The tomatoes ripen

At last, at last...I've begun harvesting tomatoes. Just a handful so far, but I'm hoping the numbers will increase over the next week or so.

The Sungold variety have been first off the mark and it is only today that I have picked the first two of the Gardener's Delight. Very tasty too.

I got rid of the two pots of courgette plants on the doorstep today having witnessed them progressively ailing over the last week or so. That leaves two in the ground outside - one very tiny that has never produced anything and the other which has been a decent cropper and might yet produce a thing or two.

I also dug up the remaining lettuce and was told by Susan that I must at least pick what I grow. The point is well taken - I didn't take great care of the lettuce and we consumed barely any.

The weather has not been good today, being very breezy and showery. We have the fire on now. Time marches on.

Bountiful days

The shallots have been harvested and are lingering in a box on the cellar top. Not bad for a £1 net of sets from Poundland. Will try them again. I've planted out onion seeds in the vacant space. Not sure how they'll do at this stage of the year, but I thought I had better use up an unopened packet before it became out of date. No idea what sort of onions they are, it didn't say on the packet.

The remainder of my Desiree potatoes have also been dug up and there was a decent haul there. So too am I having a good crop of runner beans and courgettes. Perhaps we should hold a harvest festival service.

Some spinach beet and more onions have gone where the potatoes were. I could have used green manure on this bit, but it seemed a bit early to put this bit of soil out to grass. I wanted the space to remain productive and get its nutrients that way. I've also set some spinach beet off in the conservatory, ready to plant out later.

Waiting in the wings are the french beans, kohlrabi and broccoli. They seem to be coming on and should be ready soon.

But the tomatoes are the big if. Precisely two have ripened so far (the sungold ones). There's plenty of green ones, but they are remaining stubbornly green.

I'm looking now for inventive ways of using runners beans and courgettes. One thing that worked well today was something called Greek runner beans, taken from the marvellous allrecipes.co.uk website. Pretty tasty dish.

Taking stock after a week's absence

Our daughter did well in looking after the vegetables while we were on holiday, even to the extent of tying up one of the courgettes when it started leaning dangerously in its pot on the doorstep.

A few more tomatoes have appeared on the plants in the conservatory, but they are still some way off ripening. I wonder if they will.

Jobs done this morning before the rain came on were to dig up lettuce which had bolted and lift a few dodgy looking potato plants. This is the first time I have tried Desiree spuds and I was upset to see some of the plants seeming to be ailing, with leaves going very yellow and spottled.

Three of the plants seemed to be in such a bad way that I had to dig them up to see what was happening. I was very surprised to get a healthy haul of this red-skinned maincrop potato, having thought that it would not be ready for harvesting until September/October. Scouting around to see other people's experiences with this variety, I was reassured to read this comment posted by one satisfied customer on the website for Marshalls seeds:

Very good cropper even in dry conditions, with no need for extra watering. Suffers some scab, slug damage and also the dreaded blight, but well worth growing for delicious, heavy mash. Desirees are often ready for harvest by the end of July in my garden and they store very well right through winter.

Hurrah for that.

And also hurrah for the beans, which have come on during my absence and which I began picking today. A bit of a tangle in the wigwam, but I believe I got all those which were lurking in there.

We're all going on a summer holiday (except for one who's staying behind)

I've well and truly nettled one of my arms after a session in the garden in my short-sleeved shirt. Good job I don't keep bees.

We're doing the things you have to do preparatory to a week's holiday in Switzerland. Little does my 23-year-old daughter know that she will be the keeper of the courgettes and tomatoes while we are away. A crash course awaits.

The courgettes have been cropping well, but it is only now that the first of the tomatoes have appeared, both Sungold and Gardener's Delight. They'll have to be fed and watered while we are away if they are to come to anything.

So it's Switzerland here we come. It's probably not fashionable to go in summer rather than winter, but we don't care. We're devils, us.

Pride and joy

Well, it's looking good so far with a few of the crops.

My two courgette plants standing in pots either side of the front door are thriving, one especially so, and the tomatoes are going on well in their growbags. Might have to think about staking them soon.

