Grow Comfrey to give your garden a real lift year after year
A few years I wrote about rocambole and a few weeks later I discovered that it was actually growing in my garden. A colleague in London had given it to me on a plant swap and described it as “White bells that smell of garlic. Weird!” I felt such a fool. I’ve had a longing to grow comfrey in my garden as it appears to be such a useful plant. The leaves can be made into a fertilising tea – high in potash, nitrogen and loads of other trace elements that the exuberant roots find deep down in the soil. This tea is a wonderful free...
read moreInvesting in perennial vegetables for the hungry gap: Sea Kale/ Seakale/ Crambe maritime
Many years ago, when I was just a newbie herbaceous gardener a friend came to stay with her mother. Her mother bought me the book The Victorian Kitchen Gardenby Jennifer Davies. As I wasn’t actually planning to grow vegetables at the time it was put on my books for later shelf. I had no idea that suddenly it would come into its own this year. Here I found details of making hot beds and so much more. OK Victorian kitchen gardens were labour intensive but I do have time on my hands and if you cut out things like expensive hothouse boilers,...
read moreThe fascination of gardening. Constant learning curves.
For the second time this year my tomato seedlings in the greenhouse and Solar tunnel have been hit by sharp frosts. I thought the first fifty had succumbed to damping off. This happened last year when I watered them with rain water from the butts. These had had the same treatment. Since then I’ve discovered that this is a bad idea as they can easily keel over with the nasties lurking in a butt. Tomato, pepper and cucumber seedlings are very delicate for the first few weeks after germination – they need tap water or filtered water from a...
read moreDiscovering marsh and rock samphire, salsola and seakale. Edible plants that need a bit of salt if grown away from the seaside
Even though I spent a lot of my childhood living beside the sea building seaweed castles to catch that special prince, I didn’t even meet the seaweed fairy and never tasted samphire until a couple of years ago. It was love at first bite, the saltiness and the crunch. The totally green tastiness of the thing. So when I spotted samphire seeds for sale in the new Otter Farm online shop they were slipped into my basket within a thought. Having ordered these seeds I began to fret about actually growing them – we are an hour and a half drive...
read moreEat your greens
“If you eat your greens your hair will curl,” my mother would say. “But I’ve already got curly hair.” As a child I longed for straight long blonde hair, like my friend Twink. I also didn’t like greens. If I’d had my way it would have been toast or Wall’s Chocolate Carnival ice cream for every meal. Until I started growing my own veg I didn’t really enjoy eating them. Salad, broccoli, frozen peas and the occasional carrot were vegetables at the more appealing end of the ‘horrid veg” spectrum. One of the few...
read moreEgyptian walking onions
“Look the Egyptian walking onions have arrived!” I was opening an envelope that had dropped through our letterbox. Danny looked bemused. “In Finland they are called Air onions.” “You didn’t get them sent all the way from Finland did you?” Panicky cash strapped yelp. “Well yes. They were cheaper than buying them in the UK – including postage.” “But do we need them?” “Yes. These are perennial onions. Once you plant them you should have them forever.” “Ahhh.” The word perennial brings out the purr in D. I...
read moreThe Garlic Lovers Collection from The Garlic Farm, Isle of Wight
“The great thing about working from home is that I can eat as much garlic as I like and not have to worry that I reek.” Danny was savouring some chunky garlic cloves in a baked vegetable dish. “As long as you eat some garlic too,” he added as an after thought. I will never make the mistake again of not eating garlic when Danny is devouring it. The two days in non garlic purda were very long indeed and strenuous as I had to breath through my mouth. We eat a lot of garlic. In fact our consumption has rocketed over the last two years...
read moreHow to save tomato seed easily and the Gardening Which? blind tasting test results for the tastiest tomatoes
This idea was given to me by Amalee Issa in a comment on a tomato post that I wrote. Amalee writes the quirky blog The Garden Diaries of Amalee Issa and is well worth a visit. Not just gardening and always entertaining. Basically all you have to do is spread the seed on a piece of paper and let it dry in a warm room. Mark the piece of paper with the variety and store somwhere dry. In the Spring peel off the dried seed and sow as normal. I tried it last year and every seed germinated. Forget the fretting over water and seeds. This is easy...
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