Green thumbed folks, gardeners and grow your own

Enjoy!!! It’s immensely rewarding!!!

We have an allotment!

We came to the top of the list just as we were due our eldest so decided not to take it.  The allotments have now been moved to our estate (phased over the last couple of years) and we’ve been assigned one.  I pick up the keys later this week.  We are looking forward to checking it out this weekend and getting started.  We think the timing is great.  As the kids are 6 and 3 it can be a fun family thing!

Congratulations! 

We have an allotment!

We came to the top of the list just as we were due our eldest so decided not to take it.  The allotments have now been moved to our estate (phased over the last couple of years) and we’ve been assigned one.  I pick up the keys later this week.  We are looking forward to checking it out this weekend and getting started.  We think the timing is great.  As the kids are 6 and 3 it can be a fun family thing!

That's so exciting! Have fun planning it and planting all the things.

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Pepper harvest number 2! 5 types of peppers pickled, and it is quite spicy! Anaheim, poblano, mild banana, sweet pepper, and a few cherry bombs. Really enjoyed growing these.

Shopping online for chicken manure and thinking of you @phatbeetle !  . How are the girls?   

They're doing great, thanks! Still ,they're lazy freeloaders, currently not giving me any eggs.  Keep threatening to eat them, but that's not helping either 

They're doing great, thanks! Still ,they're lazy freeloaders, currently not giving me any eggs.  Keep threatening to eat them, but that's not helping either 

Haha!  Maybe now spring is in the air they'll start to pull their weight! Meanwhile, I'd start selling their poop.. that stuff is not cheap, considering where it came from! 

Zombie Thread!

So in case there's ever a need to know  - "Polish White" variety of garlic makes lovely mellow bulbs, that become buttery when baked in the oven. "Bogatyr" variety of garlic has an initial bite to it when eaten raw, but mellows when cooked and imparts a nice, steady "garlic" flavor without any bitterness or bite. Can recommend both strongly.

Haven't checked the other varieties we planted yet, but it's about harvesting time so I should be able to report on them soon.

So it's "County Fair" time in a few weeks.  I have not decided, but may enter some of the garlic. We definitely have some lovely garlic this year.

Definitely entering some preserves. I have some plum jelly I made late last year (it just squeaks in to the rules under the required date) that is really nice even after all this time. (I'd never had "Columbia County" plums before - a local variety - and they are lovely.)

Also have some preserved Rainier Cherries that I just put up yesterday. A local orchard has managed to grow them - they don't grow well in a lot of places, so we're lucky. They are a variety developed near Mt. Rainier (?) out in Washington State (supposedly) and that are naturally really sweet and full of vitamins. They don't get the really red color of other sweet cherries, so they look a little "blah" in the jar, but they are damned tasty. Was able to can them up in their own juice using a no-sugar pectin to thicken it up a bit. Can't really call it a jam, as they are in halves. Can't call it a jelly as it has to be clear to qualify. Can't call it just preserved cherries because the rules say preserved food should be in clear liquid - I used a cup of the cherries to pulverize and then strain through cheesecloth to get the juice to add back into the pot, so...?  I guess I'll try "preserved" category anyway - I'll open up a jar in a day or two to see how it came out and then decide. It might make it into the "spread" category, although those normally have to be really smooth. Or jam. (They have odd rules at this county fair!)

Also have some nice spiced peach (with ginger and cardamom) spread that the Daughter made, and maybe some strawberry jam to enter. Only costs a dollar an entry, so I won't go broke. The prizes are minimal, but it's fun to do and you get a ribbon if you win. On the Friday if you bake a loaf of bread and bring it to that contest you get into the fair for free, so.... Friday it is, when the fair opens. 

The Daughter is working on a really amazing color-work sweater to put into the "wool and wool products" category in the other barn. If she doesn't win something for it I'll be side-eying the judges. It's incredibly complex, and really, really pretty (so far - still has the sleeves to go).  The prize she won last year got her a skein of a really pretty, hand-dyed yarn.

County Fair is fun Nan!!

Best of luck with the entires Nan!

Thanks!  It is fun. There's always a little carny section, and the animal judging, and the various shows and competitions. It's very "small town America", the one that we have locally here. Runs for all of one week and all the 4-H kids bring their animals in for judging. There is also the obligatory roast corn, hot dogs, fried dough, funnel cakes, cider donuts, beer garden, etc.  Just like something out of the pages of the 1950s National Geographic Magazine. 

I love it.  I grew up in 4-H and did all of the county 4-H fairs and my hometown did a fair as well (they still hold it).  So yeah, very fun.
I love all the Farmer's Shows around here this time of year, very similar! 

 

Yep. I love 'em, too!  So I'm entering the "preserved cherries" (since it's not a jam, not a jelly, not a spread - there pretty much isn't a category it fits into, but it tastes good so I'll give that one a go even though it's not "in clear liquid" so it might get disqualified). And the plum jelly, and some strawberry jam, and the Daughter's spiced peaches. We have to take the entry form over to the fairgrounds today and, thankfully, it's only going to be about 80F today. (Deadline is Friday.) We went looking for some fresh local apricots yesterday evening, as she makes a mean apricot spread, but they were nowhere to be found. I assume the weather has pretty much done in this year's crop. (We did find some imported from California, but they were extremely expensive. So no.)  She's just going to double-down on getting that new sweater finished to enter, instead.

So, garden tale. There was this volunteer plant in the middle of the flowerbed. We knew it was going to be in the squash (or related) family by the leaves. I went about a week without going to the garden (long story - combination of high heat and overtime at work).  It had been just thinking about flowering the last time I'd seen it, but on Sunday night (aka "mosquito Armageddon day") I went out to give everything a really good soak and to harvest the rest of the fennel, some kale, and garlic, and found two ginormous zucchini fruits on said volunteer plant. They are much larger than the zucchini one would normally expect. Seriously, when the kid pointed them out I thought we had small watermelons at first. In a week. (!) [Ok, so super plant, save seeds.]   

I have always heard that you only eat zucchini while they are small, because they get pithy and blah when large.  Any idea if that's true? I hate to throw it straight into the compost bin,  but I also don't want to waste the time trying to cook it if it's going to be basically inedible.

They do get pithy, but you can cook them like a marrow. 

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/collection/marrow-recipes