Our leaf beat, salad leaves and Forence fennel. Otherwise known as lunch
After last week at the allotment, weeding and taking part in the global spraying of biodynamic preps in all weathers and at all times, dawn and dusk, I have been missing it badly. Who would have thought a muddy patch of heavily manured soil could become so alluring?
Exchange the word 'plot' for 'her' and it has all the elements of a love affair: I find wondering how 'she' is, counting the days till we will be together again. I tell myself it is just a fad and that time, wind and wet will take the shine off it. But not yet.
Anyway, enough wittering, the crops are coming in thick and fast now: the peas, small, sweet and densely packed in their pods, are dropped in boiling minted water just long enough to be brought back to a simmer. The leaf beat, lightly steamed, is served with the Florence fennel roasted under an organic chicken. The red frill mustard and other oriental style salad leaves add 'heat' to an open prawn sandwich.
And this is just the start, the potatoes have survived the blight scare, the kale is now fenced off from the pigeons (guess we will net the next crop, but we are still in the market for your scarecrow designs), the bush yellow beans are nearly ready to eat (and now have sweet peas entwining their sticks) and the Cherokee purple pods are in pretty lilac flower. The kids' carrots and beetroot, the squashes and cucumbers are growing fast. The purple calabash tomatoes are producing trusses and the broad beans, spinach, chillies, tagetes, poppies and sunflowers are galloping on.
But enough about us, how is your plot returning your affections?