It has to be said, though, that the two courgette plants I planted out on the garden veg patch aren't doing so well, despite copious amounts of rain over the last week or so. Perhaps an indication of how duff the soil is. A moment of sadness this morning when I came across a dead frog next to one of them. It certainly wasn't there last night. Wonder what the cause of death was?

Looking good - courgette on the doorstep

Sungold tomatoes on the left, Gardener's Delight on the right

I'm thinking while I get a job done

Today's musing was on that vital question: Is growbag one word or two? A search on Google reveals the world to be evenly split. Indeed, some cop out of it altogether by using the description planting bag or some other term.

Anyway, the point is that I bought some today - a snip at 3 for £8 in the garden centre - and finally got round to transplanting the tomatoes into them. So now I have three Sungold variety plants and six Gardener's Delight. Two Sungold plants are outside in pots.

Let's hope they take off this year after the disappointing blight of last summer.

Did I say Gardener's Delight? That's a minefield as well - look it up and you'll see Gardener's Delight, Gardeners' Delight and even Gardeners Delight.

This growing lark is getting harder and harder.

Massacre of the innocents

You bring them up, feed them, nurture them, love them - then they let you down.

My tomatoes have been a bit of a disaster after the runaway success of last year. The outdoor ones were ditched a little while ago after being blighted, while the indoor ones have produced very little red fruit. It's been a poor season.

One lesson learned is not to put them in pots again. Growbags did very well last year and they are what I will have next year.

The nine potted plants in the conservatory were finally ditched today, having gradually wilted and yellowed over the last week. There was, though, a bit of a haul of green tomatoes from them and I have saved them to make chutney.

But that job will have to wait until next weekend as we are going on holiday. Hay-on-Wye, seeing as you ask.

A windy day

I spent most of the day working on things inside the house, listening to the wind whistling all around. It was the sort of force bound to dislodge things and so it proved when I did venture out. Nothing grave, just three of my outdoor pots of tomatoes, and righted in a jiffy. My little wigwam of Cherokee Trail of Tears beans survived (fingers crossed, the wind hasn't died down at all), but still no crop from the plants.

I cut three courgettes, two from the plant in the ground and one from a plant in a pot. Decided that now was the time to give up on the three courgette plants in pots and emptied them out. Why is it that they didn't take? The pots were massive, but I only got one courgette from them. Seems it's a plant much happier in the ground.

We are a bit equivocal

The first of this year's tomatoes have been picked and the verdict is a bit iffy. A few of the Lightfruit and Yellow Pear-Shaped were available so we had them with a light lunch of boiled potatoes and lettuce (both mine), together with a Scotch egg (Sainsburys).

In all honesty, they tasted a bit soggy. In fact, Susan kept most of hers aside to put in a curry tonight. I'm more of a gannet and tucked into mine, although I could see what she meant.

Still, they're only the first of the crop and we shall have to see how the rest fare. They were varieties acquired more or less by accident and at this stage my thinking for next year is to have a go with good old Gardener's Delight.

While looking back on this blog to remind myself what sort of tomatoes I had last year, I came across a posting about the first of the Cherokee Trail of Tears beans being ready on August 25. One year on and we've gone almost 10 days beyond that date with no beans ready. A good sign is that there are plenty of little purple flowers, so perhaps soon...

A potty day

I'm still unsure whether my tomatoes are going to work out this year. I've three varieties on the go, Lightfruit, Harbinger and Yellow Pear-Shaped, all from seed packets acquired as a gift or because the price was knocked down in a sale. The few plants outside had to be dug up and destroyed about a week ago because of blight while the indoor plants have yet to ripen.

They are showing nice bunches of fruit and have grown and spread out noticeably in the sun of recent days, so much so that I returned home this lunchtime from a morning out to discover that one of the pots had toppled over and taken two or three of the others with it. A quick rearrangement and a few new stakes have stabilised them, but the basic problem is that this year I eschewed growbags in favour of pots and I chose too small. I think also that nine pots is a step too many for the space I have in our conservatory.

