It seems like quite a while since I have had something allotment related to blog about. October was pretty much taken up with sending the puppies off to their new homes and of course we had Halloween, which the kids really enjoyed.

Once October was out the way and the kids returned back to school, I got my first chance to plant out my garlic bulbs, which had been sitting around for a while waiting to be put in. We had had some rain, so the ground was not that great to work with. I avoided digging it over again, and opted instead for a quick hand weed and a light rake over. I planted out some Elephant Garlic and some Avignon bulbs, the latter I grew last year and have been so impressed with the results that I decided to grow the same variety again. I am looking forward to seeing how the Elephant garlic turns out as this will be the first time that I have tried growing it. I covered the area with a bit of net to stop the birds pulling the bulbs up and to try deter the farm dog which comes over the compost heap,  from wandering over the patch. The dog, which is a big rottweiler, has left a couple of presents for me on plot one over the last couple of weeks. Not sure whether I should report it or not. Don’t want to upset the farmer that supplies us with free manure.  Might just have to start covering stuff with chicken wire etc.

Last year I Planted out some Japanese onion sets which grew well and reached a nice size. But I found that they didn’t keep that well, and went off quite quickly. This year I have tried ‘Troy’ which should have been planted out in September, but didn’t make it into the ground until last week. Not sure if that makes much of a difference or not. We will have to see. Last year’s overwintered onions were planted out in very neat rows.  This year, I opted for the ‘dot them in all over a spare patch‘ approach, as this method worked really well with my pickling onions grown earlier this year.

November has bought me Brussels, Red cabbage, Leeks and Parsnips for us. And Kale and Chard for the Chickens and Guinea Pigs. The Guinea’s love Kale! I keep promising myself to give it a go myself, perhaps steam it or stir fry it, but there is plenty left so, I should get my chance before Christmas. I had a hard time slicing off the Brukale Petite Posy florets, as they were quite small, and despite the plant’s ornamental value I wouldn’t grow it again just for me to eat – for the chicken’s maybe.

I was determined to give pickling a go this year. The small onions I grew ended up in soups and stir frys instead of the pickling jar, so that left me with my Kalibos Red Cabbage. I got some nice heads, probably about 3/4 of them turned out good enough to pickle, the rest was given to the animals. I had saved some jars earlier in the year and set about sterilising them in the usual way. The cabbage simply had to be washed, shredded and left in salt for 24 hrs. Once rinsed it was crammed into my jars and the pickling vinegar poured straight in. Easy! I am so proud of my two jars of pickled red cabbage. I will keep one for me and give one to my Mum. I had some small Jalapeno chilli’s sitting in the fridge which were just begging to pickled, so I used up my left over vinegar on them. These were sliced open, stalks, seeds and fleshy bits removed, they were washed and had boiling water poured over them and left for 5 mins. In that 5 mins I heated up the left over vinegar in a saucepan with a tablespoon of  caster sugar. Once the sugar dissolved I removed form the heat and left to cool slightly. The chilli’s were packed into the jar with a couple of bay leaves picked from the bush in my garden and some Black peppercorns. I was supposed to sprinkle some Coriander seeds in there too, but I didn’t have any, so I poured the vinegar into the jar with things that I did have. Simplicity is key with me, I am sure the chilli’s will taste great!

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Whats left to harvest?  Plenty of Brussels, it would be nice to save some for Christmas dinner, but I don’t know if they will last that long without getting too big.  One huge Savoy cabbage left on plot one. I must bring it home, but want to find a recipe to do it justice, rather than just serving up as it is. Perhaps use the large crinkly leaves as wraps around something tasty. I will hit the books! Plenty of parsnips and leeks left too. The Parsnips are huge. They really liked that bit of soil on plot two. They were so long,  that I found it hard to dig them up without snapping off the bottom bit.  Because the soil is so wet, they come out of the ground caked in mud so I have been chucking them in a sack and rinsing them off as required back at home. They seem to keep well in the sack, although I only harvest two or three at a time as they are so big.

The Celeriac was a complete failure, I managed to get one usable stem, which was more of a gnarled lump than a swollen stem, but it got chucked into the pot with one of my veggie soups. The Salsify is still growing, I will try to harvest that in December.

Talking of root veg, I have been making some lovely veggie soups with my harvests, I call it Allotment Soup, as every veg in it has come off the allotment, including my lovely butternut and Sweet Dumpling Squash that have ripened beautifully. I cut a couple of these open yesterday and was so pleased to see the glorious orange flesh – last year’s butternut squash didn’t go too well, but I am over the moon with this year’s variety ‘Hunter’. I would certainly recommend these to anyone. Not massive things, but at least they ripen. I used up the last of my small onions yesterday, but still have lots of garlic left, which should keep me going for quite a while yet.

The Pak Choi is coming along, slowly but surely, as are the Winter density lettuce.  I have planted out some Spring Greens for next year, let’s hope the slugs don’t eat them all this time round.  The White and Purple Sprouting broccoli plants have come under attack from a yellow and black caterpillar.  I was surprised to see them this late in the year, they h ave done quite a bit of damage but nothing the plants shouldn’t be able to recover from over the winter.