All about those Bs

In good old fashioned 'Sesame Street' style, this post is brought to you with by the letter B....

All I am about to tell you what happened on Saturday, a rare day in my life when I was able to cope and more than that, actually enjoy being at the plots!

This year, (as it is for everyone on our allotments) hasn't been going too well; we have been plagued by birds and the weather has been terrible. Thus it was that I found myself, on arrival, pulling out all our diseased and pigeon decimated broad beans. They were still in the flush of fruiting, some had flowers still to mature, but we had to say goodbye, even to the baby successional ones planted in a wee triangle further along the bed.

Beside them, the mangetout are starting to look in a bad state too, though there is plenty of flowers and pods on them. The birds have been nipping off the tops of each plant and every growing tip, they've been tugging at them hard too as quite a few plants were barely in the soil at all and had started to crisp up and crumble away from the bottom up. It really could get you down but I wasn't having any of that.

Pretty much all and I mean all (we had about 6 berries left) of our gorgeous blackcurrants were gone on Saturday. Only a day, one blasted night, after the bush had been full and gloriously bursting. Boy was I looking forward to a dark, juicy harvest only to have it snatched away from me by - you guessed it, the bloody birds. They ate every ripe one and took those on the verge of perfection and ripped them off and left them on the ground :( Such sad times.

I weeded wildly, fuelled by my annoyance for a while but soon calmed down. Andrew was off again to Gleno village for more wood - by goodness there was a netted fruit cage to be built this day! Damnation - thou shall not pilfer our blueberries! *shakes fist at sky*

the fruit cage has been working!

But, I mean look  - bird beaks have gotten to our Kale and the Pak Choi. Plus the Kohl Rabi  and PSB looks so sad. At this rate we would seriously need to consider netting our whole plot; one great big fruit cage!

So I turned my back and focused my attention on the beetroot, which amazingly Andrew had forgotten about. But then he has been doing everything else and was on Saturday building us a lovely gravelled parterre path on 14b. We really wanted a big tonne bag of the stuff but had to be happy with some smaller bags as the deliveries were over for the day at the depot. However he did a fabulous job.

Plus the Blackberries or as I like to call them Bramble berries are fruiting like crazy over there, it really does the heart good to see that one bush so big and healthy this year when so much else is a little disappointing.

Anyway, back to the beetroot, both yellow and red varieties had been sown direct and forgotten about so I thinned them all out, put the really tiny ones straight into the compost and the rest into our harvest bags. Oh did we have a feast! Now the rest will have more room to grow and become big and beautiful.

Lastly, I missed my own Blog Birthday. It was on Monday and it passed me by in a whirlwind. So happy belated 7th blogiversary to me - yay! I must remember to eat cake at some time :)

More photos to come from that day and some from Sunday too when Andrew made a quick visit :)
Love and Hugs
Carrie

Cranachan - a gift from the Scottish gods

Hey lovelies, I'm back sort off. I haven't been to the lottie (Andrew has though) but I have been eating really well - our own carrots, kale, french dwarf beans, runner beans and loads of raspberries and blackberries - yummmmy! A pile of spuds will have to be sent off to my sister-in-law too (it's so fab when people get itchy waiting for more of your home grown goodies).

But I was in Bonny Scotland last week and was introduced to my new favourite thing ever - Cranachan, oh just say the word over and over and I purr like a kitten. Now you may look it up and see a million variations on the recipe but I am going to tell you how the chief at our pub/hotel did it and I swear you will never look at any other recipe ever! Well until you see the new and exciting Gault's low fat Blackberry Cranachan recipe ;)

Naturally we all know that the vast majority of the raspberries we grow here are Scottish, for goodness sake they all have 'Glen' at the start of their name, such as Glen Ample (which we grow) and Glen Cova, Glen Doll, Glen Fyne, etc. Well in Scotland they just grow like weeds I tells ya - take yourself for a wee dander and bam! you walk into hundreds of them, you'll never grow hungry out for a walk there.

The Hotel Allan Ramsay's Cranachan

•  a lovely little glass - presentation is very important people!
• Raspberries
• Raspberry jam
• Double cream
• Whiskey (honey toned)
• Scottish oats
• Honey

* Lightly toast your oats and let them sit in a wee dram o' whiskey :)

* Whip up that cream like there is no tomorrow (burn some calories too) and add a little honey to it if you want.

