Harvest Monday

Here are my two little harvests for the week. I got my first ever lebanese cucumbers (I definitely put them in far too late!) as well as FINALLY my first beans for the season. A lot of my bean plants died in the heatwave we had here in Melbourne, so it has been a terrible year for them. Oh well, I'll enjoy them while they last and look forward to when I can harvest broad beans and peas. I also harvested my first ever radish and ate it in a salad with a satay-type sauce. I like the texture of radishes but not the flavour, so this was a good way to use it. The amaranth also went into my salad (cooked with noodles), as did some tomatoes, rocket, capsicum, herbs and a cucumber. The eggplant went, along with several others, to my mother and aunt. I'm not a huge fan of it and they didn't grow any this year so I thought they would enjoy it more than me!

This week I've been planting baby cos lettuce, more brassicas and more root veggies. I just went to the Diggers harvest festival in Dromana and bought kiwi berry, blueberry and New Zealand (even though they originate from South America) yam plants, as well as the following seeds: barletta onions (an early variety), dwarf snow peas, ruby brussels sprouts, dwarf sugar snap peas, yukomo giant snow peas (these peas can get up to 14cm long!), purple podded dutch peas and greenfeast peas. I've definitely got a lot of planting to do!

Head over to Daphne's Dandelions to check out more harvests from around the world.

Thanks for reading!

Jess 

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!