Just a few days later, and the courgettes et al are growing unbelievably fast – they’ve gone from little two-leaf seedlings to this!…
The weather has been perfect, warm with lots of sun and rain, but nonetheless I’m surprised at the speed of growth and obviously very pleased. I just hope they keep going strong and produce lots to eat.
I’ve spent quite a lot of time in the last few days staring at the ground in the veg patch; hoping that if I stare long enough some little veg seedling will pop it’s head out and say hello.
Sweetcorn and runner beans are just coming up, but sadly some old packets of bush beans I found at the back of the cupboard don’t look at though they’re going to do anything at all, which is a real shame. Same thing goes for the carrots, which really don’t keep for more than a season, but luckily I have some more of those which are more recent.
One successful planting has been all the cucurbits. I had several packets of various odds and ends, pumpkins, hubbard, courgettes, etc and I have planted them all in my many and varied compost heaps. Last year I planted them direct into the soil, but as it’s so terrible they weren’t amused and refused to grow – by putting them into the compost heap I hope to give them all the nutrients they’ve ever wanted, and more besides! I just made a hollow in the top of the heap about the same size as a cereal bowl which I filled with soil/compost. Put seed in and water well. The warmth from the heap also speeded up germination by a couple of days.
This is not a tourist blog, and I don’t want to bore you with scenes of rural Normandy; but this weekend we were at the Marché d’Art at La Perrière and I felt it was worthy of note!
La Perrière is a small village (10 minutes from here) in the west of Le Perche. For one reason and another it has built up quite an artistic community and has become the venue for an annual art market. Every year local villagers open up spaces in their properties so that around 100 artists can exhibit their work – in old barns, gardens, basements, garages, living rooms; but also in marquees set up around the church, in an abandoned factory, etc…
It was a wonderful example of what can be achieved by a whole community working together; luckily the sun shone despite dire weather forecasts and the visitors were happy! Every stall had something different: watercolours, photography, oils, sculpture, wood carving… The local bar owner, Martin, was doing excellent business with his ham and spud cauldron
and a local percussion group were keeping flagging art buyers going with their thumping Brazilian (?!) drumming.
Here’s B trying to resemble a work of art!
If you’re in the area next year, the Marché d’Art is certainly worth a visit!
With the past two weeks of glorious sunshine, the rhubarb went into action and produced four stunning blooms. It does slow production to a near standstill, but luckily I have another 8 plants which don’t flower. I even managed to pick 3 kilos of prime rhubarb to sell to the local restaurant – the first time I’ve sold anything from the garden! Let’s hope it’s the beginning of a good season.
This is what happens when you don’t keep on top of the weeding; a carpet of invading buttercups has now taken over the chive bed…
The only compensation is that the chives don’t seem to mind (for now) and it makes a cheering show in the corner of the veg plot!
I put chive flowers in yesterday’s meal and the kids loved them – they’re like little, hot explosions in your mouth and the colour is fantastic.
I turned my back on the rhubarb plants for a couple of days and they’ve gone completely nuts! I’ve pulled off 6 kilos of the stuff just to try and keep abreast of the issue, but I can already see new shoots growing in front of my very eyes. For future use I really want to pick it when it’s smaller than this to get a better flavour .
What I want to know is if anyone has a good rhubarb recipe of the more unusual type – chutneys etc. I’ll be making the usual puddings but would like do try some more long-term bulk-processing recipes. Anything that I can make and put in jars is a winner in my book. Anyone have any ideas? Does rhubarb chutney work?…
As money is in such short supply, I’ve started selling bread (above) and pasta to local friends (and as the season progresses hopefully they’ll buy some veg too!)
The chickens have gone from laying no eggs EVER to laying more than we ever thought possible. This daily delivery has led to me making lots of pasta again… I’ve had this pasta machine for years, a classy bit of kit bought back in the days when we had money. Not only that, it’s made in Torino, Italy and not in China!
Pasta is a great way to use up eggs. For the 4 of us I use 300g of flour (recipes will tell you to use only the finest 00 flour, but I use whatever is in the cupboard and it tastes no different!) and 3 eggs. That’s it! Either kneed by hand or chuck in a food mixer like I do, then begins the fun part of rolling it through the machine. It’s very therapeutic and I highly recommend it!
Anyway, this time the purpose of making pasta was to do some experiments on the drying side of things. I usually cook it straight away, but it seems like a good idea to be able to make some and then store for a future emergency.
This is my home-made drying rack, it’s just a rake handle hanging off a couple of nails and is high-up to avoid children and cats. Hanging here are tagliatelle, linguine and pappardelle.
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