Allotment/Veg Patch - Thread 7 - The Harvesters Arms

[bookbook]

Well, it's been an interesting summer, to say the least.
We are now heading into the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness :)
Everyone welcome to join in and ask for advice , share their woes and just enjoy growing!
previous thread here

Hey elephant - I replied on your other thread, but welcome to this one too! And of COURSE it's OK to post, everyone is welcome!

whoknows - God, I know what you mean about the furnishings! Just decorating a room in ours is like engaging in a huge version of one of those slider puzzles where there is a grid with just one gap and you have to rearrange the squares to make the picture! I think we might have to shove some stuff in storage for a bit.

Welcome to the thread elephant

I've just had a quick read to catch up. We paid a painter and decorator to redo a couple of our rooms the other year. We went off on holiday and when we came back the rooms were done. The only down side was having to pack suitcases and clear a room of most things at the same time. (Oh and the cost of not doing it ourselves).
A friend of mine lived for most of last year without a kitchen. I'm not entirely sure why refitting a kitchen took so long but it did. She managed one way or another without a proper cooker for months and at one stage she didn't have a kitchen sink either. So these things can be lived with, provided you can see the positive end.

I made it up to the plot on Sunday and did a bit more clearing of the new half. I hoiked out some brambles - all the time with a robin sitting right next to me waiting to pounce on any nibbles. And cleared some of the grass that is choking the rapsberries. Which must have started off as a row or two - not entirely sure - but are now coming up in various random places. I think next summer may be a wait and see what happens year for some of it. We also ate our first - small - cabbage. These were sown, ignored when the slugs were eating them, they have managed to recover a bit and now have small hearts. Surprisingly nice (I'm not that much of a cabbage fan, to be honest).

Morning!
elephant - a proper hello and everyone is welcome to hang out here.
Let us know all about it!
sounds like you are getting on well there Cedar - the raspberries I had were like that when I first started. What had obviously been two rows, merged into a thicket about 3 metres wide. But I got some nice raspberries the following season after some ruthless thinning. Erm - you don't like cabbage and yy to robins - though mine is a bit shy, and prefers the compost bin..
No doubting that building and decorating raise my stress levels. When there is no room to swing a cat, thats even worse! ( We waited until our DD moved out over 2 years ago to gut and redo her bedroom- thats so when we do ours, we can decamp into there....- did you notice the 2 years? :) )
Well, no plot as have appointments today - tomorrow morning is looking a bit iffy weather wise, and I have DGS from Saturday afternoon and overnight, so no plot Sunday either . Might have to make time to go and pick some sprouting broccoli and kale some time today.

cedar - a year without a kitchen! I guess you just get used to it after a bit. I have my instant pot, so at least I can make stews (I love a stew).

On cabbage. I am not normally a fan, but after book talked about bubble and squeak I thought I would make some for the first time. It is DELICIOUS and has become my favourite way to eat the stuff. Which is good, because apparently in the summer I was under the impression that I liked white cabbage so much that I needed 12 of the things. They are all huge as well.

Ooops, that sounded like a boast, I didn't mean it to. I meant to say they are a larger variety, not little hispi ones.

you are allowed to boast shove -:) Mind you 12 white cabbages? wow, thats a lot! 1 a week for 3 months hmmmmmm :) They all seem to end up being enormous at once don't they- you fret about picking them when they are too small , then wham they were all great big things in synchronicity .. (that was my cauliflowers last year!)
Are you making a lot of coleslaw as well ? - glad you like bubble and squeak - its a very old fashioned thing, but truly wondrous done well ! Much, much better than cabbage soup

Shove - yes to the giant sliding puzzle effect. Every time we want to buy a new piece of furniture we have to measure everything else in the room to the nearest cm, hunt for ages to find an item that is exactly the right size etc. Cedar - my friend is getting decoration done while she's on holiday from next week, but it has caused a lot of extra stress in the runup. Most of our rooms really need a bit of replastering done before they are decorated too

I have a glut of red cabbages, I'm bored of coleslaw, don't like it braised and no one else likes it at all . Will defo be trying it in bubble and squeak, I normally use savoy for that. Any other suggestions welcome. I think you can pickle it? Saurkraut?

I know! I must have convinced myself I'd be feeding an army on cabbage. Either that, or I got mixed up and thought they were caulis (I have no problem eating a cauliflower a week).

They are the variety 'Tundra' so at least they stand and keep for ages too once picked. I can't even get through one a week with a concerted effort though!

I'd forgotten about those sliding puzzles :) they always used to be in christmas crackers I seem to think .
WhoKnows I am not the biggest fan of red cabbage , but pickled red cabbage is nice - haven't done any for years mind you .

I LOVE braised, spiced red cabbage with plenty of sweetness (ahem, sometimes a little more than the recipe suggests) - you can do it in the slow cooker for hours and hours and it comes out all sticky and lovely. I use the windfall apples from the garden in the mix! This is the recipe I follow:

www.deliaonline.com/recipes/international/european/british/traditional-braised-red-cabbage-with-apples

No, sorry, it's not for me, sweetness/cloves/apples etc and vegetables do not mix IMO, I hate apple sauce and bread sauce with roasts too.

No one eats pickles much here either, I do like them, but they only really go well with cheese and I am trying to lose weight. More coleslaw it is I think.

