Beet poet

And the reason I had leftovers to use up: a TV night in with my friend Mel.

We had Campari soda, naturally, before this salmon and salad. I never usually relish a supermarket cooked beet, but these baby beets with black pepper were luscious! 

I have nothing to say about poetry, I just enjoy a terrible pun.

Radishes are my vegetable of 2016 and at any one time I have a pack on the go. My only complaint is that they are a little mild, but I intend to grow them next year and will try a few peppery varieties. Recommendations gratefully received!

Slugged!

So my lovingly hand-reared courgette plants, and several tomato plants, made a fine delicacy for the slugs and snails. Oy! The remaining two weedy squash plants are now sulking inside next to a window. They would rather be outside in some soil but I have turned protective parent.

A regiment of underdeveloped toms are perched on a radiator (don't ask) in my Steptoe and Son back garden (really don't ask). I am going to plant these out; I can't think egg shells and coffee grounds will deter these Amazonian slimies but the toms have one last chance. Grow prickly and hairy, wee Monemakers!

In a funk of vegetable failure, I gave in to reality and signed up for a veg box delivery. Iam now looking forward to it - hungry anticipation mixed with admiration for large scale growing. Imagine the slug patrols on a farm! The first box arrives this week so to make room I cleaned my fridge and defrosted the tiny ice box. I am also eating everything up.

Tonight I'll eat the final courgettes with pasta. Lunch dealt with the rest:

(A lousy photo but it'll jog my memory for next time!)

June salad with bacon and Dijon potato salad

Scant teaspoon of Dijon mustard, mixed with mayonnaise. Add in cold, cubed, cooked potato (made twice this amount)

Pile up in a dish:

4 radishes (halved), third of a cucumber (sliced), half a yellow pepper sliced, a good handful of mange tout (blanched then run under cold water), a spring onion sliced.

My sister & her family were at a hog roast today so, feeling a little pork-envy, I fried some pancetta cubes and added them - along with bacon fat from the pan - on top. 

A squeeze of lime.

May days

April is the most astonishing month.

From misty to hail to sun, the weather is petulant.  And the garden follows suit! Hidden behind the ungiving frosty mornings the ground must secretly be warming, because suddenly the green flourishes. I had been anxiously seeking my peoney plants, worried they had been carelessly squashed or murdered by boisterous fence & shed replacements. I found them on a bleak Sunday in the gloaming evening, their red alien fists punching up through the soil; three weeks later and they were lush, green and a foot tall! Everything is burgeoning. Even the weeds...

I really enjoyed weeding in winter.  My battle with brambles and that sneaky, tenacious ivy actually seemed to be progressing - in my favour. But bring on the April showers and shy first sun and I have a dispiriting handicap, as if I am now fighting with one hand behind my back.  I see I can no longer be a weekender; it begins to seem as if longer days are provided for the sole purpose of keeping on top of the growing vegetation.

For the first time, I have been nurturing* seeds to life. I thought I had over-watered and rotted them, but it turns out that even they are keen to thrive. After 3 weeks of being ignored they sprang to life and now I am thrilled to be growing tomatoes (moneymaker), courgette, patty pan squash and butternut squash. I have some herbs on the go and Rose & Al gifted me two sturdy strawberry plants they have been bringing on.  

I put the seedlings outside yesterday to harden off, only to find it was warmer outside than inside the house. May has over stretched itself into July temperatures: such hot weather! Like being dropped into summer for a day. So today I shelter inside (ironically less hardy than the spindly, baby tomato plants) and make lunch.

 

Surprise-Summer lunch

1) Discover last year's elderflower cordial hasn't gone off & have with fizzy water & lemon.

2) Rootle in the fridge for salad items.  Layer up in a flat bowl:

Watercress; cucumber, cubed; radishes, halved, a spring onion, thinly sliced; avocado; red chilli which later turns out to be disappointingly mild, very finely diced.

Lemon juice, olive oil, black pepper & salt... you know the drill.

3) Make like the Larkin poem and enjoy it with all windows down, all sense of hurry gone.

* neglecting