I declare this window-sill full!

It’s February, and now is the time to hunt through the seed packets and start sowing this years crop. The weather is still still erratic where I live in Glasgow and I don’t feel I can put any seedlings out to fend for themselves in the ground just yet; especially when weather forecasters are predicting snow for next week. This has not stopped me from sowing seeds however, and now I am running out of room on my window-sills and you can see!

Even if the weather decides to act against me I have my secret weapon…heated propagators! I now have two and they are working remarkably well. I daringly decided to plant some of February’s seeds in January and to my surprise the seedlings started to appear.

I have at least 14 tomato plants with more waiting to be transplanted into slightly bigger pots, various chilli and pepper plants, cumin, parsley, basil, aubergines broad beans, and marigolds currently growing so it is no surprise that I am running out of room to put them. Unfortunately I have two enemies who will stop at nothing to prevent my seedlings from growing: my cat, and the fruit fly.

My cat loves mountaineering, so frequently my husband and I will find her on top of things and wonder how on earth she reached such a perilous height. She also likes sitting on windows-sills and looking out at the world. She is currently prevented from doing this as the window-sills are currently occupied. This does not stop her. I have come home to find my plants on the floor, soil spilling out on the carpet and a little furry face looking at me as though saying “who me?!”. She knocks the tops of the seed trays as well, this would not be so bad but this usually means the lids knock the leaves of the emerging seedlings as well.

As for the fruit fly, they love plants as well. I have got a weapon to use against them: carnivorous plants. Hopefully they shouldn’t go hungry!

Recipes

As readers will know I had a glut of marrows last year which I turned into Marrow and ginger marmalade. Here is the recipe I used:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/7565/marrow-and-ginger-jam

Making marmalade (yes I know it says jam but at this recipe uses lemons it is technically a marmalade) is a lot easier than I thought. I thought I would have to buy all sorts of expensive jam making equipment. In the end I bought a cheapish stock pot from Ikea (£20 if memory serves) and some jam sugar. I also bought jam jars, but really all you need to do is save jars and lids when you’ve finished with them. Sterilising jars is easy enough. You’ll find plenty of advice on that on the net (by the way, you don’t need a pressure cooker. I haven’t got one). I generally sterilise my jars in the oven.

I also had a glut of tomatoes at verious stages of ripeness. Two very large bags worth in fact. So I tried two recipes for these:

http://www.allotment.org.uk/recipe/906/green-tomato-chutney-recipe/

This is lovely with a cheese board on in cheese sandwiches or however you like really.

http://southernfood.about.com/od/greentomatoes/r/bl30322v.htm

This is green tomato ketchup. I would give this a 6.5 out of 10. I didn’t use any ‘pickling spices’ mentioned in the recipe. If I make this again I will add something in the way of herbs and spices, but I don’t know what. However this is nice used as ordinary ketchup,

I would put a link to this next recipe as the idea for it came from Jamie Oliver’s 30 minute meals, but I can’t find one. This meant that when I decided I would make it, I couldn’t find a recipe to follow, so I had to make it largely from memory. I am pretty sure Jamie Oliver called it a spicy Sicilian pesto. But I could be wrong, so I am calling it a slightly spicy pesto.

Ingredients:

Cherry Tomatoes (I used about 6)

1 Red chilli

Parmasan

Olive oil

big bunch of basil (I used anise basil, mainly because I’ve got some growing on the window sill)

cashew nuts.

Clove of garlic

You’ll notice I’ve not put any amounts on this, that’s because when I made it I did it by eye and what looked about right. There are two good things about this pesto recipe. The first is the amount of oil used…you don’t need much! I put this down to the cherry toms, as the wetness in them helps to combine the pesto. The second thing is pesto is so easy to make. All you have to do is bung all the ingredients in a blender and whizz until done. I de-seeded the chilli first, but that’s all. If you feel like a slightly different sort of pesto with your pasta, I can recommend this. It is really nice.

Update:

I have just tried this recipe, with a few alterations due to store cupboard restrains. I didn’t have any harrissa paste – so I used chilli paste. I didn’t have any red onions, so I used white onions. I didn’t have any almonds or preserved lemons so they got left out. Also instead of the yoghurt mix I just put a dollop of sour cream on the top, which worked really well! Result – I will definitely be making this again.

http://www.itv.com/lifestyle/food/cooks/recipesseriesfour/tx23moroccanchickpeastew/default.html

 

Review of 2010

Lets take a moment to think about 2010…

 

 

 

 

Finished? New year is traditionally the time to make new years resolutions. My resolution: never make any more new years resolutions! In my case they are a waste of time.

 

New year is also the time for (let’s whisper it) diets, and don’t the advertisers know it! Weight loss videos and home food delivery (no fresh vegetables included…and you think I’m joking! Look at the small print at the bottom of the screen next time) to help you lose weight. It is January 2^nd, and I am fed up with them already.

