Harvest Monday

This week saw a few exciting firsts in the garden! I harvested my first long red capsicum, and I'm pleased to report that it was absolutely delicious, a relief after months of patiently waiting for it to turn red. I also harvested my first listada di gandia eggplant (though I think I picked it too small. Thoughts?) and my first cauliflower. 

My experiment with growing cauliflower in the Australian Summer was not all that successful. Yes, I received a cauliflower at the end of it, but despite my best efforts it was yellow, small, bitter and caterpillar ridden. I did eat some of it (and nearly ate a caterpillar in the process!) but in the end I decided to gift the rest to my chooks. Hopefully they will enjoy it more than me. I'm looking forward to growing cauliflower in the right season and seeing what the difference is! 

I have also harvested cherry tomatoes (many not pictured), silverbeet, kale and amaranth (much of it also not pictured), a mini capsicum, plenty of herbs and one measly carrot. 

I've started planting root vegetables (well, I started a couple of weeks ago) and have been gradually planting out brassica seedlings and succession planting more seeds. I have LOTS of coriander self seeding all over the place, and plenty of pumpkins ripening away (11 that are already just about full size and several smaller ones that will hopefully mature in time for the cold weather to arrive), a cucumber (finally!) that is almost ready to pick and a watermelon that I don't suspect will be ready by the time the warm weather disappears, but a girl can dream! 

All in all it has been a great week in the garden, mostly because of my capsicum success!

You can see more harvests at Daphne's Dandelions.

Thanks for reading!

Jess

Listada di gandia eggplant

Harvest Monday & Community Gardening!

First up, here's a pic of my main harvest for the week:

I've also harvested more kale, silverbeet, amaranth leaves and cherry tomatoes that didn't make it in front of the camera! I haven't harvested a huge amount but I'm only cooking for myself at the moment, and this is enough that I rarely buy any other vegetables. At the moment I'm only really buying onions, garlic, mushrooms and occasionally sweet potato. It's very satisfying to know that almost all of the veggies I'm eating have come from my own back yard! It also leaves me more money to buy yummy organic fruit :) I don't really garden to save money on veggies, but I suppose it is a nice advantage.

If you'd like to see more harvests, head over to Daphne's. 

In other gardening related news...

Today I went to the first working bee of the semester for the Melbourne University Community Garden. I was involved with it a little in 2013 but I took the second semester off uni and honestly just got a bit lazy about going to working bees! I regret that I stopped going, because I enjoyed the working bee a lot today and I've definitely missed out on meeting lovely people and seeing the garden evolve. I suppose I will just have to make up for it this year. The garden is relatively new but it's looking great and has a really nice community feel to it. If you live in Melbourne and you're interested in checking it out, have a look at the garden's website or Facebook page (this is updated more regularly). Community gardening is such a wonderful way to use public space, create a great community and produce healthy food.

That's it for this week.

Thanks for reading, 

Jess

Harvest Monday

This week I've had a couple of zucchinis (disclaimer: I think I accidentally photographed one twice!), tomatoes, mini capsicums, silverbeet, kale, amaranth leaves, carrots, eggplant, basil, garlic chives, rosemary and Vietnamese mint.

I made this delicious pizza with grated zucchini, eggplant, rosemary, pasta sauce, ricotta, fetta and grated cheddar. It was simple but really yummy!

Other than that I have mostly been using my produce for pasta sauce and Asian noodle salads. Yum!

Check out Daphne's Dandelions to see other harvests!

Jessica

Harvest Monday

This week has seen...

plenty of tomatoes,

lots of herbs and rocket,

my first lemon,

potatoes and my first pointy tomatoes (any idea what variety they are?),

pretty Tigerella tomatoes,

silverbeet, amaranth leaves and 'fireworks' chillies,

kale, a great carrot, zucchini, eggplant and my first mini capsicum!

It has been a wonderful week in the garden and I'm looking forward to the next!

Check out Daphne's Dandelions to see more harvests.

Jess

Harvest Monday

See more harvests at Daphne's Dandelions.

Jess x

New seeds!

I was very excited to arrive home to my Diggers order. Can't wait to grow these interesting varieties!

Harvest Monday & my new chooks

I didn't post last Monday, so in this entry I'll show two weeks of harvests, which still isn't really a lot! I've mostly been harvesting tomatoes and herbs. I'm a little disappointed that I'm not harvesting more things by now, but the weather has been crazy (a cool-ish Summer with random really hot days) and it's only my first year of gardening on my own (and second year ever) so I should probably cut myself some slack for things not being perfect! Regardless, I've been really enjoying gardening and eating my own produce. I find gardening so incredibly relaxing, and of course harvesting and eating my own produce is a delight. Here's most of what I harvested this past fortnight:

A very sunburnt Tigerella (I presume?) tomato that did not taste very nice!

And...I'm attempting to sprout an avocado seed! If it grows into a successful little tree, the plan is to graft a cutting from my boyfriend's mother's avocado tree onto it so that it hopefully fruits. I will then plant it at my parents' place, given that I am renting and I don't think they will ever sell their property!

I also got new chickens! I wasn't planning to get more so soon, but I visited a friend who has just started a free range egg farm and he had a few with...um...issues. They seem perfectly happy but he couldn't keep a close eye on them in a flock of 800+, whereas I can spoil them and make sure they're OK! There is a tiny rooster called Midgie (on the right) who doesn't crow (though if he starts to my friend will take him back because I live in the suburbs and I don't think the neighbours would be too fond of a 5am wake up call!). There is also Wonky Beak (left) whose problem is obvious, Jeff (centre) who has a hunched back, and Wobbles (not pictured) who walks like she is permanently drunk. They're an odd bunch but they're lovely chooks and I am getting attached already, especially to Wobbles!

Hope you've enjoyed reading this post. Head over to Daphne's Dandelions to see what other people are harvesting (or dreaming of harvesting in the Northern Hemisphere).

Jess