I was away for a few days last weekend and got back late on Monday night, so was keen to get down the plot after work on Tuesday.
What would I find? A lot of weeds (I knew this already), really long grassy paths (I already knew this), lots of massive slugs (I knew this already too unfortunately) but also......
A lovely range of goodies! All the eating apples were ready, they came away from their branches with a little twist - I think the variety is Charles Ross - I have it written down somewhere. I have 4 apple trees, all dwarf ones that I've planted myself since taking the plot. Although the cooking apples / dual purpose varieties had some insect damage, these ones were perfect. We're still working our way through them, yummy
Now, although all my first few brassica sowings got eaten by beasties, I had left a couple of last year's plants in place on the plot, mainly just to see what would happen (and flowers for the bees etc). In the pic above you can see some Nero kale that's now producing some leaves, plus a cabbage that didn't really do anything last year, which in spring produced lots of flowers and extra side shoots, that have now got some decent leaves too. Luckily I'm not a very tidy allotmenter or else I'd have cleared these away in spring and missed out on extra bonus crops!
We've had a lot of rain the last couple of weeks, and the squash plants have really benefited - otherwise I think they're have had it by now. I'm also just getting the first few dwarf beans (a late crop this year due to beastie damage on earlier sowings). I keep my onions in the shed at the allotment and bring some home every now and then.
The runner beans in the back garden had produced a steady crop every few days but it it's now getting quite cool during the day and at night, so they've slowed a bit. But the tomatoes in my lean-to have been coming along nicely....
Early in the week
Saturday - it's important to keep picking the toms as they can start to split with over-watering, as you can see below. I use these up straight away as otherwise they get mould in the split.
I did some more roasted toms, with one of my own green peppers, red onion and Rosemary. I keep forgetting about the peppers as they're up on a shelf but there's some nice looking ones which're actually turning a bit red
Yummy
I also made some mixed pesto with walnut, basil and rocket. The rain has really given the rocket in the back garden a boost too so I should make some more. The mint in the front yard has gone crazy but that's another thing I keep forgetting about. I'm not really sure what I should make with it either.
Pesto - topped with olive oil to create a seal to preserve it
I've use up most of the pesto now though anyway.....On toast
With a side dish of toms and summer squash
More toast
Sandwiches for lunch today, very tasty. I was going to do a sort of open sandwich but changed my mind, so we ended up with double pesto!
Tonight we had a mixed veg curry with quinoa (No pesto this time), with everything veggie from the plot or back garden, yummy. Just when we were dishing up I thought we should've made a yogurt and mint side dish but it was too late by then, doh!
It's not all been about veg - I've picked a few small batches of blackberries, added to them some from the freezer plus some of my cooking apples and a huge chunk of frozen raspberries peaking out. There's frozen gooseberries in the bottom of the pan too.
I've frozen it all back again in portions in tubs - it's much better in terms of maximising freezer space than in the bags the rest of the fruit's in. I didn't freeze them very well and they're mainly in solid weird shapes!
I should really make a tomato sauce or something tonight to freeze the rest of the harvest but time is getting on, so that'll wait til tomorrow. There's more toms ready to pick since Saturday too, phew.
Yesterday, after a lovely day out at the Maritime Festival over in Great Yarmouth (where we went on the world's tallest Tall Ship - the amazing timber Gotheborg from Sweden), I headed to the plot for an hour to start shearing the long grassy paths. All was going well until the gnats started coming out, so I'm sitting here trying not to scratch a big itchy bite on my neck, argh.
Anyway, That's it for now...linking in with Harvest Monday on Daphne's Dandelions
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