BeetrootandSpuds

  This little beauty (it is, after all, only about an inch from head to foot) is a new product for us, a cucamelon.  Slow to germinate, and even slower to fruit, I had begun to despair by the time it first appeared, but before long it was followed by a couple of dozen.  In fact we have a small number of cucamelons on both our plots, and they have performed about equally.  They like bright sunshine, plenty of water and something to climb over. That apart, they are easy enough - though seedlings have, in the past, proved vulnerable to slugs. So there they are. Now, what can you do with them ?  Well, as the name suggests, cucamelons, which hail from Mexico,  are a cross between a cucumber and a melon, so as the name suggests they can be eaten raw (they have a citrus tang), put into salads, or pickled      

    As I mentioned a few posts ago, blight has struck in our polytunnel. But although that does not mean that we have lost the entire crop of tomatoes, as I feared, it does mean that we have had to salvage what we can before they are attacked, and let them ripen off the bush.  Or not. One way of using a lot of unripe tomatoes is to make Green Tomato Chutney  

    It is my pleasure to introduce Arthur, so called because he "ain't 'arf a biggun." As readers can see, Arthur weighs in at just over 1/2 a kilo. Splendid as he is, Arthur's days (hours as a matter of fact) are numbered.  He will shortly be joining his siblings in a pot or two of Tomato Chilli Jam .    

As keen reader will know, our former partner, Spuds, caught blight earlier this year and departed, leaving us to cope s best we can.  And with the harvest at full tilt, we've got our hands full.  Tomatoes, pumpkins, butternut squash and cucumbers are all at their most productive.  And don't forget the sweet peas:  Thank goodness Cloudberry is keeping his head, and remaining calm.      

  We don't get many visitors to our plot(s), but I am pleased to say we had one recently.  And there she is, inspecting the purple beans on Plot B in the above picture, and her name... Aubergine  

  Yesterday we welcomed a visitor to our plot, and to celebrate, we dug out the first of our French black radishes, or mooli.  More to follow...    

   The reason that we have our allotment might seem simple, to produce fruit and vegetables.  However, it provides much more than that, it requires us take exercise (plenty of it), meet new people, and eat new things (not to mention a few old favorites cooked in new ways).  But that's not all, the allotment is a refuge from the bustle of the town,  a place where we can enjoy being out of doors and appreciate the beauty and complexity of nature. One of the things we are beginning to learn about is the interaction between plants of different species.  Marigolds have a reputation as good companion plants, but we have also planted sweet peas amongst our beans to attract insects.  And, as for so many plants, the more you pick, the more they produce.