* Play with the different food stuffs, layering them all like a trifle. Oats at the bottom, then a dollop of cream (with honey mixed in - or spoon a little on top), then raspberry jam over some juicy raspberries, then repeat until your glass is full and gorgeous looking.

*End with a raspberry on top and sprinkle a few more oats.

We made a load when we got home with our Blackberry glut (which is still continuing). But you know, shame on me, I didn't take a single photo ~ when you're at home all dignity goes out the window and you just unceremoniously get stuck in, you know its true. I bet there are some of you out there that even lick the plate, hahaha

Gaults' Low Fat Blackberry Cranachan

a lovely glass - presentation is still very important!

Blackberries

Blackcurrant jam

Fromage Frais zero fat

Whiskey (honey toned)

Scottish oats

Honey



Just do the same as above in the layering idea, but in the wonderful knowledge that this is healthier and indeed could possibly count as good for you, hehehe. We didn't bother toasting the oats (we didn't have the patience) and we just spooned some lovely honey on top of the Fromage Frais. We fell down on the Whiskey though as though it was Scottish it had a peat tone - a little overpowering but we do like our whiskey in this house so it was fine :)

Berry Boastful :)

Looking back on the photos for this post I can't help but feel a little down. It was 2 Saturday's ago when these were taken and we had the best day at the lottie - look at the sunshine so apparent in the pictures (though often it was very overcast); today is the 1st of August and it has done nought but rain and rain heavy all day today. Anyway - I do have some hope that we shall get our Indian Summer. Hope, we must grab on it with both hands!

So here is my boasting bit. Oh yes, behold and feast your eyes upon these fantastic statistics, the weight of fruit I harvested:

Raspberries ~ just a small bag half full
Red Gooseberries ~ 1kg 600g
Green Gooseberries ~ 200g
Blackcurrants ~ 2kg 50g

Darn it all to heck though, as we haven't done a darn thing with it all, bar eating the raspberries, it merely sits in the crisper drawer in the fridge - so really I have no reason upon which to boast ~ shameful!

I took this particular photo because I was really scraped to bits all up my arms and through my gloves by these thorns. I thought there was a great proverb just waiting to be written about this, you know, how the sweetest rewards come only through getting hurt along the way, but I can't think of how to say it all posh, I'm not that clever but the lesson stands..... :)

We lifted the last of the early potatoes as well and cut the artichoke heads off - a nice wee gift for Mamma G, I hate them and she loves them = good swap for a homebaked wheaten, yummmmmmm.

We also got the 1st of our peas - look how carefully they were carried by Andrew - we love fresh peas.

Funny though, so does someone else and the smell of them was driving her crazy - leave alone with them for a minute in the back seat (our own stupid fault) and this was the result. Oh she knew she had been bold, hahahaha.

One of the most beautiful things on the allotment (in my humble opinion) are tendrels on pea plants, I just love them.

Utter Allotment Shame

A summery day, we had 1 ~ hoorah! The 12th of July was a stunner and Andrew, Maggie and I took ourselves off up the coastline of Co.Antrim. I may be biased but that is one of the best drives in the world and it's right here on our doorstep. It's perfect, just stopping at little beaches along the way and letting Maggie run whilst we chased her and also looked for cool beachy treasures.

The fair I was at last weekend was brilliant, there were lovely and friendly stall holders, it was really well organised and then loads of lovely people came and they had their shopping heads on :) It was a real buzz.

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The rest of our time off was spent in the back garden or just loafing around. We did want to go to the allotment a lot but well, it's such an unholy mess that we simply couldn't face it. The Council isn't keeping the paths clear and the grass and weeds are knee height, a significant number of plot holders haven't bothered their asses over the past year and those disastrous messes are full to the brim with more flowering grass, weeds and diseases. I am furious, so angry at the lack of any care and the complete unenforcement of the rules ~ the council is failing us and ought to be kicking these people out! For goodness sake, we have a 2 year waiting list with people desperate to try growing their own.


pretty, yes, but this is suppose to be cultivated and growing lovely food!! (The plot next door)

So it's now been a whole week since I was anywhere near my plots. My hay fever has been very severe this year and with the afore mentioned mess of the plots in general I have been so bad I couldn't breathe last Friday night and ended up retching so much, gasping for air, that I threw up twice on the footpath. It was truly very frightening and reminded me of those asthma attacks when I was little; I thought I was going to die. I didn't die :)
I was put on different meds though and they nearly killed me again! I had to come off them after 3 days; 3 days which are lost to me, I either slept or was dizzy and very confused, those were my options :) But hey - I ditched them and I'm still here fighting away with a runny nose and itchy eyes. Thank goodness we live by the sea - last night's visit to the beach was a joy!

