no dig gardening, seasonal cooking, permaculture, preserving, foraging, storing, crafting, home life
A recent discussion on Twitter about homegrown harvests in January, has inspired me to write a blog about all of the lovely homegrown veggies I am cooking in my kitchen.
January may be a long, dark cold month but there’s still a lot of homegrown deliciousness. With planning, and some growing space, you could be making some almost entirely homegrown meals next January too. Alternatively, these are the kind of veggies that will have the fewest food miles in shops and markets.
It’s the last day of 2019 …. didn’t that pass quickly? I’m sure there are things on my “to do” list from February that I’m still meaning to get round to!
Now is the ideal time to sow many different kinds of vegetables and herbs, for cropping through the winter and into next spring, and beyond!
I’ve spent much of yesterday standing under the apple tree in the back garden where I have my outdoor potting bench, sowing seeds. Some are for cropping in autumn, others will be for winter and spring harvests. There is a list of everything I’m sowing at the end of this blog post.
Sow delicious easy to grow and store vegetables for a taste of something homegrown throughout the winter and into spring. Here are a few of my favourites. What do you like to grow for winter recipes?
Kale, a nutrient dense vegetable high in vitamins, is well known for its many health benefits. Easy to grow and winter hardy in the UK, it’s a fantastic plant for the hungry home gardener. Kale’s delicious leaves make a tasty addition to all kinds of meals cooked and raw, but did you know that you can also eat other parts of this cruciferous vegetable and that growing it benefits wildlife too?!
It’s spring and I am thinking of winter vegetables! Root vegetables are surprisingly easy to grow using no dig methods. Yesterday I sowed parsnips, carrots, radish, Hamburg parsley and scorzonera into a recently applied mulch of compost on top of my heavy clay allotment soil.
I had a great time on holidays, but it’s nice being home again too, especially now that spring is in the air!
This gorgeous, vegetable-filled salad is ideal for winter meals, a great way of using leftover vegetables from a roast dinner – just like “bubble and squeak”. A tasty way to make the most of a Thanksgiving, Christmas or other roast dinner leftovers! This recipe includes an oil free version, too.
It has been a busy time since my last blog post and how the garden has changed! The weather has been typically British, from unseasonably warm to icy cold (for Somerset) and back again. Mornings are misty, deciduous trees almost entirely without leaves now and anything frost tender has died.
The polytunnel has frozen a few times now, I love the patterns on the frozen polythene, although it is still reaching 30˚C in there some days. I have electronic thermometers in the greenhouse and polytunnel and it’s so interesting to see the extremes of temperatures undercover, compared with outside in the garden.
This week began with the Autumn Equinox, the festival of Mabon, which starts on September 21st
Every year I mulch my no dig allotment with an inch or two of composted manure or homemade compost, but this year I am trying something different!
Usually the end of February and early March heralds a dramatic increase of activity in the greenhouse – but the unusually cold weather means last week was more about snowing than sowing!
I absolutely love growing aubergines. Incredibly versatile for so many different recipes, I love all of the different colours and shapes, how some are seriously spiky and of course the delicious taste.
Homemade newspaper pots are quick and easy to make and use, biodegrade in the soil and worms like munching them too! Put into reusable containers to make your own module trays or use as individual pots.
We are often asked to start no dig gardens and so Charles, the admin team of our Facebook group and I have come up with the Top Ten Most Frequently Asked Questions.
If we haven’t covered your questions, please ask them in the comments here (or on the Facebook group if you are a member) and we will answer them as soon as we can.
There’s a lot more information in our (Award Winning!!) book, No Dig Organic Home and Garden, in Charles’ other books, on his website and his You Tube Channel.
Beetroot grows in my garden from April right through to the end of autumn, some in the polytunnel over winter too. This tasty root vegetable stores so well that I can make this hummus at any time of year, but there’s something especially autumnal and satisfying about the combination of roasted beetroot, carrot and onion.
This gorgeous bright seasonal salad is almost a meal in itself and can easily be adapted to include other summer vegetables in your garden (and winter root veg later in the year). It is a zingy, delicious, colourful way to use up gluts.