I'm not quite sure at this distance why I decided against going with growbags this time. They worked perfectly satisfactorily last year and gave me a bumper crop. Think on for next year.

I took a photograph of the Lightfruit tomatoes, a name I sniggered over at the time I was given the seeds. They are in fact quite heavy and promise to be productive.

Getting stuck in

Spring is just around the corner, with the equinox this Saturday (17.32, to be precise) and the clocks going forward the following weekend. I am matching the seasonal change with a burst of activity in the garden.

Susan drove me to Kershaw's Garden Centre in Brighouse this morning to get the bags of manure I spotted the other day when I took a walk there. Five bags of J Arthur Bower's Blended Farm Manure, a snip at £20 the lot. As Susan says, this makes it the most expensive vegetables ever.

Two of the bags were dug in as soon as we returned and the remaining three are awaiting the plots being fully prepared. We later went to Wilkinson's in Brighouse to get two tubs of poultry manure which I shall use in the near future and five bags of potting compost.

I noticed with delight while digging in the manure that the white onions I planted last year are at last beginning to come through. There was no sign of shoots just a couple of days ago, but the sun really seems to have done them good. Hope they maintain their progress.

I started off some tomato and herb seeds in propagating trays - three filled with tomatoes and three with oregano, dill and English thyme. It was with some alarm that I noticed the tomatoes are called lightfruit, harbinger and yellow pear-shaped, hardly names to fill you with confidence. The lightfruit packet was from the Dig for Victory set which Dorothy gave me for Christmas and the other two were Thomas Etty packets I got for the knockdown price of 20p each at Oxfam in Ilkley last year. Looking forward to seeing how they turn out.

Santa visits our house

Christmas Day arrives and Dorothy has bought me the welcome present of three packets of seeds and a herb mix from the Imperial War Museum North in Manchester (all right, all right, Salford).

The seeds are tomatoes, onions and nasturtiums and I can't wait to get them in the ground next year around June time, tomatoes a bit earlier. 

The herb mix is very intriguing, being a mix of parsley, chives and basil in what resembles a tea bag. Indeed, you do have to soak it in a bowl of water for a day before planting.

Whatever will they think of next.

 

Never write off the Russians

There are times in life when things creep up on you unexpectedly and take you totally by surprise. Take my Red Russian tomatoes, for instance - they're growing again.

This is a real shock to me as my Bonny Best has long since died, the Outdoor Girl hasn't produced any for a while and I had the last of my store of Gartenperle in a sandwich today. Blow me down when I saw some green Red Russians growing and, lurking at the back, one that is reddish in colour. 

Recent weeks have had a decided autumn air about them and we've had a frost on a couple of mornings, so it is a real shock to see the tomatoes bursting into life again in a conservatory with no heating. I hadn't even been watering them.

How far will they get?

Is it a jar of chutney or a jar of pickle?

There's been an autumn nip in the air today after a few days of sunshine and it seemed appropriate weather to be indoors making pickle with my Red Russian tomatoes.

This variety of tomato is a real whopper and I think the weight has contributed to the fruit splitting on the vine before reddening. A better and more experienced grower than me would undoubtedly have a technique to deal with this, but I decided the best thing would be to harvest them now and turn them into pickle (or is it chutney? What is the difference?)

I've grown quite fond lately of browsing old recipe books produced by churches, Women's Institutes and the like and the latest to come into our house is a booklet published by the Hick Lane circuit of Methodist churches in Batley circa 1955.

It's thanks to those church stalwarts of half a century ago that I spent a happy couple of hours today in the kitchen cutting up and boiling tomatoes, onions, garlic, apples, sultanas and spices. Mind you, the very strong smell of vinegar in the air brought a few complaints from Susan and Dorothy.

I think they knew what they were doing all those years ago. I only hope I have done the cooks and their recipe justice today.

Trail of destruction hits veg

It's been pretty windy here for the last few days and on my tour of inspection in the garden this morning I discovered that a tangle of Cherokee Trail of Tears was hanging loose from one of the wigwam poles. Winding it back up the pole was out of the question so all I could do was tie it tightly at the top. Hope it holds.

