions/ spices etc that you've packed into a jar. Then you cover the jars with a cloth or similar, so that the pressure doesn't build up, and let the natural bacteria on the veggies develop and ferment for a few days, skimming off any white froth from the surface. When it gets to your required sour flavour, you seal it and keep in a cool place (to stop the fermentation continuing).

I made loads of jars of these and they took up the whole bottom shelf in the fridge. Now, as far as I was aware I was making these all in the same way. But, left to their own devices in the fridge, some developed a really thick white gloopiness on top, and those batches are inedible.

Here's a good jar (left) and a bad one (right) - see the thick white gloop on top

I've had to compost several jars because of this. Anyone know what might have happened? Should I have just kept more of an eye on them in the fridge and started scooping off the scum as it grew?

Hmm, I dunno, but I'll try again this method again this year too.

On to more positive things, my tomatoes are continuing to germinate. They're getting a little bit leggy but when I come to pot them on, I'll plant them deep, so that the stem is covered (toms grow roots from the stem when it's been buried, so it's not a problem at the moment)

Another thing to watch out for when growing on a windowsill is that they lean to one side to reach towards the light. You can keep turning them round each day to even them up but they can get leggy this way too. For some reason this year I haven't had to so far. It might be because I've made them a bubble wrap wig wam that seems to diffuse the light more evenly. I'm just using a pencil to keep the bubble wrap off the seedlings, acting like a tent pole. Also I've put a white bag beside them to reflect the light more evenly too.you can use anything reflective like tin foil etc. or even a white piece of paper would do I guess.

 

The peppers haven't come up yet but they need more warmth than toms to germinate, so if they haven't come up soon I'll probably take them out into their own little protected area.

And on Sunday, Norwich had its first big seed swap event ever! (In one of our dozens of flint medieval churches that have been put over to community use. Honestly,you would not believe how many of these lovely churches we have in Norwich. This is one of four on one street!)

I went quite late in the day so it had quietened down a bit but I heard that it had been really successful, which is great. You could take along seeds to swap or just make a donation if you wanted seeds but didn't have any to swap. There were stalls there too, like a couple of the local allotment associations. I didn't actually swap any seeds or take any as I'm pretty full on the seed quota for this year but wanted to show some support for the event. (The day before I had also bought a magazine that had 11 free packs of seeds on it!!).

Linking in with Harvest Monday on Daphne's Dandelions.

10 comments:

  1. I have been hearing a lot about fermenting in the last year, but don't really know too much about it. I thought that you didn't need to refrigerate fermented veg. I would be interested to hear what others have to say about your "goop"!

    We have "Seedy Saturdays" all across Canada which are essentially seed swaps. I've never been to one although each year I tell myself I am going. This year for sure, though, as I actually have a good number of packets of seed to contribute (varieties that I no longer plan to grow & it would be such a waste to chuck them as most are only a year old). I doubt that I'll grab anything, however, as I do have so much seed already...unless something really catches my eye.

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    1. Thanks Margaret. I think you just need to keep them somewhere cool, not necessarilyin the fridge, but as I don't have a cold room or cellar I've had them in the fridge. If kept at normal room temp they will just carry on fermenting and go 'past it'. That's what Ive read anyway.

      The Seedy Saturdays sound good. Like you, I think if I'd spotted something really interesting I'd have had a had a go though. I've done a mini seed swap with friend and given her some packs I don't need.

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  2. I love the idea of fermenting, as I much prefer saltiness to vinegar. I've never tried it though, but I'll be interested to see what the answer is to your problem. The seed swap looks great, I wish there was one round here. CJ xx

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    1. I'd definitely recommend it CJ, the ones that have kept ok are really tasty if you like the sour kind of pickles. Also you don't have to buy lots of vinegar, you just need salt :)

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  3. Oh dear, no idea what went wrong.

    I actually used to hate it when seed catalogues gave away free seeds after we had already bought the ones we wanted to grow, It would have been different if they were new things that we hadn't thought of trying but usually it was standard stuff.

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    1. Thanks sue. Yep I spent some time looking at all the magazines with free seeds to choose the most useful one! I Might use some of them this year but they should be ok until next year anyway. Last year I got a good one with red pear toms and gherkins.

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  4. I'm going to try fermenting for the first time this year. I've been reading up. So what I'm saying isn't from any first hand knowledge. But the white stuff is mold. When it forms you are supposed to take it off like you did. But even in the fridge the molds can form, so you have to keep scooping. Make sure your cukes are totally submerged to keep the mold from growing on the cukes. If the mold gets too much of a foothold it can grow down into your cukes and then they have to be tossed. So like you, I'll be experimenting next year to see how it goes. Such things always sound so easy in book, but I know sometimes they don't happen like the books tell you.

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    1. Thanks Daphne, yeah I think I should've kept checking them in the fridge. There were so many that I got lazy and just left them. The ones that are ok are really tasty though, so I hope you have success this year.
      I'll try and grow less gherkins this time, there were just too many and that includes giving loads away!

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  5. I can't help with the fermented gherkins issue I'm afraid - they are one of my nightmare foods so I avoid them completely! As far as the seeds are concerned, I reckon that a lot more seeds are sold than are sowed. Lots of people buy many more packets than they can ever use, and they could easily be wasted, so the seed-swaps seem like a good idea.

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  6. Haha, yep I can see how the flavour isn't to everyone's liking Mark.
    It's true, there must be so much seed that goes to waste. Hopefully there'll be another seed swap next year, or even at the end of this year, so you can swap what you have left over and aren't going to use the following year.

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