Take plums, not too ripe:

A big bendy squash (this one’s a Tromba di Albenga):

Small onions, stunted by the shade of a cherry tree:

A selection of spices (looking disproportionately large) and some muslin or cheesecloth:

Now, chop up the fruit and vegetables, put all the ingredients into a pan and — chutney!

This excursion into the world of chutney-making was long overdue. There’s a jar of plum jam from 2007 in the cupboard. As a first-timer I let Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s ‘Glutney’ recipe be my guide, in spirit and in proportion of fruit and veg to vinegar and sugar. I would have used more onions if mine were bigger and the task of peeling minuscule bulbs barely larger than the onion sets I planted was less tedious.

I can’t vouch for the chutney’s flavour until it’s had a few weeks to mellow. But it looks like chutney and certainly smelt like it during the cooking process.

Plum and Summer Squash Chutney

(these quantities made three and a half jars)

800g plums, stoned weight, diced

450g squash, diced

150g onions, diced

175g light brown soft sugar

350ml white wine vinegar

½ teaspoon chilli flakes

1 teaspoon salt

Spice bag:

small piece of fresh ginger, bruised

6 black peppercorns

1 blade mace

½ teaspoon coriander seed

½ star anise

½ teaspoon yellow mustard seed

Method:

1. Chop the fruit and veg into small dice.

2. Put all the ingredients into a large pan, tie up the spices in a square of muslin and put the spice bag into the mixture.

3. Bring to the boil slowly, stirring from time to time.

4. Simmer, stirring often.

5. When the mixture is thick and reduced, it’s ready (this took 2½ hours).

6. Pour into warm sterilised jars.

7. Seal and photograph.

An August Bank Holiday weekend harvest: Cherokee Trail of Tears climbing French beans, and patty pan squash.

This picture doesn’t give any idea of how dense they are and the nets make it difficult to get a good overall view:

But overrun we are. These are the tiniest amount of them:

Recipes to follow.

A pound of gooseberries, picked yesterday. I was determined to beat the pigeons to them this year.

Busy times. Suddenly there’s a month of work and photos to show, with ample proof of the arrival of spring.

The last post ended with Jerusalem artichokes going into the ground. One has made its first appearance out of it, photo taken on 18 April:

The rhubarb on 29 March, in a bed infested with couch grass:

…and a fortnight later, on 13 April, with not so much couch grass:

Preparing the ground for Arran Pilot first early potatoes on 5 April:

Planting them the same day:

And the first potato sprouts, taken on 26 April:

Cherry blossom on Easter Monday, 13 April:

Thirteen days later:

Redcurrants already (not yet red), on 18 April:

Close up:

Plum blossom and the beginnings of leaves in the woods on 5 April:

Friends helping out – definitely a change to be welcomed – on Easter Monday, digging, tidying the borders of the beds and planting onion sets (Jet Set and Red Baron), in front of slightly leafier woods:

The onions sprouting on 26 April:

Perpetual spinach, overwintered onions, globe artichoke and garlic in the foreground on 26 April. The trees of the wood are now thickly leaved and casting shade, and the grass growing like mad:

After several hours of effort:

It won’t stay like that, but a compliment was forthcoming from the allotment society secretary, no less.

Shame about the woodworm destroying the shed:

Shame too that I have no seeds on the go yet, unbelievably.

About a dozen hours over March weekends have gone into weeding and clearing areas in and around the plot. A particular target was this seemingly permanent infestation of brambles and nettles in the back corner, intended as the home of the Jerusalem artichokes:

Now it looks like this (and I’ve developed muscles like Popeye’s while wrestling enormous clumps of nettle root from the ground):

Here are the artichokes, prior to planting in the middle of the month:

On Sunday 1 February, hours before a huge snowstorm brought southern England to a standstill, I took a train from London to Brighton for the annual seed exchange in Hove. Seedy Sunday aims to promote biodiversity in kitchen gardens by encouraging veg growers to save the seed of unlisted heritage varieties and bring seeds along to swap with fellow gardeners.

Officially the sale of these seeds is illegal, as a TV reporter squeezed next to me at the long trestle tables, continually fluffing his lines (it was Sunday morning), was trying to explain to a cameraman being elbowed aside by crowds surging towards the best swaps before they were all swapped away.

Seedy Sunday gets around this by having people exchange rather than buy seeds. For those (like me) with no seeds to swap, a donation of 50p a packet is suggested. Despite the weather, the event was popular:

In addition to seed swapping, several seed companies had stalls selling reasonably-priced packets of heritage or other interesting seeds. Inevitably, I went in search of courgette seeds. This one is Goldena, a yellow courgette from the Czech Republic:

Onion sets were on sale (I bought Jet Set yellow onions) and seed potatoes (Skerry Blue, a maincrop, for me). I picked up Jerusalem artichokes from the main seed swap table – at 50p a bag – duly warned that not only do you have them for ever because the knobbly roots are hard to find at harvest time, but that they are better-known as ‘fartichokes’.

My mixture of purchases and ’swaps’:

A seed/onion/potato/plant stall:

There were various workshops on offer and a long line of people waiting for wholesome organic hot food, both of which I eschewed for fish and chips, real ale, and the train back to the capital before we all got snowed in.

I’m almost ashamed to post this picture. The grass should have been cut before winter set in. (I’ve since removed the nets from the fruit trees, and cleared and covered some of the beds.) New job responsibilities have absorbed my allotment time. Even fortnightly visits have been rare since September.

But I’m not beaten yet. I have Iberian Wight garlic from The Garlic Farm and Seedy Sunday approaches!

I notice that C&F is now available in Romanian thanks to Google:

I was struggling enough with Italian, wondering whether to call the Tromba di Albengas ‘Trombi di Albenga’.

Here they are before harvesting – I think the lighter-coloured spots are frost damage:

A further question is what to do with them next, since they look like a cross between a courgette and a squash. I left two smaller ones on the vine. Any suggestions welcome.

There were even a few baby courgettes growing. The leaves look dry and I admit (to my shame) that yesterday’s bizarre mid-October summer afternoon was my first visit to the plot in several weeks of mad work rush. There were still things to eat, like this perpetual spinach:

The nasturtiums are thriving and attractively without blackfly at this time of year: