Allotment harvest

I'm still gathering goodies from the allotment. Following a 2 hour digging and weeding session today I gathered a few bits including 5 leeks, a few pototoes I found whilst turning the potato patch, 1 celery plant, 3 parsnips (I know its too early to pull them up, I couldn't resist), some french beans and the remainder of the beetroot......totalling around a dozen plants the largest of which weighes nearly 500g (and they are nearly all that size).

I'm in the process of making a hearty filling winter soup with some of it and whilst looking for some beetroot recipes found these......

beetroot cake 1
beetroot cake 2

so I guess I'll be making beetroot cake tomorrow then :)

More apples

My good mate Kim (hi Kim) kindly let me raid her apple tree. She just lets them
fall and then throws them away :( So I came away yesterday with 5 carrier bags full and that was from the branches I could reach from standing.

I've sorted the apples into 'use now' and 'store for later' and put the 'store for later' ones in trays in the garage wrapped in sheets of newspaper.

Then I have set about starting to use the 'use now' ones. I've made iced apple souffle and apple snow, 3 apple cakes (now frozen) had pork chops with apple for dinner, along with boiled potatoes from the allotment. I peeled and chopped some using my new apple corer and slicer tool. Anybody with alot of apples to process needs one of these handy little gagets, they save hours of chopping. The apple slices are in the freezer waiting to be turned into apple pie on Sunday.

On the allotment front, I covered part of the plot with black platic today in preparation for winter. I put it over the green manure I had sown a few weeks ago. It was raining and I just did not have the time to dig it all in. I'll pull up the plastic in the spring and turn the soil when its all rotted down.

I also dug up the last of the potatoes, although I always manage to leave some which pop up as new plants the following year. Trouble if I can't bear to chop them down, so I end up with random poato plants in weird places.

I bought some manure a few days ago, so will cover the bases of the fruit trees with newspaper and cover that in manure sometime soon. I bought some garlic bulbs too and must remember to get them in the ground soon, rather than forget and plant them in spring, like I did this year, which resulted in a poor crop suitable only for making bug spray.

Tomato soup

2 1/2 lb of tomatoes later and Ive just sat and enjoyed my first bowl of home made cream of tomato soup. Mmmmmmmm

I also found another apple tree and spent the afternoon peeling apples to make apple cake, apple sauce with lumps in and just cut up the rest of the apples to make smooth apple sauce (cooked and put through a sieve). I peeled and cut up the rest of the pears but still need to process and bottle them and still have a crate of apples to wade my way through along with the rest of the carrots..............I guess I wont be going to bed any time soon.

Volunteering

Not very gardening like I know, but this afternoon I spent a couple of hours with Dave at the LILI head office, giving him and Taryn a bit of help with promoting some of the courses they list.
I quite fancy a go at basket making, cheese making, smallholding, keeping pigs, tree pruning and sheep keeping to name a few (actually I fancy having a go at just about all of it).

When I got home my lovely Mummy had brought a big box full of apples from her tree round and a smaller box of pears from my sisters tree (thanks guys). I made apple crumble and custard for pudding and peeled and cored a load of pears which are now sitting in an electric water bath in kilner jars.
On Thursday I'll process the remainder of the pears and all the apples. I have made apple jelly and apple butter, so what to make now.........?

Right now I need to scrub and blanch all the carrots I pulled up from the allotment and get them in the freezer.

On a side note
It Rained!!!:)))))
Which means my water butt is full. On the down side, the pressure isnt high enough for me to use a timer off it for the watering system, so I guess the water butt system will be manually operated and the mains supply one on the timer.

I have several sunflower heads, so if anybody wants some sunflower seeds, give me a shout and £1.00 P+P (UK only) and I'll post some out to you.

Bird Table

I've been wanting a bird table for a while now, so rather than pay someone or somewhere else to do the job for me, I thought I'd make one.
This is the result of an afternoons work in the garden before my night shift on Friday. I'm very pleased with myself although I cut the felt too small and have to recut a piece for the roof.
The weird thing sticking up is a sunflower head from the allotment. I'm hoping the birds will like the seeds.
Next bird project is a nesting box and I'm trying to work out how to put a web cam in it so I watch as the birdies hatch and grow.

