The view from 39a

The best time of year

Oh my days the allotment is in full swing now and I'm loving it!  This little pink and white beauty is a new variety of beetroot we grew this year and it is delicious, I cut this one up and put it on a pizza (dough made from scratch, passatta made from home grown tomatoes, home grown herbs, spring onions adorning the topping, smug much?).  The beetroot was so sweet it was delicious eaten raw, with some of the others we've grown I'm going to grate it, mix with carrot and have with falafel in a pitta much nom!

Our little cherry tree is fruiting this year, if we want any fruit we have to get in there quick before the birds get them.  This little fella looked good but was a bit tart, I think I'm going to have to cook our crop up into jam but that is no hardship.

Don't judge me

So my most favourite vegetable ever is baby corn, I love it on pizza, steamed or just raw it's so tasty.  I've tried growing sweetcorn before but outside and it didn't fared that well (but that may have been down to my inconsistent watering) this year we've grown some in the poly tunnel and as you can see its doing well as it towers over me!  

I can't lie I'm a little bit obsessed with the corn, it's so alien looking but beautiful as well, the photos don't do the plant justice as these fronds are so pink and red and amazing!  I picked my first corn yesterday, it seems a shame to pick them so young but if you want baby corn you gotta do it and frankly I got over it pretty quickly.

Look at that!  I mean what the hell!? I never knew that each little kernel on the cob gets it's own strand.  You peel off the outer leaves and then gently pull the corn out from it's leafy casing and this is what comes out, amazing isn't it?  (I told you I am obsessed with the baby corn.) I'm delighted to report that it was delicious as well, next year I might just shoulder out some of the tomatoes and grow a full bed of corn!

What we've been doing on the plot

• Battling with bind weed, I doubt we'll ever get rid of it entirely but it's a lot less invasive than it was before
• Battling black fly, we've got a full infestation on the runner beans which is an arse but I'm trying garlic infused water and just scraping the feckers of the plant, guess which method is working best?
• Harvesting the last of the broad beans and turning it into pesto to stock up our freezer.  Also when your broad beans have finished fruiting cut it off at the base but leave the roots in the soil to rot, they have a lot of nutrients in them and will do your soil the world of good
• Thinning out the apple tree, remove the weedy looking fruits so you only have a couple per bunch it will make the apples you do harvest a lot sweeter

I'm on holiday this week so will hopefully be spending a lot of time on the plot tidying up and planting more seeds!