I've just got back from 'viewing' the proposed allotment. I am out of all proportion excited. It has obviously been worked until very recently. There is an established strawberry bed, some beetroot and onions and really very few weeds and 2 Christmas trees. It has 6 beds and a very tumble down shed. I can't wait to get started.

Brilliant news Elephant, when do you pick up the keys? You'll need to decorate those trees!

I expect I will hear something on Monday as it is done through the Town council, so it will probably next weekend before I can get stuck in.

Evening!
WhoKnows a very old tradition is pickled red cabbage with fried fish ( think pickled onions) and also cold meat. But that doesn't help weight loss :)
I love apple sauce, but hate bread sauce, liked braised red cabbage too, but no-one else does apart from son in law.
It's actually been a nice day today, but have DGS , so been drowning in lego....:)
elephant - that sounds almost too good to be true! Check the tumble down shed - its amazing what a bit of care and effort will do - see if its watertight and go from there. And beetroot to pick too - it sounds as if you will soon whip it into shape, you lucky thing :)

I tried pickled onions with cottage pie recently at the suggestion of another thread and it was a surprisingly good combination. Another favourite of mine is slices of onion in cucumber in malt vinegar with roast beef, inherited from my Yorkshire grandmother. So maybe I will try the pickled red cabbage.

Feel like I can officially be here now as I have an allotment!

It has a shed! A big shed!

It's not too overgrown, needs clearing, but has raised beds, and the site is lovely, Sunday morning tea & coffee in the community room type of lovely! Lots of friendly faces.

I'd guess clearing the weeds is where i'll be starting!

Ooo Golden may be we will able to compare notes. I am going to try to get DS to photo mine this afternoon and ask advice about my shed, yours looks palatial in comparison.

This is the allotment. Does anyone have an idea about the shed? The plot is on a slight incline and so the shed is falling down the slope. I assume I couldn't put a concrete base in so how do people do this successfully. I am thinking about putting some hardcore down and paving slabs on top, without any cement to level it and then put a shed on top.

Hi elephant, have no idea about your shed. Sorry. Yes I've been smiling all afternoon about my giant shed. Looking forward to getting started - your plot looks great!

elephant - Blimey, that's in an excellent state! You can unscrew sheds fairly easily (even rickety old ones). It needs to be on a level base, so a combination of building up the lower areas and digging out the higher ones needs to happen. It is absolutely vital that it's properly level and worth taking some time over this because even the most robustly built timber shed will fall over if it's not level.

Then you need something hard to put it on. One of the easiest ways to do it is to use hardcore and a hand tamper - it's heavy work, but cheap - and then use a base kit, which is basically lengths of pressure treated timber. (Or you can get posh plastic squares, but these are more expensive). Another way is to go on Freecycle and get a few free paving slabs, and lay these on compacted hardcore or crusher run. You don't necessarily need cement or concrete - I have put up 2 sheds myself and didn't use those on either occasion. Both are still standing too!

Welcome golden - your new plot looks lovely!

evening!
great photos elephant and Golden .
Golden - that sounds as if you have landed a real corker - a lovely community is one of the real pluses :) Take it steady on weeding/digging- my mantra is this - 'it's a marathon, not a sprint - you have a lot of winter /early spring, so make a priority list for what you want to achieve and do a bit at a time, otherwise you will know where every muscle is :)
elephant - that looks a lovely plot. I have shown the picture of the shed to my resident handyman ( DH :) ) . If its not too bad level wise , DH suggests not trying to unscrew it - sheds are bolted together, but the roof is usually nailed on. So its easier to solidify it where it is, using wood to support it - ( you can raise the lower side by means of bricks / 2x2 wood if its a long way out of true, but that's hard) . To support with wood - check the side facing the incline is more or less upright ( use a spirit level ) then drive posts of ( preferably tannelised ) 2x2 wood into the ground as near to the corners of the shed as possible , so 18" at least is left above ground and 18" below ground - (so post needs to be minimum of 3' long) . some hole digging, plus clouting with a club hammer should do that. Then screw through the posts into the shed corners with very long, big screws 4" -ish ( you need a powered screwdriver for ease if possible). Then refill holes around the posts with soil, tamping solidly as you go. This should stop it sliding down the incline and firm the frame. Depends on the soil to a certain extent.
Does that make sense? or worth the effort?

btw - you can take your pick/ignore any advice I give - we all have our own ideas !

Morning!
Not a bad one at that.
I am so hoping to get to the plot sometime today. I need to pick some vegetables, and check over everything, and get the compost heap sorted.
I forgot to say last night that shove's advice on the shed is really good too, if you need to move the shed. There is more than one way to skin a cat always...

You're so lovely book! It is good to have both methods up since the best way forward really depends on all kinds of things. The picture of it all propped up like that made me smile - wonder how long it's been defying gravity!!

Our Christmas celebration with the in laws is next weekend, so I have been running around like a crazy person all weekend getting stuff ready! It is a huge deal within their family, every adult has to be given literally 10-15 presents (I'm honestly not exaggerating), which shocks me a bit as my family don't go in for it at all. I don't know if this will make sense, but I feel a bit unbalanced by the sheer amount of 'stuff' (and money) that is involved! I am looking forward to spending time with them, though. Keep your fingers crossed that we get some nice weather the week after this one, as I'm hoping to get to the plot most days to sort things out then!