Monday 21 September 2015

Harvest Monday - colourful beans

A quick whizz through this week's harvests as I've been making my eldest nephew a birthday card this evening. He's going to be 21......21!! Unbelievable.
On the fruit front, there's actually been a few blackberries - a couple of tubs like this. They need picking quickly though because all the rain makes them go soft. I'll pick some more tomorrow I expect.
I've picked some elderberries from the tree in the back garden but have missed lots that the birdies have eaten. Also some of the nicest sets of berries were too high, even with a set of steps and a rake to hook them down. I'm going to pollard the tree this winter as it's gotten really big and shades the garden a lot (it's on the south side) , plus I read that they fruit on the current year's growth, so will make it easier to pick the flowers and berries. Also, Jan spotted a tree with good fruit overhanging the pavement from a school nearby so we picked some of them too, and I've spent a couple of evenings sorting through them.
I have to be careful not to ping berries off everywhere....they stain easily! Ive put them in the freezer for now - I'll either make a jelly or cordial with them later.
More toms coming along, a bit slower but steadily
Lots of green things
And some more (rocket from the back garden)
I made walnut pesto to freeze
More green things
And some more (chard and beans have done well this week)
 
A more colourful plate (Carrot and red cabbage from the market though). My 5 gherkin plants all got eaten when young so I've not made any sour pickles this year....but I still have one jar in the fridge which is amazingly still ok over a year later!
Yesterday's pickings....this week I spotted blight on my maincrop potatoes....they'd had brown blotches on, which could have just been natural dieback but then after a few days I spotted white bits on the back of the leaves which I think is an indication of blight. The plants had had a long growing season anyway, so I cut the tops down to help prevent the spread of the blight spores. I decided to lift the first potato plant....there were some big uns!
Lovely roast
And the colourful beans for tonight's tea....my cheating meal of a tin of baked beans, but with veggies cooked first before adding the beans. The red colour is the stem from some beautiful chard plants.
I went to the Norwich Vegetarian and Vegan food fayre this weekend...lots of lovely things to buy and a tombola where I won some Booja Booja ginger truffles....Mmm....and already eaten, finished off tonight. It's actually a local business so is nice to see they've done so well. I remember first trying them years ago....my tastebuds were more suited to sweet things and I didn't like them that much but now I'm much more sophisticated, (haha)!

I had two slightly unusual naturey encounters this week....on my way in to work one day, I was walking along a quiet leafy lane off a main road that leads to the 'campus' when the all little birds in the trees started to be very noisy all of a sudden....then a sparrow hawk whizzed past, closely followed by two magpies chasing it. Cool!

On Saturday afternoon I was at home and some activity in the back garden caught my eye....little birds flitting around. Then suddenly a blue tit was in the lean to just in front of me (with a window in between us). It happily hopped around on the tomato plants and on the shelves before flying out the door...I knew if I tried to grab my camera it would've gone so decided to just enjoy watching it instead...ah what a cute little bird.

Whoops, I just remembered I left two dishes of oven roasted Sage and tomatoes in the oven from yesterday...I'd better put them in the freezer, oops!

Linking in with Harvest Monday on Daphne's Dandelions

 

 

7 comments:

  1. We often get blue tits perched on the window packing for little spiders etc they never stay long enough for us to grab a camera.

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    1. Aw, that's cute sue. They sure do move fast when they want to....and when you see their little heads looking around all over the place, heehee.

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  2. That sounds like my goldfinches. They don't stick around long enough for me to grab my camera. They sure are fun to watch though.

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    1. I looked up American goldfinches, they're very smart looking, beautiful! A bit like a posh version of our green finches, whereas our goldfinches have a more delicate beak. All nice little birds to hear and watch :)

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  3. The berries look wonderful. You've still got a good variety of vegetables coming from the garden, lovely.

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    1. Thanks Michelle, I need to use up the elderberries soon as the freezer is full already...hopefully I can find someone with some spare apples to go with them :)

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  4. Beautiful harvests! You've reminded me about pesto - I have to get harvesting a wack of basil and get some pesto in the freezer before we get our first frost, which likely won't be too much longer.

    Those blackberries look wonderful. I wasn't sure whether or not I would get any from the canes I planted this spring, but it looks like I won't, so I'll have to wait until next year for my first taste.

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