 

Next up – television. Although I like the new Doctor Who series it seems to lack something. A certain spark. Other’s close to me (no not my husband) say it lacks David Tennant. But I’m not going into that debate. Sherlock on the hand, written and produced by the same writers, has that spark, and so far it is the only series I am actively looking forward. As a long standing whovian I shall watch the new series out of loyalty, but it has become far too commercial in my opinion.

 

I am entering the last stages of the first bit of my photography course and thanks to my friend I now have lots of reading in that area so no excuses! The freeze provided some excellent opportunities for snowy scenes. My favourite pictures taken in this period were some close-ups of frost. Which I shall share some other time.

 

I am amazed at how hardy purple sprouting broccoli appears to be. Despite being frozen and drowned in snow the plants still appear to be alive and kicking! This year I am going to try companion planting. This means putting plants near each other to ward of pests. Marigolds are good for putting off carrot fly for example and I’ve just found out that a good companion plant for raspberries is ragwort/tansy. So it looks like I shall be looking for ragwort in a verge near me – it is a weed after all. I shall find some and put it in a container to stop it spreading to the rest of the garden that should puzzle the neighbours! I am also going to try and propagate cuttings. I have got a large amount of lavender, a largish rosemary, sage and thyme that I would like to try and take cutting from and see if I can grow them.

 

The bottle gourds are worth a small mention at this point. I first saw bottle gourd bird houses and feeders in Germany. Basically you grow the bottle gourd, dry it, drill a hole in it, tip out the seeds, and bingo! You have a bird house! Need I say this is a vastly simplified version of the instructions? Either way I wanted to have a go. I found out you can get seeds for gourds if you are living anywhere but Britain! I nearly gave up, but luckily my husband found a company that sells them, so I will be starting that off this year as well!

 

I might also try my hand at foraging. I fancy picking wild mushrooms (the edible ones, not the ones that induce projectile vomiting). There is a yearly wild mushroom foraging that takes place in Aberfoyle that I keep missing. I’ll try not to this year! The other three things I fancy foraging for are: Wild garlic, I know some places where this grows but I am not sure about foraging rules. I know you cannot dig up an entire plant as it is a wild flower. Blackberries, raspberries current etc. They seem to grow in abundance around here – so urban hedgerow jam here we come! Finally samphire – poor man’s asparagus as it is called. If you have never tried it do so, it is delicious. You can usually buy it from fishmongers, and waitrose sells it occasionally as well. The last time I had samphire I fried it for a couple of minutes in butter (nom nom nom!). There are other ways you can prepare it though.

Some pictures!

Eeep!

Has it really been two and a bit months since my last post? Well I can see from the date it has. All I can say is:

I’M BAAACK!!!

So the last post was the beginning of August. What has happened since then…

Garden:
The courgettes threatened to take over the garden. So courgettes get the thumbs up. Next year I shall be growing more interesting varieties. I have yellow and round varieties to try!

The chillies I set off late February were very successful. I had so many of them that they are currently hibernating in the freezer. Other varieties I tried were less successful, but I think that was largely due to the size of pot and inconsistency when watering. Still I know for next year. I have special chillies for next year…

To my delight a couple of the black peppers grew to an edible size. They taste just like yellow or orange peppers to me, but are a more interesting colour; so I shall be trying for more next year!

The quick grow salad: Again a thumbs up, but I think I shall be sticking to rocket and mild salad. I tried a red leaf mustard variety and let me say, you need to eat that stuff young, if the leaves get to big they blow your head off!

Carrots: Purple carrots! They grew to a nice size and were purple! I’ve got black ones for next year!!

Herbs: I am getting the hang of herbs. The herbs I grew from seed are surviving after some mistrials. I have about 7 different varieties of basil going at the moment. I’ve got oregano, tarragon, and lemon grass (this doesn’t seem very happy, I think it may be too cold for it even indoors, still I have plenty of seed for summer.)

Tomatoes: Blimey! Like the courgettes I ended up with a lot of these. I have interesting coloured varieties for next year!

Alpine Strawberries: Red and White. I have to say the red are tastier. The white ones are good though. Yes I did have a problem telling white from unripe red but I know how to tell the difference: If they come off the plant easily, they’re ripe. Seems to work for me.

Ongoing: Saffron crocuses. Oh yes I am in the process of growing my own saffron! Imagine my delight when I found saffron crocuses liked the cold?! Perfect! I finally have wild garlic plants. These are a recent addition and I’m not expecting anything usable for a couple of years, but I can’t wait to try out recipes I’ve seen for ‘wild garlic pesto’ and so on.

Since I had a glut of courgettes which turned into marrows I had to use them somehow. So I gritted my teeth and braved…jam making! Actually it is a lot easier than I thought it would be. I made marrow marmalade partly to use up the marrows and partly because marrow marmalade sounds strange, the taste isn’t however.
The other glut of crops I had were tomatoes. More specifically green tomatoes. I found a recipe for green tomatoes chutney. Let me say it is great with cheese! Also from the same site I made green tomato ketchup. It’s more a sort of greeny-brown but it’s home-made and I don’t care. Tastes a lot like regular ketchup, however I think I will be adding more herbs to it if I make it again.

So endth a quick round-up of garden news. Pictures will appear sometime.