Allotment Allsorts

Of course we don't have to confine ourselves just to my garden, so let's take a quick walk up the hill for a change of scene and explore the delights of my allotment. Along the way we meet the latest example of land grabbing in Chippenham. Until a couple of weeks ago, this site was just one house surrounded by a magnificent walled garden.The walled garden of my dreams which always bought a smile to my face as I passed it on the way to my allotment. Now there's rubble and the promise of 14 'retirement cottages'.

Today the scene at the gate is less gloomy than the one I found back in late December last year, though January's advertisement found just inside the gate is still there albeit a little dog eared. It's looking very different now...

Site view from Plot 14 - August 2008

To your right is the large oak tree standing over the loo, communal shed and my nearest water standpipe. In the middle is my plot (just to the left of the next door's brown shed), the top right hand bed you can see is packed full of Autumn Bliss raspberries. The top of the left hand bed has my manure heap plus a blue compost barrel with a volunteer potato growing out of it. The Veg Plotting archive section at the end of this blog shows this year's plan for rest of my plot. On the left are the trees forming the site's boundary with the main road. Most of the tall trees are Horse Chestnuts showing very obvious signs of leaf miner damage. Below these is an ancient ditch from the days when the site formed part of the Hardenhuish Estate with the more traditional hedgerow specimens along it, mainly hazel. Just to the right of these trees are views to the Wiltshire downs - as far as Westbury White Horse 30 miles away on a clear day. On summer Sunday afternoons the sounds of brass bands playing in the nearby John Coles Park can be heard when the wind's in the right direction.

Now, let's have a closer plot level view shall we? Starting with the left hand plot nearest the entrance gate.

Until this year, we've had no allotment people...

...but toddler Jack thought long and hard about it and insisted the whole street help him to put that straight :D

Meanwhile back on my plot...
Oops - the 'pile of useful things for later' appears to be reasserting itself. Hope the inspection team haven't noticed. Could I pretend we're playing a spot of 'allotment Jenga' if they do?

Which reminds me, here's a quick guide to 5 things an allotment plot shouldn't be without (all should be available at a skip near you):

1. Pallets - for building award winning sheds, or compost bins, decking, raised beds, cold frames, shed stands or whatever
2. Bricks - cold frame sides, weighing down stuff
3. Tyres - water butt stands, water butt (stack with a heavy duty pond liner inside), weighing down stuff, potato tubs (stack with compost inside), small impromptu coldframes
4. Carpet (sadly banned on our lottie now as it's deemed a rat hazard) as a weed suppressing mulch, a cover for your pile of poo (assuming the animals haven't been grazing on Aminopyralid treated grass first)
5. Your choice - do add them to the Comments section below!

Here's what makes everything worthwhile - a selection of current crops and dreams of harvests to come:

Clockwise from top left: 1. Raspberry 'Autumn Bliss' 2. Courgette 'Defender' 3. Blueberry 'Top Hat' 4. Lettuce 'Little Gem' 5. Apple 'Falstaff' 6. Sweetcorn 'Swift' 7. Borlotti Bean 'Lingua di Fuoco' 8. Onion 'Red Baron' 9. Pear 'Concorde'

I'm sure your produce will put mine to shame - what are you harvesting at the moment?

Plus, there's some glut busting ideas to follow...

Beat the Glut

Marrow stripes - July 2008

August and September sees our harvest in full swing and with a number of crops in glut. Courgettes (zucchini) are notorious for this - back in June/July you may find just one small courgette per plant, then the next time you look there's armfulls of them. We always host a curry evening in August and put a crate of them out for our visitors to help themselves, having tried the product already in my husband's vegetable curry.

With this in mind, I've put together a few of my favourite 'glut busting' recipes. Some may already be old favourites of yours or you may have a similar version, but I think there should be something new here to tempt and tickle your tastebuds. Let me know how you get on if you decide to try any of them.

Any allotmenteer worth their salt is also a great soup maker. Here's my version of the genre. I've also added New Covent Garden Soup Company's Courgette and Brie Soup as a variation.

Soup should have lots of fresh, homemade bread to mop it all up - Courgette, Tarragon and Lemon Bread gives an easy to make more unusual, flavoursome twist on the old classic.

No soup, but you have some cheese to go with your bread? Then Glutney chutney's just the thing to go with it.

It's teatime? You love carrot cake? Then this Courgette Cake recipe's going to blow you away.

Right, we have enough recipes for snacks and tea-time treats. Here's a few more savoury recipes to make a more substantial meal.

For starters there's my favourite dish from Greek holidays - Courgette Fritters. For a main course I have two choices for you - Baked Courgette Omlette or Butternut Squash Risotto.

Oops, I appear to have overlooked tomatoes somewhat in the glutbuster stakes. It's probably because I had total crop failure last year owing to blight and this year's only just coming into production (I only grow outdoor varieties). So lets redress the balance a little with my favourite basic tomato recipe, Roasted Tomato Sauce.

What's your favourite Glut Busting recipe?

The Plotting Sheds

I'm a girl with riches - the proud possessor of two sheds. The first one is at home. It was pretentiously called a Summerhouse at 'Shedworld' in Bristol where we bought it, but dubbed by us as 'The Shed with Windows' ever since it's been gracing our lower patio. We bought it in 2001 and NAH managed to erect it pretty much all by himself, though it was a bit touch and go when the roof went on and so our neighbour was called in to help. Naturally it's a favourite with our two cats, who spend quite a lot of time up there chilling out and birdwatching - thankfully not bird catching.