Andrew has been and collected the last of our broad beans :( It was fabulous while it lasted. We have kept some, blanched and frozen - a nice treat for those winter months. I don't know if it was just us but we had to skin our beans this year as they were quite tough otherwise. Must be something to do with the weather... He also brought home a load of spuds - boy those plants are doing us proud, it just never seems to end.

I shall be going to the plot tonight; fingers crossed I survive. We know (Andrew has seen) that the raspberries and currant bushes and gooseberries have been going mad with production so we need to fight off the birds and actually get some this year! As I write this I am just thinking I have most likely jinxed us simply by saying that out loud. Tut tut, I ought to know better.

I leave you with a photo of our raspberry+ harvest from 2 years ago - an image that sold well at the fair :) Oh I get so proud when people ohh and ahhh over photos of our produce :)

Hugs. I'll be back on form soon!

Celebrating Spring whilst eating Summer

I wish I could weave you a fabulous tale about how all Irish people buy their spuds and eat homemade Blackcurrant jam on St Bridget's day. It's certainly something that I did and I wish it would catch on...maybe after this post it slowly will... Also it would be lovely if we all sent each other gorgeous bunches of Tulips as I received from my bestest pal Rose - thank you again!!

Ahh, the joy of thinking Spring-y. The flower boxes on the window sill in front of me have little daffodils not only emerging but getting ready to burst open and send their beautiful sunshine yellow glow into the street. It's a waiting game and one I am enjoying. In the back garden we have had sweet little Snowdrops for weeks; I think there is a grand total of 5 single blooms but they are only baby plants and in time I am sure there will be years when it's just a jungle out there :)

Well anyway, back to the wondrous tradition *cough cough* of potato buying and jam eating on St Brigdets' Day.... So as I am sure you are all aware, the 1st Feb is St Bridget's day here in Ireland and thus the 1st day of SPRING. Sing it with me people - Spring!!!!
Side Note -
I'm not religious at all but...St. Brigid represents the Irish aspect of divine femininity in her role as patron of babies; cattle farmers; dairymaids; dairy workers; midwives; milk maids; poultry farmers; poultry raisers and all sorts of people involved in fishing, scholars and poets and the printing press. So she's pretty powerful in the farming community of which us Allotmenteers are pretenders to the throne ;)

So you got your Spuds? We got ours last weekend and they were duly put on the window sill upstairs to start chitting on the 1st :) This year we have remained faithful to Sharpes' Express and are trying a new one to us 'Estima' . We prefer to pick ours by hand; love a good looking at and a squeeze, we do ;) I am absolutely sure that there is nothing wrong with buying them in bags or through the mail but if I can, I love to choose personally.

I LOVED the brown paper bags..

And this is the money shot - the jam. Nothing quite like growing your own blackcurrants, picking them (arrgh the eternal battle with the birds!), washing and freezing them until the horrid winter. Then making jam - so sweet and summery on one's toast; there ain't anything like it. We have lots of Raspberries and more Blackcurrants, so more jam to come :) Yummy.......

Hope to chat again soon, just need the weather to co-operate and then I can get out there and plant seeds and what not :)

Summertime and the growing is easy

We haven't managed to get much done (make that nothing done, to be honest) at the lottie over the past days. The weather was bad then it was too good not to go to the beach after dinner and then we where away all weekend at a Wedding in Donegal. So there, excuses out of the way. I did on the other hand do some weeding in the back garden yesterday and gave the patio a good brushing *grins with pride*.

(N.B. a 'seasonal side salad' in one of Donegal's fancy Spa Hotel restaurants was.... Watercress - what!!!????)

But though we haven't been giving a whole lot of love to the lottie, she sure has been sending it our way. I picked 3 and half pounds of Blackcurrants last week, a pound and a half of Raspberries and about a dozen big, fat, perfect Strawberries (most of them had been partially eaten by birds - ggrrrr; it's bad enough that we lost a load to birds but for them to only eat most and not all, well that is just darned annoying!)