The crop, by the way, continues to be impressive and the product excellent to eat - far better tasting than the runner beans. Mind you, the French beans with lemon sauce I cooked the other night failed to find favour with Susan. She thought I'd put too much lemon juice on it, she's not a big fan.

I have decided I hate slugs. What's to like about them? Nothing. They have butchered another of the Red Russian tomatoes that was just coming ripe. In fact, one of the buggers was still on it when I got up in the morning. I might cut my losses with the other Red Russians and make green pickle out of them. I'm glad to say, though, that the other tomatoes seem to be going on well.

Our healthy diet

The crops are coming in and we are living on a diet of tomatoes and beans (green, not baked).

The Cherokee Trail of Tears beans which have so intrigued me, pictured above, are now cropping handsomely and tasting very good. To my mind they are better than the runner beans. And to think that I once had grave doubts about them.

I've also dug up the garlic at long last and put it to dry. Some bulbs grew, some didn't. Who knows why?

I'm also getting a healthy amount of tomatoes - the Outdoor Girl first off the mark, followed by the Gartenperle and now one or two of the Bonny Best. Sadly, I have found that something has nibbled at three of the tomatoes I have picked over the last few days or so.

Nothing of the Red Russian tomatoes yet, although the biggest of them all is getting redder by the day. Now that would be a real shame if something got to that before me.

My tomatoes go down a treat

It was a genuinely thrilling moment when I picked and ate my first two tomatoes. I must have had a face like a little boy who had just been given a train set.

It's tempting to say they were the best tomatoes I have ever tasted, but I'll restrict myself to the comment that they seemed pretty good to me. I had pondered how to have them, wanting to savour the little beauties at their best. Karen Meyers, who runs an interesting gardening website from her home in the USA has had a recent posting suggesting three easy ways to serve tomatoes, but it seems to me they refer to the whoppers they favour on the other side of the Atlantic rather than the much smaller types such as Outdoor Girl. In the end I had one on its own and the other in a salad sandwich with lettuce from the garden and a hard-boiled egg. Lovely. I notice that some of my Gartenperle tomatoes are starting to redden. Will be interesting to compare the taste with the others.

I've been out and about foraging down our lane this afternoon, picking such blackberries as are ready. Not a great lot yet, but I gathered a decent amount to do something with.

It turned out to be a more profitable little outing than I thought, as a neighbour passed by and offered me some of his daughter's apples to go with them. Should make a nice pie or crumble.

Code alert red

The Observer Organic Allotment Blog asked a few days ago how everyone's tomatoes were doing and I had to answer then that mine were still green, although getting bigger and bigger. A momentous occasion has arrived since then - one of my Outdoor Girl tomatoes has turned red (and, since I took the photo, another is turning). Wonder what they are going to taste like and how should I serve them? We live in exciting times. No sign of any redness yet on the three other varieties of tomato I have.

I have also cropped a second courgette. Funny how I saw no sign of it the night before, yet there it was all grown next day. Can't appear that fast, can it?

I'm still waiting

The latest posting on the Observer Organic Allotment Blog wonders how visitors are doing with their tomatoes. Are they reddening and ripening, the writer asks.

The answer in my case is that they are getting bigger, but are still very green. One of the Red Russian variety is getting on to the size of Russia itself, as you can see in the photo. It should keep us going for a good few meals when it's ready to pick. Note the use of the word when, not if.

First courgette of 2009

Well, I've picked my first courgette of the year and I feel like a proud, over-age parent. It looks a very healthy specimen and we're hoping the taste lives up to the promise. Perhaps it will go in a curry tonight with some of the spinach from the garden. Fingers crossed that there will be more courgettes.

There are also one or two runner beans ready to pluck before they get any bigger and nice green tomatoes are emerging in the conservatory. I shall have to do my best to nurture them during this critical stage in their growth.

When I look back to starting this enterprise, almost a year ago now, it is amazing to see something that I have grown actually reaching the table.