Harvest Monday - blimey big butternut

It's been so rainy here recently that trips to the plot have generally been short and infrequent. But I did decide to bring back my monster green butternut squash (ideally winter squashes are left a bit longer outside in the autumn sun to help them harden-up and store better over winter but the amount of autumn sun is virtually zilch at the moment, and I don't want them to rot with all the damp). So I took my trusty trolley (sadly on its last legs/wheels after more than 10 years...and I rescued it from a skip to begin with anyway, but I digress) and wheeled the squash home, with it poking out the top of the trolley. Here's the beast, over a stone in weight (14lbs 8oz) according to the bathroom scales. It took us a while to find somewhere in the house with a clear background so this is me standing on the bed...by this time the squash was getting rather heavy to keep holding, urgh.

And then yesterday I nipped down again after some rainy showers to bring back the second largest one...except I just took it upstairs to weigh and it's actually 16lb, so even bigger (it's shorter but one end is thicker). Here's minxie to give it some scale (some might say she was just pestering me for food but I like to think she was trying to help). The heavier one is the top one. The indentation around the right end is from when a tendril had wrapped around it when the fruit was small, aw. The pale bit on the left end is where it was sat on a bit of hard plastic to keep it off the ground. I'm really curious to cut into these squashes but think the flavour might develop more if I leave them a while longer. In the meantime they're completely in the way of course.

I harvested a few peppers from the lean-to at home this week. The nice ripe red 'lipstick' ones in the middle and some still-green 'quadrato' which started to show signs of damage (not sure from what though...slug?). Oh I've had another bowl of tomatoes too but didn't get a photo. I cleared a lot of the tomato plants yesterday to make room for planting out winter salad seedlings.

Also at home I picked the last of the courgettes (I've now pulled out the plant, which was in the way and the fruits were growing so slowly by now that slugs were damaging them before they got to a decent size). And I was surprised to find a couple of cucumbers hiding in the garden too, I thought the plants had finished. The left hand one is marketmore and the right hand one I forget the name of (burpless something).

In the lean-to I trimmed the top off the basils to promote some fresh growth. If I get round to it I'll make a little pesto with the trimmings. I also have some little basil seedlings that I should bring inside the house as the nights (and sometimes the days) are quite cold for them.

Back down on the plot I noticed a final sweetcorn that I'd missed before - it was on a plant that had blown over in the wind a while back, and was actually quite tasty. Next to it is my last (I think) blue kuri squash to bring home. I have three of these. There are still some other winter squashes to bring back (two more much smaller green butternuts and some gem types) but their stems aren't hard yet (an indication that they're not ripe).

And a real treat - some quinces from a garden I work in. They haven't got a quincy aroma yet, so will sit on the side for a while. I'm not sure if we should have left them on the tree longer but one had already fallen on the ground and rotted, so I picked most of them from the tree, and my friend and I shared them between us (it's her elderly mum's house - just turned 91!). Previously I've made quince cheese and quince jelly but this year I'd like to just use them in a crumble or something (maybe mixed with apple or pear) - anyone cooked with them before?

But that's 'nut' all the harvests this week (Ho Ho). Yes, I picked a few more hazels from the allotment.

They're looking really good so far. I've been through, selecting out the ones which seem to be empty (I.e. Nut is a bit small, doesn't come out of the husk easily, or is a pale colour), and cracked them open to make composting quicker. The rest are ripening in a shallow cardboard box lid, sitting on top of the two big butternut squashes in the kitchen. Yes, the kitchen is feeling rather cramped and messy, nevermind, just think of all the tasty food to come.

Talking of tasty food, yesterday we made a vegetable toad-in-the-hole. You make up the batter mix (in this instance the recipe includes mustard, which is the dark dots in the batter you can see) and partly cook your veggies of choice (everything here home grown except the carrot). Whilst that's happening, heat up the oil in a tray in the oven for ten minutes, then add the batter to the tray (careful of hot oil splashes), add the veggies to the middle of the pan and bake for about 35 mins.

Then...yum!

On a completely different subject, a while ago I mentioned that I'd germinated a couple of mango seeds (prise open the seed case with a blunt knife, pop the seeds in compost in a pot, moisten the compost and seal in a plastic bag or similar until you see growth). These two germinated in the lean-to greenhouse over the summer. Well they were looking really healthy but the bigger one started to get spots on it (possibly related to colder temperatures during the day and night?) so I've brought them inside. We'll have to see if I can keep them alive - anyone got any tips?

Thanks for reading this week. I really need to get to the plot and do some weeding if the rain holds off for a little while, it's looking a bit of a state. Anyway, tonight I'm linking in as usual with Harvest Monday kindly hosted by Dave at Our Happy Acres.

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