Unlike some of my fellow Garden Share Collective bloggers like Dusty Country Road, Our Wee Farm and Strayed from the Table, we don’t have chickens on the allotment. I wish we could, as I love the idea of being able to go and collect fresh eggs each day, but one of the rules of the allotment site is […]
I love Swiss chard. There I’ve said it. It has to be my “go-to veg” when sowing at the allotment, if there is a space it’s filled with chard. As a plant, it’s hardy and forgiving, and just keeps on going. Added to this, it has a beautiful form and, if you sow rainbow chard […]
Whenever I’m asked by people about what to grow when you take over an allotment, or start a veg bed at home, the answer is always the same. Potatoes and Swiss chard. Potatoes are great, as they do some of the soil improving work for you, not least when you have to dig your harvest […]
One of my favourite Indian foods are pakoras. I love this crispy, spicy, snack. It’s perfect as part of a meal, but equally good as a savoury treat. Eaten all over the Indian subcontinent they are a great way of using up bits of different vegetables, working well with cauliflower, courgettes, onions, potatoes, spinach, chard, […]
So, summer has started and its rained all day for the first two days of the month! Still, it promises to be a good, and busy, month at the allotment. With the transition from spring to summer, there is increasingly more to harvest from the plot. The salad leaves have enjoyed the gentle rise in temperatures […]
The Ploughman’s lunch is a British classic, and appears in many guises on the menus of pubs and cafes across the country. Whether it is steeped in tradition is debateable, but there is no doubt that the combination of bread, cheese, chutney and pickles is a winner. Teamed with a pint in a sunny pub […]
This month generally starts with a few days of beautiful weather. My wedding anniversary on the 2nd is almost always beautifully sunny. This year the greyness of March has carried on to the start of April, and my mood has only lifted now that the sun is shining (and I’ve managed to get the plot […]
So much for the fresh hope for better weather, it seems to have been particularly wet over the last few weeks, culminating in the wettest day ever for the last 24 hours of February. The allotment is as a result undiggable and pretty much untouched in the a couple of weeks. Don’t get me wrong, […]
There are still vegetables to harvest, the Chard, Cabbage and Broccoli are still looking good and will no doubt make their way into a few soups, or onto the plate with a winter stew. This year I have grown cauliflower for the first time, the Romanesco variety. Cauliflower has become the vegetable of the season, […]
What a wet month! It’s been weeks of random downpours and wind fuelled rain. The allotment has a real windswept and weather beaten look to it, and our visits to the plot have often been cut short by inclement weather. November , despite the weather, has given us some crops to harvest. In this period of the year a […]
Spade Fork Spoon 