2011 yield review and the best intentions

Laziness, a new job and Winter has meant that I haven't updated in a while but now that Spring feels like it's round the corner, I am stirring like the snails crawling out of the nooks and crannies in the allotment and feel it's time to start writing again.

Where better to start in January but a review of the last year and a blog full of good intentions?

This is what I wrote back in July
Slow start to the year as things got into their swing. Things came early due to warmth but when growing from seed still need a growth cycle so not as successful than established soft fruits. Heat may have been a check and certainly the raspberries need magnesium (Epsom salts) to correct yellowing leaves. They also should have been tied in better. Next year or in the autumn I will create a framework of wires which should resist the weather better than normal string.

Now for the update in January 2012
We had a dreadfully wet summer and that meant the tomatoes got blight and yields were poor. It also didn't help that I didn't tie them in or support them well. Again - must do better next time.

Yellow was the colour of the season and yellow courgettes, patty pans, ornamental squash and yellow beetroot were great fun. The squash stored well and we are still eating it now in stews and bakes. Despite a slow start and early lack of germination the beetroot ended up doing well though they weren't the impressive giants that Bernie managed to grow.

I can't tell you what varieties did well because I forgot to label them, or labelled them in pen that washed off or on sticks that got lost over the season. Again, must do better this year.

Now in the midst of winter, incidentally the warmest winter since the early 80s apparently, we have had just one frost and the chard is still going strong and we are starting to harvest the Jerusalem Artichokes. We also had a potato harvest to make an Irishman proud. Sadly, though we tend to eat bread or pasta more as our chosen carbohydrate and my constant on/ off diet discourages me from even that so we still have mountains of potatoes at home. 

My resolve is to find recipes that are both healthy and that use up potatoes in vast quantities before the next season returns.  In fact the whole chest freezer needs a good clear out as I fear we may even have vegetables from Autumn 2010 lurking in there! 

So that will be my challenge for the next four weeks is to use up all the stored vegetables before Lent starts on the 21st February. Watch this space for recipes using fruits of the freezer...

Oh and I promise to:
- cut down a third of the raspberries to see if they are autumn or summer fruiting
- tie the raspberries in with wire (string just didn't work)
- label things properly
- tie in and support the tomatoes I eventually grow.
- I can't promise not to order too many seeds because that horse has already bolted but I can sow them with caution to avoid a glut

Taking a break

I have been on holiday. The neglect and mini Indian Summer while I was away combined with the previous wet, bad weather meant that crops stopped much earlier than last year.

On my return I decided it was time for a tidy up. I took up the beans (remembering to keep the nitrogen fixing roots in the earth) and, with the help of my friend Carole, weeded the plot.  Now all I need to do is shift (I did say shiFt) a load of manure that a local pony owner left and mulch the plot to prevent weeds from regrowing and to nourish the land.

Earlier this year I was forward thinking and, looking to future, I ordered purple broccoli plants.  Unfortunately they arrived just before I went on holiday and while I was away in Sicily they died when left out (unplanted - very wasteful Katrin) in the unexpected late sun.

In the mean time I have gone mad and bought a myriad of vegetable based cookery books:
- Verdura - vegetables Italian style by Viana La Place
- River Cottage Veg Everyday by Hugh Fernley-Wittingstall
- Vegetables From an Italian Garden by Phaidon deserves a special mention for being a simply beautiful book with special seasonal sections on growing vegetables too. A delight to look at.

I can't wait to try out some of the recipes.