Then last night Andrew had a wee harvest for dinner and bought home a bounty of Broad Beans, Peas, Mint, Sorrel, Green Garlic and mixed Lettuce leaves. Oh and a beautiful bouquet of Sweet Williams, Roses and Carnations for his lovely wife (ie. Me, haha).

We sat outside and podded the beans and peas and then ate a Gault classic - beans and peas on toast (with pancetta, mint, lemon juice and sorrel), it was fabulous all washed down with non-alcoholic beer in the sunshine; happy times. It is nights like that and super fresh meals like that which make the soil improvement in the rain and bitter winds of winter all worth while :)

 

Hope your gardens and lotties are flourishing! xxx

Blackcurrant bonzana!

We walked to our lottie last night and on the way down the drive to our plot we noticed that the council-planted blackcurrant bushes were cleverly being covered by some opportunistic plot fellows to safe the berries from the many birds :)

This made me think about our own plants and whether we had many. All the cherries are gone AGAIN this year - so not fair and we didn't look after the strawberry plants at all and I haven't even bothered to look at them *slaps wrist*. Ronnie walked past us later in our visit with a big washing up bowl over flowing with the best looking strawberries I have ever seen (he's cheeky and didn't even offer one - I love Ronnie, so competitive).

Anyway we have a lot of blackcurrants it turned out, each of the 6 or 7 plants had beautiful clusters on them and there are more ripening away. I picked around a pound and was very happy getting my fingers all reddened :) Here's what we did with them, added sugar and ...... made a thick luxurious jam come almost sorbet  - yummmmmmy

It's amazing and no, hands off, it's all ours, hahahaha.

Whilst I was picking away I came across two of the saddest looking gooseberry bushes ever. Nematode attack number 1 has failed utterly and totally. These little buggers are from one plant alone, I bagged them up and put them in the bin; I accidentally squished one and almost vomited, it's not a nice feeling. I HATE sawfly caterpillars with a passion that requires a lie down and some soothing music.....



DIE DIE DIE!!! (sorry about that)

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And today is Andrew and my 6th Wedding Anniversary - we're going out for a special dinner and everything!! I love my hubby :)

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Gooseberry Fools

Our gooseberries were ripe and ready for the picking on Saturday. I got the job, aow! darn thorny plant. It's the first time it has given us a berry and we did really rather well; I'm always surprised that these very cheap plants, bought in a discount shop (Poundstretcher) can do so well. Apart from my arms still looking all scratched and blotchy, the exercise was one of joy and pride. Though our other red gooseberry bush still resolutely refuses to bear fruit (cheeky), it gave us 1 last year which we shared, haha.

So this was our haul of berries, check out that bumper crop of Blackcurrants (I think there were 22 of them)!

Back home and as usual we can't hold our water. The gooseberries had to be used right there and then. Neither of us had ever really tasted green ones before, well Andrew did decide to eat one raw and his face was a picture I think his tongue shrink up whilst stuck to the roof of his mouth and his cheeks.

We decided to make Gooseberry Fool. Well, our own versions of it. There was a lovely recipe on Retro Food Recipes but Andrew's creative chef side came to fore and the magic began to happen.....

So here is our recipe for the gooseberry treatment:

• 440g gooseberries + some blackcurrants (washed, topped and tailed)


• plonk into a small saucepan with 2 tablespoons of castor sugar and 2 tablespoons of water
  
• put the lid on the saucepan and heat until squishy (approx 10 mins)


• sieve fruit, really squishing them hard through the mesh (good for anger management)


• add more castor sugar to taste (we added 100g)

Pretty colour, no? That's the blackcurrants for you

Basically this is a runny warm gooseberry jam. I suppose if you added a little more pectin you could easily store it in a jar but, well, again, we can't hold our waters! We poured some into a bowl each and put some (low fat, may-as-well-be-good-for-you) cream on top and added some much underrated sprinkles. Andrew also had some strawberries. Eh, viola, dish number one. Gorgeous!

I like low fat cream okay!

Then we had that look at each other, you know the one ~ the slightly guilty "I want more, do you; cause I will if you will" look. We did. And so to the kitchen again for dish number two. This time (against my better judgement) I let Andrew mix the cream and the rest of the jammy mixture together to make a proper 'fool' (it wasn't broke, so why fix it?!!). It wasn't as nice, though he added muesli to his and maybe more strawberries and thought it lovely. I had just settled for sprinkles again.

