Family Moved in & Harvesting Continues

We have a new family who have moved into one of our compost bins, Mr and Mrs Slow worm.  Hopefully lots of babies to come.  Saw one slow worm in the compost bin earlier on in the year so he obviously decided to make it his new love nest.  Lovely to have creatures setting up home on the plot, often see little lizards in and around the raised beds too.



 



The beans are starting to come to an end now, apart from the runners which we keep producing for a few more weeks yet.  Picked the last few Hunters and Cobras today and only a few flowers left on the dwarf beans.  Been a good year though and the freezer is full.   The hops are getting close to harvest time, that will certainly be a full days work



The sunflowers are certainly brightening up the allotment now that the calendulas and poppies are almost done.  Sunflowers of all shapes and sizes, some about 10 foot tall, some as short as 10 inches.  Had to bring some home today to brighten up the kitchen, look lovely with a bit of fennel.



Todays haul - more beans, some chilli peppers, courgettes and tomatoberries.  Also the largest pattypan squash we have grown.  Also pickled 5 jars of beetroot today, still have loads more to dig up!

The Ultimate Allotment Sandwich!!

On the trip to the 'Lottie today I went prepared with couple of slices of bread, some cheese and a bit of salad dressing to make up a fresh lunch.

The contents of the sandwich ended up with this (everything in blue was grown and picked from the allotment):

• Cheese (not from the Allotment)


• 2 very small red Habanero chillies (finely chopped)


• 1 small Medina chilli (finely chopped)


• 3 radishes, 2 white one red (finely sliced)


• A sliced tomatoberry


• a Sliced Crystal Lemon Cucumber


• Little Gem Lettuce


• Lola Rossa Lettuce


• And a good dollop of Honey & Mustard dressing.

You just can't get a fresher sandwich than that, all washed with rain water, and the chillies and radish certainly gave it a kick.

Oh and I did some work weeding and stuff, and picked a load of veg again :)

Brewday : Elderberry Wine

Every year I go out foraging for Elderberries, I really like this wine and have made it now almost every year since I started brewing.

This batch, which I intend to make several, is a early batch of elderberry wine, as the berries on the trees are just coming into fruit.

I got my required 1.5kg of berries (stripped from the stalks), but there are quite a few unripe ones in there, so I hope this won't effect the flavour of the finished wine.

The berries are then put in the bucket and crushed with a potato masher, then I top up the bucket to the 5 litre mark with boiling water.

This is then allowed to cool and then it is fermented on the fruit for a week, no sugar is added yet, this is done a bit later on and I'll blog it then.

I'm making this wine the same way as I always do, more details on this page.

Brewday: Apricot Wine

 I was given a nice bag of little Apricots from a mate at work, (thanks Les)  They are only little tiny ones but I had a taste and they are very nice.

 After Cutting and stoning all of them, which took forever, I ended up with 1.048kg of fruit

Put all the fruit into my fermentation bucket added 1kg of sugar then poured boiling water over the top to the 5 litre mark on the bucket, stirred it all up until  the sugar was dissolved.

Let this cool over night then added the yeast in the morning. I'll leave this now to ferment on the fruit for a while then transfer it to a demijohn to finish.

Hop Growing 2014 season (Part 4)

Got a good picture of the hops this weekend.

From left to right, Fuggles, Target, Challenger and Goldings all mixed up together.

The Hops are now starting to form on the bines now so that's great. I just hope that in the latest high winds that the poles stay up and the main stems don't break.

The Goldings (REDSELL'S EASTWELL GOLDING) and the Challenger are all wrapped up in each other so it's going to be a right pain to sort them out come harvest time. Might just harvest the lot as one and make a beer up using the mixed hops, it's a good job that one is a duel purpose hop.

Hoppyness, Hoppyness, the greatest gift that I possess

Apologies to Ken Dodd for the title first of all.  The hops are indeed doing very well, despite the tail of end of Hurricane Bertha giving them a bit of a bashing today.  Not very much rain with it, just some strong gusts of wind that were testing the poles integrity.  The hops are flowering and hopefully will produce much hoppy goodness for Simons brewing.







Really pleased with the produce that is coming back from the plots, all of it down to Simons hard work really, I just go down and pick beans really, do a bit of weeding and generally stand back and admire all Simons dedication.   Brought back another big bag of beans and crystal lemon cucumbers today, and some peppers and swiss chard.  Freezer is full of beans so having to eat them.  Lots.  And lots.



Simon checking things out in his wonderful pepper greenhouse.  All looking good in there.  He munched on a Habenero today.  Ouch.



One of our Invincible pumpkins, have a few coming along nicely now.  Should go black on the outside and be bright orange on the inside.  Headed towards a spot of beer making I reckon.



Our one and only marrow, earmarked for homemade marrow and ginger jam which is my all time favourite.  Will let this grow for quite some time yet I think.





The jungle, AKA the polytunnel.  Somewhere in there are multiple cucumbers, both 'normal' and crystal apples, and a melon.  Its looking good but couldnt get close enough to photograph due to the prickly cucumbers.  Oodles of tomato berries too, mostly green at the moment.



Simons lettuce bed.  Not sure why the funny babbits are leaving this alone, would have thought it would suit Peter Rabbit to a tee.  However they remain perfect and un-nibbled.

And finally, Simon with our tallest sunflower so far, the bank of sunflowers is looking lovely but they are all facing the wrong way due to the suns direction!

Bottled : Blackcurrant & Plum Wines

 

Bottled up the Blackcurrant and Songold Plum Wines today, so we now have another 12 bottles of wine in the Cabin Brewery. Both wines are lovely and clear and I got six full bottles of each wine. (750ml)

The Blackcurrant wine came out great with a nice medium sweet and very fruity flavour and the Songold Plum is a very good sweet wine due to the fact I stopped the ferment early. Both wines really do the fruit used justice. 

Still picking Beans and Cucumbers

The beans are still coming, 2 kg picked on this run, although the dwarf French beans are nearly at a end the cobra and hunter climbing beans are still producing loads, with plenty of new flowers that will turn into even more beans.

Those crystal lemon cucumbers are certainly heavy croppers, they just keep growing and growing, picked another 10 today, started eating these now as a quick snack while down the allotment. Eating them just like apples.

The beetroot are doing great still, these where harvested for my mother to have as we now have plenty of pickled beetroot. We do have plenty more in the ground still with a second sowing now poking their heads up.

Picked a few more courgettes as well, as unlikely as it seams we had run out of them in the fridge at home.

A single Yummy Sweet Pepper was ready, at the orange stage, so brought that one home to add to the others in the fridge.  May use these for another Hot Sauce along with some hot peppers.