Sunday 27 August 2017

Tomatoes are now...

Sweet courgette relish
    The tomatoes are now passata! Well, some are. Like to think most are but I took a look outside this morning and I suspect that there will be a few more seed trays worth to come yet! So far three bags of Gardeners Delight (grape tomato) in the freezer, eight jars of passata and six jars of sweet courgette relish. Oh! Forgot the dried bay leaves. Good start. Shallots to make into pickled onions yet to do!
 This has been a good year for tomatoes despite the onset of blight. Rain and sunshine has happened at the right time.For me it has been a poor year for french dwarf beans. Potatoes have been good and I look forward to digging up the main crop soon. The melons, both water and 5 dessert have done well. I really like the 5 dessert melon and will be growing them again next year. A lovely taste and texture.
    Is it a record? Six round courgettes picked of one plant! The courgette planting this year has been about right. Still overrun with them but not excessively, well not yet anyway. I notice there are still more coming, however, the plants are showing signs of giving up. There is butternut squash, vegetable spaghetti and I think another type of squash which for the moment its name escapes me. Much to my surprise and delight my pumpkins are producing fruit and fingers crossed I should have a few pumpkins for halloween. On my return from New Zealand I thought I had lost them.
    It is still a very busy time in the garden. Maintenance, that is, weeding, mowing grass, preparing and planting winter crops (leeks, winter cabbage, swede, beetroot, carrots), watering and harvesting . All requiring ones time and effort at the same time not to mention the need to process tomatoes into something that will keep for a while. 
   One thing is that the weather is being good. Cool early mornings, hot middle day, warm late afternoons and evenings. Wonderful sky at night. Sheer magic. I love this time of year. The season is changing, autumn is on our doorstep. There are black berries to pick. Big and juicy this year as it rained at the right time for them. 
    


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