Courgette Recipes Galore

In preparation for what we hope will be a bumper courgette harvest, I bought this famous (or infamous) recipe book. The writer Elaine Borish uses the words courgette and zucchini interchangeably, which gives me the opportunity to drop the word ‘zucchini’ into a post and quote a couple of her more interesting suggestions. Some [...]

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Early Morning at the Plot

I don’t often get chance to visit the plot on work days. This morning we made an effort to do some watering before breakfast after the hot weather of the week. In the picture above are – respectively – two batches of Stuttgart Giant onions, some Sezanne radishes, turnips and a few beetroot shoots. J [...]

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Courgettes in the Bed

The courgettes were more than ready for planting, so we gingerly took them down to the allotment in their trays (not having a car, this was a precarious exercise) and spent the afternoon preparing the courgette bed. We grew tomatoes and runner beans in this bed last year, but it had become overrun with couch [...]

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First Radishes and Rhubarb

The rain finally stopped.
Our afternoon on the plot was hard work: the damp soil was easier to dig but tougher to hoe than usual. We were rewarded for our efforts with month-old radishes, three sticks of rhubarb – both the first of the spring – and good old spinach beet.
The cherries are ripening nicely.

The cherry [...]

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April Showers in May

Here’s something I don’t really need at the moment.

My visit yesterday confirmed that everything on the plot had survived the wind and rain of the week. Even those leggy broad beans were still attached to their supports, flower buds appearing despite the clusters of blackfly – and one or two ants and ladybirds seemed to [...]

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Fennel Forming

On Wednesday morning, three tiny loops of fennel were beginning to sprout from the seed tray. I took the above picture on Thursday, when more had appeared and the first lot were no longer loops but standing up straight.

And here they were this morning.

The tray of fennel on Thursday and today, left to right.

Not [...]

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Strimming, Sunflowers and a Six Quid Spade

Due to computer mishap I’ve been unable to record any of our weekend progress until today. The never-ending rounds of weeding and tidying up continued as J completed a tricky strimming operation around the little fruit trees at the top of the plot.

And a bigger, more straightforward one by the side.

Having given up on [...]

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Courgettes, Fennel and Squash (and Artichokes)

Earlier this week (Tuesday, I think) J planted fennel seeds – Wadenroman, yet another Italian bargain from Gubbio market last summer – in the seed tray at the front on the right. They’ve joined the courgettes, butternut squash and the few little artichokes that weren’t ready to go into the plot. We are complete novices [...]

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Ladybird on Currant Bush

I took this photo on Sunday – the ladybird seems to have more spots than usual. I haven’t been able to get to the plot since then, so J has been watering it and did a lot of strimming yesterday to complement my weekend weeding.

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