So there you go, what an exciting experience. May your gooseberries be plump and juicy and may you too enjoy them, whatever you decide to do with them! xx

Manure and Fruit

I'm eating cherries - yum. One day, one day in the not too distant future maybe I'll write a blogette eating our own from the Lottie. Happy days..... Also, just took the dog for a walk, by myself, for the first time this week, so I feel momentarily invincible.

The title is blunt, I know but for me the weekend truly was all about Manure (Green and Animal) and fruit bushes. I'll explain...

Andrew was driving me mad with his Fruit Arch shenanigans and the vibe on the Lottie wasn't great. When something is perfect and done in an instant, he gets very crabby. Enough said. I (to save my precious sanity) went to the other end of the plot and started to dig, turning over the green manure so it can start to rot down. Ahh, digging, thrusting your spade into the ground with force and getting a sweat going - does you the world of good when peeved off at the Hubby.

I did 3 beds in the end and it just happened to work out that it was a half and half split between Green and Animal Manure that I was turning. I have to say, so far I much prefer the cow poo (never thought I'd write that sentence!), the ground just under it was more friable and full of worms - in the Green Manure beds, it was compacted, very compacted and a pain to work with. I still have an open mind about the whole sowing a living covering for over winter but I am still to be impressed with the results. We'll see...

Actually what are you're thoughts on this???? I'd love to know.

I am not going to post a picture of 3 beds of muck to illustrate my work here. That would be very boring for all of us; have a look at this instead, much better. My Valentine's Day dinner, made by the hubby - yum.



Then I had the terrible, and I mean heartbreaking, task of cutting back the Autumn Raspberries. My goodness they've only been in there for a little while and looked sad enough as it was, i.e. 6 twigs in the ground. But now it's as if there isn't anything there at all. They get cropped right down to ground level - so harsh. (Oh, and my cherries are finished too - not fair!!)



Let's move on from this story and go to the big moment (for me) - Planting the Blackcurrant Bushes on Sunday. We were lucky a good few months back to get hold of 2 bushes a 'Ben Lomond' and a 'Baldwin' for the great price of a £1 each. This past weekend was the first time the ground was okay to plant in. I DID IT, ALL ON MY OWN. It was exciting, I did a totally text book job of it and Andrew was extremely impressed. It was in doing that job that I had a 'life- is- okay-and-so-am-I' moment and believe me they are very few and far between. After I'd tidied up after myself, I took a wee walk and there was a tear. (Think what you may of me but I didn't feel terrible and that is huge).

The before and after pictures of that will have to wait, I got the before but then the camera battery died a very untimely death - so no after shot. :(


P.S. Finally put up that new number sign, eh viola!




Update on manure debate:

My friends at Grow your own - http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/grapevine/allotment-advice/green-vs-cow-manure_27946.html - have decided that both types are good ffor different areas, but over all they prefer animal poo.

Those friends at Grow Veg - http://www.growveg.info/viewtopic.php?f=861&t=13441 - also went with animal poo though again some felt green manure had it's place, especially as a weed suppressor.

The polls have only been going one night but this highly unscientific experiment seems to show (at present) that animal poo is the way to go.

Christmas Bargains

This whole credit crunch thing has its good points you know. At the weekend Andrew and I got a whole load of stuff for the Lottie, with Christmas money from my 2 Aunties. My Hubby has been planning an Apple Arch for a long time now and we bought 2 lovely trees and 3 arches all at a bargain price. (I'll tell you about the arch tomorrow...)

We have also become quite obsessed by Raspberries. After putting all those Autumn fruiting ('Joan J') ones into the permanent bed recently we decided that more Summer ones would be good too. (We like Raspberries.) In Homebase they were selling 3 pots for £10! There are 3 good, just potted up stems, in each pot = 9 Raspberry plants for £10! Good eh?

2 pots of 'Glen Clova' and 1 of 'Tulameen' ~ these names mean nothing to me yet but I will get round to looking them up. I just hope we get fruit some day and I can get to making jam (its quite an achievable dream, surely).

Then we drove up the road a little, to a nursery (mainly for a coffee and wee bun in their nice cafe) and managed to get these lovely blackcurrant bushes at a humble £1 each. You just couldn't shake a stick at that now, could you?

The one on the left is a 'Ben Lomond' and on the right is a 'Baldwin', Fingers crossed our bargains don't turn out to be a false economy.