Allotment goodies

I love pottering around on the allotment and bringing home little treats to proudly show off to my boys, so can you imaging my glee when I came home today after a trip out with a bag full of apples (not from the allotment, but free none the less), a bag of veggies (monster sized beetroot, potatoes, carrots, leeks, parsnip and sweetcorn) and a modified 6 pint milk carton fruit picker full of raspberries. Yes I was beaming from ear to ear :)

Now all I have to do is process it all for eating and storing

What am I going to do with these beetroots ?

Seeds!!!!

I took a trip to the garden centre this morning to buy a couple of £1 hozelock attachments for the water butt so I can attach the timer for the watering system (and yea :)))) it works), but I spent £26!! On what?? 1/2 price seeds for next year. I've done this before and knew they would have seeds this time of year, so I dont know why I suprised to get the bill at the checkout. However I am now the proud owner of a whole load of fruit, veg and flower seeds for next year and will add them to the stash I already have. Perhaps the most exciting (for me anyway) is the melon seeds. I am sooo looking forward to putting some strings up in the conservatory next year and growing melons along them :)

Water Butt and green tomato mincemeat

My lovely son played 'man' today and helped me install a water butt into the back garden, in the pouring rain. I'm hoping to connect my watering system upto it for next year. I figured there is no point this year as I am coming to the end of garden cropping time and can use the exiating system until winter when it needs to come out anyway. I have a timer on the watering system, but it connects to a tap with a screw thread and I want to connect it to the tap on the water butt, so I will have to see if I can find a connector (suggestions welcome).

I love mince pies at christmas so as I'm going to have a bumper tomato crop so thought Id make use of some of those green tomatoes early.

I spent a few hours making green tomato mock mincemeat with the green tomatoes in the garden.

I was pleasantly suprised with the results and now have 3 large jars of mincemeat for my christmas mince pies, yummy.

Grow bag holder

I've seen a couple of products on the internet that hold grow bags on thier sides and claim to provide more space for roots. The plastic version is availiable for £26.99 + P&P from http://www.kakoi.co.uk/ and the wooden version £24.99 from www.nucan.co.uk/grow.html.

I figure they look pretty cool and could increase the space in the garden I use to grow my tomatoes, or at least make it more portable. I have lots of scrap wood around (thanks neighbours) and will try to figure out a way of making something similar over the winter ready for next year.

I have a couple of plans on paper. The wooden version looks easiest and it's all slot together, so this is what I will be aiming for, with the possible addition of something on the ends to hold bamboo canes in place. This will allow me to cover the holder in plastic (instant mini green house) or netting, or construct a system of strings for the tomato plants to grow up. This years tomatoes have very sucessfully been grown up the tomato frame I built earlier in the year.

Allotment - this year and next years plans

I finally seem to have got on top of the allotment and all it's weeds, with the help of black plastic (not very eco friendly I know, but it worked a treat and will last for years).

I have divided the allotment into sections and have a crop rotation system in place. The raspberries have a permanent spot as do the strawberries. I have 4 vegetable plots, divided by grass paths and bordered by fruit trees that I'm trying to train to espaliers (I say' trying' because I've never done it before, so its all a bit hit and miss).

The plot has been easier to keep relatively weed free, but the produce is not as much as I'd hoped. Maybe it's because I'm growing in traditional rows????? So with the use of my plot planner on http://www.growveg.com/ I converted the plot into a square foot gardening style (even though I won't be growing in raised beds) and increased the potential plot productivity.

Here is next years plan, although it doesn't show the raspberry plot (incidently growveg.com allow you a free months trial, so it's well worth checking out)

Cuttings

The cuttings I took from my fuschias, rosemary, rose bush and next doors clematis all seem to have taken. I think this is mainly due to treating my cutting correctly after reading the http://www.hccollege.co.uk/ RHS level 2 sample chapter, which just happens to be about propagation. My plan now is to get as many free plants as possible for the garden and the allotment.