Days of sowing and growing peas and beans

There's nothing like picking fresh peas and beans from my garden or allotment. Popping a perfect pea into my mouth or crunching into a mange tout pea which you've grown is such a summer pleasure.

Yet last year I hardly grew any. My allotment lay unloved and my garden was neglected too, as most of my free time seemed to be spent working or in hospitals visiting my husband or looking after him in between hospital stays.

That's why this year; priorities when it came to sowing seeds, after tomatoes, were peas and beans.

This year, I got my order in early with the Real Seed Catalogue, I've been buying from Real Seeds in Wales for quite a long time off and on. To be fair, you don't need to place an annual order with them as you can save your own seeds from their heirloom and heritage vegetables.. 

This year though, I bought these.....

There hasn't been an inch of space on the dining room table since the beginning of March when I started off the tomatoes

I know you can grown peas and beans straight into the ground, but living in the middle of the countryside, I know from experience that  sowing into trays indoors gets far better results.

One of my long standing favourite pea is the rare yellow golden sweet yellow mange- tout pea . These peas grow tall and I've always grown them up a wigwam of canes, both on the allotment and in the courtyard facing my kitchen window. Their pale yellow pods almost become translucent in the direct sun, and they really are a talking point when people see them, both as they're being grown and  on the plate!

So, a very much tried,tested and loved variety of pea, and the first sowing is already growing in situ in the courtyard.

I've also ordered a semi dwarf pea called Rosakrone for the first time. It's always nice to try something new don't you think?

This is an unusual, very rare heirloom variety from Sweden. Apparently the red/pink flowers are very pretty, reaching around five feet in height, but I'm afraid if you want to buy some this year , you're too late - they're all sold out.

I shall try to save some seed for next year....

Onto beans, and broad beans are a favourite to sow early. I have tried sowing these in Autumn and overwintering them but it's such a hit and miss affair, I now wait. I sowed this first lot in early March and they're now in the garden growing very strongly. They're from Real Seeds again and they're called Aquadulce Longpod ...another  variety I haven't grown before. They're a dwarf variety, about three foot tall. I've planted them  in a small area just  behind the old privy in the garden, which earlier in  the week was a mass of nettles. I've dug and dug them out, and added some peat free compost, so am hoping for a good crop.

Of course it's too early to sow runner beans yet, but I'm looking forward to trying "The Czar"this year for the first time. You can either pick them as runner beans or can leave some to produce white beans for drying. I'm going to try them both ways. I couldn't resist opening the packet to have a sneaky peak at the beans....they're beautifully smooth and I do love a tasty, fat butterbean.

 As for climbing beans, I've still got about fifteen Mr Fothergill's "Cobra beans left from last year , which always do well so I will sow them at the end of this month.

I have already sown a tray of "Aquilon"dwarf french beans...a new variety to me from France.
On 1st April, I thought I would pop some in to see how long they take to germinate. They've absolutely romped away and will have  to go in the cold frame soon. There's plenty more to sow too.

To say I'm really pleased with the germination rate of all these varieties of peas and beans is an understatement  - so far, it's a whopping hundred per cent.

My mouth is already watering at the thought of all the broad bean frittatas, pea risottos, vats of french beans simmering in olive oil and tomatoes a la greque, and those first precious boilings of runner beans to come.

Now all I need to do is to first go and sort out the allotment ....

Days of admiring and eating artichokes

Yes, I know I should have harvested my globe artichokes back in early July. I didn't, and although I've never let an artichoke plant flower before, the result is stunning.

I've been mesmerised on the allotment this week by the sheer beauty of watching these artichokes flower.

 

They really do make a statement don't they? Standing upright, aloof almost , ignoring their more humble thistle cousins which are also on the lottie, and posing saying "look at me" 

 

 

I 've been doing exactly that - from all angles, at different times of the day, marvelling at how they look in different lights.

Artichokes are so good natured too, not being fussy about the soil so long as it doesn't get waterlogged. I confess that I haven't mulched them with well rotted manure as you're supposed to and I've left the watering to the heavens above, but still they stand and produce.

I'm going to divide them next year....and not let them flower. After all, they're now a superfood, brimming with antidoxidents...so much so, I'm told they're better than blueberries and broccoli.

If they're easy to grow, they're so easy to cook too...I just bung them in my large stockpot filled with boiling water until they're tender...about 45 minutes or so for the larger ones, and serve with a vinaigrette dressing or melted butter.

That's where Uncle Barry comes into the story. I cannot eat an artichoke without thinking of him.

It was the year of my friend Jenny's fiftieth birthday in France. She threw a beautiful and civilised  lunch party  in a chateau in the Charente Maritme  which was followed by a riotous barbecue at her family cottage, which Iachieved legendary status for many reasons.

We took our two youngest with us, and afterwards motored over to near Limoges to stay with my husband's Uncle Barry. When I first met him, he must have been in his forties, he'd flown over for his mother's funeral...looking oh so Left Bank Professor, a velvet jacket, a cravat, Cuban heels and windswept longish dark hair tinged with grey. I adored him.

