Tomatoes!

We have been getting food in abundance the last few weeks. When we went on Saturday, ( to pick a food parcel for Natalia and Dan,) the tomatoes were rampant, but green. With the weather this week overcast and grey, when not raining, I was looking up green tomato chutneys. But hooray! I went this morning for salad and chard and amongst the foliage, some tomatoes were ripe and bursting after all. - There's hope for the grapes outside my kitchen door.

things to do with patty pan squash

So, what to do with the patty pan squashes....
well I don't like pickles so didn't try that. I tried a drop of chili oil then chopped tomato and feta, herbs then baked them and that was good. So I thought, lets use them as pie or quiche shells. (I don't eat wheat or pastry so an alternative would be a find!) So I had a go at a chevere quiche and a little apple thing..

with not bad results. Now I'm gonna be more experimental. Rub flavors in before adding the filling, try a meat filling, a custard before the apple. I could be on to a winner... if only I was a better cook! Any ideas very welcome.

sweet corn

Sweet, sweet, sweetcorn is the best. Just picked, eaten raw. What more can I say!

Yesterday we got back back from our holiday

and rushed to the allotment to find the vegetables growing with abandon.

Purple runner beans,

 Patty pan squashes

 sweetcorn

 courgettes

 and cucumbers.

 Today our daughter Natalia and her boyfriend Dan who were visiting, came with us to the plot and  helped us harvest ....

 even more blackcurrants.... (Natalia has made some of the blackcurrant cordial. )
 and raspberries and blackberries, ( and plums and apples from the secret bit,) then beans and onions and chard, and sweetcorn, and potatoes, and courgettes and marrows and all those squashes.

there were huge sunflower heads ripening.
Dan found out what to do with them... http://www.sunflowerguide.com/drying-sunflowers.html

and Natalia checked out what to do with the Patty pan squashes. We love those pickled and stuffed baby ones...we are gonna try, http://foodinjars.com/2011/08/pickled-baby-pattypan-squash/ and http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/pickled-baby-pattypan-squash-50400000128162/ 
I'll tell you how they work next time.

Todays harvest

We've popped down to the plot from time to time over the last couple of weeks, to water, to hoe, to pick yet more blackcurrants and gooseberries, the first courgettes, lettuces beetroots and some potatoes.  I haven't been since about Tuesday, when I brought our youngest son; back from uni, to see how it's getting on. But today, after our week of blazing sun, the odd shower, and then last nights downpour, a transformation astounded us. The sunflowers have grown giant sized and have golden flowers.

But everything else has started to produce fabulous goodies too. Our harvest was enormous. 

 Kilos more blackcurrants, some raspberries, the last gooseberries, onions, beans, cucumbers, beetroots, lettuce, chard and a little squash.

We are going away for a couple of weeks on Thursday, you can be sure I'll be down on the plot, tending and harvesting then too. We wont be able to shut our freezer. Yum. yum.

watering very early in the morning...

As it has been boiling hot with our mini heatwave; 3 hot days constitutes a heatwave after all the grey  sky and rain. I went to the plot very early this morning.

So I fed, watered, weeded and picked.
Yet another  kilo of strawberries; I'm sure the bindweed is acting as a natural net cus the birds haven't gorged the lot.
More blackcurrants and there are hundreds more to harvest...  (blackcurrant-sorbet.)
and... the first gooseberries.

gorgeous green globes. I searched for a gooseberry sorbet recipe and found one to try. http://www.cookyourdream.com/2011/07/gooseberry-sorbet.html

From the tasting as I make it, it should be as good as the strawberry one. Mmmmm.

Strawberry sorbet

I went to the allotment yesterday with Maya; my oldest friends lovely daughter who has been visiting us. We picked two and a half kilos of strawberries... yum, yum!

 and some black currents. So, what to do with them?
We planed to make some blackcurrant cordial, http://www.britishlarder.co.uk/home-made-blackcurrant-cordial/#axzz2YANRjAjL  (I made some lovely elderflower cordial last week. http://britishfood.about.com/od/recipeindex/r/efowercordial.htm - but without the citric acid, because everywhere had run out.) But, first the strawberry's.

 So, freeze some of them, you put them individually on a baking tray in the freezer for a bit, then put the frozen berry's into a bag and store them in the freezer.
Then the strawberry sorbet. I found a recipie at  http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/6550/strawberry-sorbet

500 grams strawberries
250 grams sugar
250 mls water
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
1 egg white.
It worked perfectly... yum yum

Thank goodness we went again today to picked some more and do some weeding of course.