Men at Work - April 2001

When I got my allotment in late 2003, I was delighted to find my plot already had a shed. It held traces of the previous owner - I still use the wellies, but have replaced the coat. The shed sort of hunkers down at the end of my plot. It looks like it might fall down at any moment, but surprisingly has remained dry inside and has TARDIS like qualities as far as storing some of my 'useful stuff for later' is concerned. I don't store anything of value up there as we've had a couple of break-ins over the years. The first break-in resulted in me acquiring a new pair of gloves. This gave me visions of a kind of 'reverse burglar' in operation - finding what's lacking in allotment sheds and donating the goods. These were then taken during the next break-in as was the unlocked padlock on my door. I've also had to quit my shed during the past three springs as I've had robins nesting above the door. They've rewarded my consideration by doing a good job in keeping the allotment pests down to a minimum.

Clockwise from top left:
1. General view 2. No shed is complete without ladybird drawing pins! 3. Guess how often I've worn these (they've been in there for over a year)? 4. Shed interior

Any Questions?

Now it's over to you!

What else would you like to know about my garden or plot? I also welcome constructive feedback, good or bad. I call this version my 'learning garden' as it was my first major design and planting. Who knows how it will look in 2, 5 or 10 years time as I add to my knowledge?

I'm not a gardening expert, just enthusiastic. If I don't know the answer to your question straight away, I'll let you know and get back to you later.

Now don't forget those all important refreshments, nor the plant sales area to complete your visit. And of course there's the Guest Book to sign...

From the Veg Plotting Archives...

Tales from our Sing For Water Preparations:

• Rehearsals Start
• The Practice CD
• Focus on the Horizon
• The Concert - Singing for Water for real!
• Rehearsing for London - 13th September
• Flushed with Success - the London Concert

Reviews of books available in the grand giveaway:

• 101 Bold and Beautiful Flowers - James Alexander-Sinclair
• Jekka's Complete Herb Book - Jekka McVicar
• The Allotment Keeper's Handbook - Jane Perrone
• New Gardening - How to Garden in a Changing Climate - Matthew Wilson

Posts to help with your orientation and trip around the garden:

• Where am I Veg Plotting? - An introduction to Wiltshire and Chippenham
• Our Skimble & Jess - More about our 2 cats
• Introducing the Patio - How we designed it
• Garden Whimsy - some of my spur of the moment finishing touches to the garden
• Allotment Plan 2008 - The crop plan for this year

The Allotment Keeper's Handbook

This review first appeared in Veg Plotting on 4th September 2008.

It's been a rainy day here in Chippenham, so I've had a chance at last to catch up with some of my 'book log' (i.e. book back log). I always have a number of books on the go at one time, with a number forming an orderly queue behind them. Leaping over them all in an effortless bound today is Jane Perrone's The Allotment Keeper's Handbook. It forms part of my Open Garden prize book stash, so demands a review without further ado.

Peruse the gardening shelve(s) in any bookshop at the moment and the number of titles on the subject of food growing and allotmenteering has (pardon the pun) mushroomed in the last couple of years or so. This title is a relative newcomer (published last year) and came after the time I was in search of my own allotmenteering bible. However, I've been enjoying Jane Perrone's blog Horticultural since I started blogging, so I was delighted when The Garden Monkey persuaded her to part with a signed copy for me to give away sometime in the next few weeks.

Unlike most of the books in this genre, The Allotment Keeper's Handbook falls into the practical sized volume - neither coffee table glossy nor impossibly large. It feels like it should have the reassuring words Don't Panic written on the cover in the style of Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. This is a book written from personal experience aimed at the beginner allotmenteer. It feels like you have that allotmenteering friend to show you the ropes right there in your hand - the friend I didn't have when I started my allotment 4 years ago.

This is a book that cuts right through the jargon, packing a lot of information, advice, anecdote and humour into a relatively small size. You won't find many photographs along the way, but that doesn't mean the book isn't useful. In fact it leaves the way clear to get the novice allotmenteer thoroughly started - from getting the right plot, cultivating it, right through to the final, satisfying harvest. There's also plenty of new information to keep relative old hands like me interested, such as the reputed use of carrots to attract nematodes away from the cucurbit family. This is the book to help you get your allotment licked into shape. Partner it with Joy Larckom's classic Grow Your Own Vegetables for more details on specific crops and you'll have the best help possible to get you started on your plot.

Sadly Jane has given up her allotment since writing this book. I wish her well in developing her new vegetable garden from scratch at her new home.

Allotment Plan 2008

Click on the picture to enlarge if needed

January's rainy weather gave me the ideal opportunity to finally plan where everything is to go this year. As you can see the more permanent features are in glorious technicolour and I then fit in the rest of the year's crops around these. As I produce a plan each year, I can make sure I keep a good crop rotation through the beds by referring back through the years. However, I don't necessarily stick to these plans, but it keeps me going in the right direction and I do update the plan as I go along.

The division into 4 main beds you can see was how the plot looked when I took it on in 2004. I then decided to sub divide these further into beds approximately 10 feet wide by 4 feet long - it makes the onerous tasks of digging/weeding etc seem much smaller when you're just doing a couple of small beds or so at a time! It also means that I don't walk on the crops when I weed or hoe them. There's a mulch path between each bed - mulched because I've used old compost bags as a weed suppresant and the mulch stops the bags from blowing away and me from slipping on them! Producing the plan has also given me a scarily long list of jobs to be done for the rest of January through February*, starting with manuring all the beds you can see highlighted in yellow on the plan. I hope the weather doesn't thwart my to do list!

* Not completed as usual