Allotment 19/10/10

The first frost of this Autumn, in Dorset anyway, was on Sunday. Sunday was also my birthday. Do these 2 things occurring on the same day have any significance? Is it like the groundhog thing? Probably not, it just shows that winter is on the way so it's best to be prepared. If you get some of those dull jobs done now, such as digging over, then you don't have to do them in the middle of the cold, cold winter and that is why I spent about 6 hours last Wednesday moving my raised beds.
When I first got the allotment I had no experience of such things so the spacing between the beds was far too big and there was fair too much wasted space. It was a job that I had been putting off and finding excuses not to do as I knew it would be hard work but I had a surprise day off and the sun was out so no excuses.
I'm not going to bore you with heroic stories about how hard I worked but I did have blistered hands afterwards.
I did have to move a few plants but I'm pretty sure that they'll be ok. My chilli plants, however, have come inside. Last year I left them outside and the fruit didn't ripen leaving us with a lot of green chillies, which was ok but I wanted red ones. Having dug them up, replanted them and placed them next to my indoor chilli plants I noticed something interesting. The outdoor fruits are so much bigger. Really much, much bigger.




See. I have no idea why. Ah well, as long as they ripen I'll be happy.

Anyway, on to the main event. Nettle ale. What does it taste like?

Allotment 4/6/10

I come before you to report a rare success today. I have been a little failure heavy recently but some things are going alright.

 I have finally managed to get some carrots seeds to germinate. I know that this is usually very easy for most people but I seem to have a problem with them and I don’t know why. Anyway this is my 3^rd lot of seeds and some of them have germinated, this makes me very happy. Look at their tiny little green leaves,

And then there are the chillies on my window sill,

How lovely is that?

The elderflower is finally out here so there is only one sensible thing to do, until my gooseberries are ripe and I can make gooseberry and elderflower preserve that is, and that is make cordial. It is the loveliest thing in the world and it is really easy,

Take 1kg of sugar and pour over 750ml of boiling water and dissolve the sugar, then add 10 heads of elderflower, they look like this, if you don’t know,

Add 5grams of citric acid and a sliced lemon, you can grate a bit of rind in if you like, give it a stir and leave it for 24 hours. Then strain it and put it on sterilised bottles. It can last for 6 months in the fridge but won’t because it’s lovely. You can also put it in plastic bottles and freeze it until you need it but remember to leave room in the bottle for expansion.