63 days ago
We have had a fine crop of beetroot this year and already enjoyed it with many meals. Now the last few plants have been pulled from the ground as you can see below. I reckon that is about five family meals with Joshua loving the stuff but Jaya refusing even when we tell her it is a pink carrot. She likes carrots and, like all little girls these days, all things pink.
99 days ago
A large courgette, spring onions, potatoes, beetroot, radishes and some garlic and shallotts to dry and store. One trip to the garden and a few minutes harvesting.
101 days ago
Not literally but I am stunned how, in a Greek absence of less than three weeks everything has grown so fast. Naturally it is the weeds that have grown most rapidly and I sense some hard days ahead for myself and Joshua on that front.
120 days ago
A number of kind readers as well as an Oxford contemporary, L, have either expressed surprise that I am such a keen gardener or have asked for a progress report. Well here goes. I start with the small field behind the barn which was six foot high in weeds when we arrived and contained a number of abandoned metal structures hidden by those weeds. As you can see in the first photo, it is now anew orchard of about 30 trees, mainly plums, apples, crab apples and pears but with the odd fig, a dog’s arse tree and a tayberry. At the end of the orchard is the top field where one day I hope to keep goats. I have planted five edible olive trees from Greece, three mulberry trees and a sweet chestnut around the edge. That is all WIP.
735 days ago
Ok, there were also some sausages not home produced but elsewhere you see beetroot (still being harvested) which we eat boiled, roast spuds (still being harvbested) and roast butternut squash which I harvested a few weeks ago and which are stored in the larder. I’d happily eat this lot without a meat dish but the Mrs and the kids are very much carnivores.
875 days ago
Much to my surprise, all 12 tomato seeds have taken. Thus, I worked late into the night on a small patch of the jungle, bringing it into life as a tomato bed. In addition to the ten plants I was given by a friend, I hope to be drowning in tomatoes by autumn. We shall see. It was about nine when I finished. I leant on my rake, pondering the last roped-off patc
