Potager update

We are well and truly enjoying a bumper crop of vegetables much to my surprise!!

The new (to us) yellow beans are wonderful, so soft & creamy.

As is usually the case I have far too many to eat all at once, so I have been busy blanching & freezing them and also handing them out to all & sundry.

The tomatoes are doing well after a slow start although I'm hoping there will still be some green ones left so I can try a recipe from the Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe cook book soon.

The same cook book has a great recipe for "summer squash casserole" which I have made twice with some extra large (ok, I forgot to pick them in time) round zucchini. My other half who always maintains that he hates courgettes loves the casserole and wants it on the menu as often as possible. Go figure!

a bientot

Potager produce

All things in the potager are flourishing and we are enjoying freshly picked vegetables and salad everyday.

Yesterdays supper included chou fleur & courgettes and tonight I'll serve the first tiny new potatoes which I dug up less than 15 minutes ago.

Bon appetit

Beetroot Bonanza

This is the first year that I have grown beetroot, I bought the young plantlets from a vendor at the local market in Le Molay Littry so can't claim all the glory but am pleased as punch with the results.

The first ones I harvested were cooked simply - skin on, tops cut off and then peeled & sliced, we ate them cold with ham & cheese but this week feeling a little more adventurous I made beet soup adapted from a Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe which I found in a magazine.

Delicious!

Flushed with success I've bought some beetroot seeds and hope to grow my own plantlets for a second crop.

Bon weekend a tout

Maggie

Potager Update

The weather this week has been variable, hot & sunny days followed by rainy nights. Ideal planting weather, so I now have 2 rows each of haricot vert & jeune, mixed salad leaves, spinach, 12 betrave and 6 chou fleur plants in the soil.

The runner bean supports are up, the seedlings are now about 8 inches high and they will be going in, in the next few days.

We visited another new garden centre yesterday and came away with pretty geraniums for the pots at the front of the house, more compost and 2 blueberry bushes. I have long wanted to grow my own blueberries, they are always in short supply and expensive to buy in the supermarket and blueberry just happens to be my favourite type of muffin. I bought Myrtille Patriot & Myrtille Blue Crop as the RHS website tells me that the yield will be higher with 2 different species able to cross pollinate. We shall see!!

The picture shows Sean the Gardener putting the finishing touches to the low fence surrounding the central plot.

Bon weekend

Creating a new potager.

When we bought this house I inherited a vegetable garden and for a number of years I've been happy just pottering around and growing salad, beans, peas, courgettes etc. in quite a slapdash manner I must say!
This Spring, however, I'm trying to be a little more structured and so have had Sean (my new gardener) create 3 long beds dissected by a pair of paths using wood pavers
Today at the weekly market in Le Molay Littry I bought the first plants to go in the new potager. 4 sorts of salad; courgettes; tomatoes; cauliflower (chou fleur, so much prettier in French); beetroot (betterave); celeri and seed potatoes.
There will also be a section with herbs: parsley; coriander; rosmarin; wild garlic; basil; sage and mint (but in pots to contain the roots which would take over the whole place if planted in the soil).
In the potting shed I already have spinach; pumpkin and runner bean seedlings sprouting and when the soil has warmed up a little more I shall plant haricort vert and for the first time haricot jeune seeds straight into the prepared beds.
My bedside reading now is a gardening magazine and I'll welcome any tips that you feel will help with mynew project.
Check back for more info and hopefully, pix of my progress over the coming weeks.