By the time he was living in Limoges, he was in his sixties, such a gently spoken man, who hesitated occasionally when speaking in English, to catch the right  word. He'd been living in France since his twenties after a stint with the Special Boat Service. Two lovely French wives and two gorgeous daughters later, he'd come to Limoges for a quiet life, to fish, to enjoy life.

And that was the night I remember....after arriving late afternoon, wine thrown into our hands , a walk and then a meal. But everything took a long time....and when he brought out the first course about 10 pm, we were all ravenous.

He placed the artichokes on the table, with a bowl of melted butter and one of vinaigrette. My boys looked  at their plates...I'd never served them artichokes before.

Barry taught them how to eat them...."carefully take off each leaf scale, one by one yes that's it...you can't rush this. Dip each one in the dressing...., slowly now..."

All I can say is they tried, but didn't like the artichokes. Barry was sorrowful...."they're English" as if that explained everything.

And I suppose it did, for the next course there was a huge vat of curry, which, being English , we love and adore and which we devoured. By now it was midnight, and the boys drifted off to bed.

I got up too, to take the plates back into the kitchen before toddling off to bed, but then Barry appeared with a tray .Three iced glasses and a bottle of  frozen vodka , a nightcap to toast our visit.

At 2am, we were still sitting out under the stars....somewhat worse for wear, but chatting and laughing about everything and anything, including a gentle reminder, that artichokes are good for you, and the boys should really learn to like them.

The following night, artichokes didn't appear on the menu, but another huge vat of curry did.........





 

The day I got a big surprise at the Village Show

The beginning of September has a different feel.It's been cold in recent nights, and although the weekend was warm and sunny, there's a different feel and smell in the air. Autumn ...and then it's the oh so fast slippery slope to winter.

Of course , there are compensations! Harvest! At the allotment there's an abundance of apples and plums, the runner beans, although slow to start, are now in full production and I've been picking climbing french beans for a few weeks now. I'm still digging up  up potatoes too, although it's the last row now as I only planted some first and second earlies.

The beginning also marks the joint annual village show of a number of villages close by. I have an allotment at one of them, and Monica , the wonderful allotments organiser, encouraged us to enter the show.

I didn't consider it initially - after all, I don't grow the best vegetables or the most on the allotments, and I'm still learning. But no one else apart from Monica and Christine seemed game, so on Friday I rang Monica . "What classes are you entering" she asked. "Fruit and beans" I answered.. So, I was told to turn up at the village hall , pay my entry fees for each class and then display them.

The entry fees were nominal, 20p for each class! And  the organisers were so friendly, showing me where to go, and were so encouraging.

I was looking at the exhibits already displayed and almost decided to go straight home, but then Monica came over, and gave me a few tips.

"Good, you've got the strings on your beans" she said and advised to get six the most compatible in size. I'd bought lots in my basket and started measuring them.

Then it was onto the plums and apples sections with more advice.

Everything displayed and my number attached to each exhibit, it was time for a chat with everyone else. , who were all very  friendly and welcoming. There was just time to have a look at all the displays, but by then the judges were arriving so we were  all shooed out of the hall.

When I returned in the afternoon, I couldn't have been more surprised if you had slapped me around the face with a piece of wet fish.

"Come and look" said one of the organisers with a big smile..."you've done well for your first time"

I received a third for my dish of three plums.

There was even better news for my beans

And I burst out laughing when I got a first and a best in  section for fruit.

Now I'm one of the least competive people I know, I like the buzz of doing things for pleasure not for winning, but I genuinely was so pleased.

And it's all thanks to Monica who encouraged me to enter, and who was so helpful. I shall now call her  my mentor Monica, not just because of this weekend , but all the helpful advice she gives to everyone on the allotments. Not so long ago, she lost the sight in one eye after a really nasty car accident. Many would have given up running the allotments, or let somebody do all the work for a while. Not a bit of it, she carried on regardless, and I for one, am so grateful for the work she does on our behalf.



Now, this is may be just a small village show, and it's only the second  I've attended , but what I loved was the genuine warmth and camaradie there. Everyone admired what was displayed, it brought the three villages together, and I couldn't get over what talent there was in the cake, bread, and bottling sections. 

But this year, there weren't so many entries as usual I'm told, and this is worrying for some. If no one enters, then shows like this could come to an end. And that's a crying shame. In the old days, these shows were a focal point for all the villagers to get together and celebrate the food they had grown for their families, to find beauty in the flowers and fruits of their labours.

A Saturday in a lovely rural village, celebrating  time honoured traditions, meeting up with like minded people who like growing and making things, all made an entertaining afternoon.. And I shall be back next year!

Meanwhile next Saturday I'm off to another village show at the other end of Leicestershire. This is quite a big show - but I'm not there to enter. I'm making an hour long edition of BBC local radio's longest running gardening show , finding out what goes on behind the scenes, and it will be great to get some tips for next year's village show near where I live too.