An allotment helper, still too many vegetables, making kimchi and ice cream

 

A helper at the allotment, July 2026

That little amphibian pictured above also has a friend, slightly smaller.  A female and a male maybe?  We don't have a pond at the allotment but instead an old pond liner smothering weeds;  it has a dip in the middle that has a continual puddle from watering--our little frog puddle.  This one had been lurking in the zuc patch that day and quickly made its way back to the puddle and the safety of the tomato overgrowth nearby.

Speaking of tomatoes, we (well, the husband mostly) have been picking a reliable 2# every other day this past week.  So far I've been making tomato heavy meals, but supply is starting to outpace demand.  I really want to bottle some--but have very few jars left.  The freezer is seriously full now, and the dehydrator is constantly packed with shredded zuc (we're going to be eating this for the rest of the decade I think).  What to do?

I had another kimchi marathon, making about 9 L over the course of three or four days.  I've got an additional 1.8 L of pak choi kimchi and another 1 L of komatsuma too.  And have been slicing up zuc for fresh/unfermented kimchi as needed.  To me it tastes less spicy when fresh, maybe because it doesn't have the sourness.  The zuc softens down so fast I think it would turn to mush if fermented;  I like the fresh texture, and it has a slight sweetness too.  The Savoy cabbage I used for the majority of the kimchi is much more robust;  I probably won't get to it till autumn or even winter--when the zuc gives up!  I've read that kimchi can last a year or more, although I doubt mine will--I'll eat it long before a year's over.  Unlike with the tomatoes, I don't have to have hermetically sealed jars for kimchi or other fermented vegetables;  the salt and acidity prevents spoilage, so long as the jars are kept tight shut.

The daughter and I are waiting for the figs to ripen, although I also have some trepidation:  it's loaded!  It's been such a hot dry summer, our dessert of choice has been homemade fruit ice cream--no doubt fig will be a delicious flavor.  She and I have gone out on our bikes to the local country park to pick wild blackberries, to tide us over.  They're big and juicy this year;  some years they're small and seedy.  

To make ice cream, I cooked them slightly in a pan with a tiny bit of water, just to soften--they really released a lot of juice.  After cooling down a little, I put the entire contents through my food mill with the smallest plate size to catch all the seeds.  Then refrigerated until cold, sweetened to taste, and gently folded with whipped cream.  I froze this mixture in a variety of containers (some silicone muffin cups and a plastic takeaway tub) and we enjoyed it the next day after dinner.

Whose idea was this, anyway?

Help, I'm drowning in vegetables!  The son cried off his potato digging duties at the weekend (only one row left of Charlottes to come up), so the rest of us went to the allotment on Sunday to bring back five Savoy cabbages, about a dozen zucs, two fennel and a handful of purple snap peas;  this completely filled my two bags, one an extra large canvas bag.  The husband declined to pick any tomatoes, saying there was no room for them and he'd get them in the evening when he went back to water--after I got home with my heavy heavy bags (the husband took the daughter to the park), I was so glad he'd refused!  I spent about two hours dealing with what I had:  soaking/washing, blanching, freezing, drying and kimchi-ing.  

The majority of the potato bed has been resown now, with beets, carrots, turnips, swede, and two kinds of winter radish.  Some of the seed was old so I really oversowed the bed, just in case.  The beets, turnips and pink radishes ought to be ok.  But if there are big gaps in the bed, I have some winter/spring brassica seedlings to transplant in about a month's time, too.  

Still hoping for some rain, though thankfully it wasn't blazing hot again last week (it's forecast for this week instead).  Our washing machine was out of commission for almost a month, so there's been very little graywater for my kitchen garden until this week (finally!).  I save the water from washing/cooking vegetables, but that just about covers the planters, not the beds.  I've had to drag the hose out a couple of times for my cucumbers and French beans.  

Actually my allotment has much better water retention than my kitchen garden, most likely due to the annual sheet mulch (cardboard and straw/manure over plants and weeds)--my kitchen garden gets a top up of chicken manure once a year, but usually just one bed per year.  I should give it a thick layer all over this coming winter.  Unlike at the allotment which is mostly deep mulched with wood chips, I've had to leave the weeds in the soil in the kitchen garden, just to keep the soil shaded. 

Speaking of hot and dry, I picked my very first aubergines/eggplants last week--I can't believe they've actually grown and ripened on my patio.  They're all in large pots in a sheltered place right next to the house;  the pots are filled with composted chicken manure and a light topping of commercial potting compost.  I made ratatouille with the first batch, and steamed the second batch and seasoned with soy sauce/vinegar/sesame oil--this was even more delicious than the ratatouille, and some of it went onto homemade pizza.  I've got my eye on the next batch, just about ready to pick again.  What's more, I have cucumbers after all that drama:  I've started a jar of gherkins in the fridge, and the daughter and I have been munching the first salad cucumbers.

Let's get it done before summer's over

My summer break off work at last (I work at a school), and maybe I'll have a little more time to devote to my food producing engine--I've got six weeks before the kids and I start back.  I've been racing just to keep up with everything these past couple weeks, particularly since the zucs started.  But it's not just them;  it's also lettuce, French beans, kohlrabi, cabbage, komatsuna (similar to pak choi, which I also have), Charlotte potatoes, snap peas, cherry tomatoes, beets.  I've also been desperately trying to keep a handle on the couch grass and bindweed in my wood chip mulch--I can't let them take it over.

Me at the allotment (zucs in the foreground), July 2026

I'm dehydrating zuc shreds daily, freezing snap peas, putting potatoes into paper sacks;  I've made komatsuna kimchi, made kohlrabi/beet sauerkraut, and I'm cooking up a storm.  We are a family of four:  we can eat a lot, right?  Preservation is a high priority:  I'm unofficially following the Vegetable Challenge (not buying any veg except onions--and even these only rarely) and I'll need vegetables in winter too.

The allotment spoils of the day (heavy!), July 2026

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As daytime temps dropped by about 5C (down from the high 20s), I took a chance and started my late season seeds in pots:  Chinese cabbage, spring cabbage, kohlrabi, lettuce, fennel, pak choi, komatsuna.  Some of these are second or third sowings, but will probably be the last this year.  Most of these have already started popping up, to be pricked out sometime this week.

I'm also sowing my last half a packet of beet seeds in the potato bed now it's been cleared;  probably some winter radish and turnip seed too.  This bed was generously mulched with well composted manure in early spring when the potatoes went down;  I'll gently fork it over to remove any obvious couch grass runners (a constant battle on my allotment) before sowing, and will cover over with insect mesh to protect from birds/cats/slugs/caterpillars, my usual strategy.  I should be able to take the mesh off by around mid September, as the white butterflies diminish.

An excess of veg, but too hot for seeds

Last week's heatwave was hotter than the previous (though less humid at least).  Thus I've been in harvest mode only, though even that has been almost too much work: a lot to pick!  Still picking lots of zucs, lettuce (not all have bolted yet in the heat), purple French beans, cabbage and new potatoes; and a few artichokes, kohlrabi and purple snap peas (I still plan to save seed from the peas).  The raspberries are just about done with;  and I managed to pick a tub of blackcurrants--unusually for me--to make a small batch of ice cream in the same way as the gooseberries.

I can see little cucumbers forming on my plants at home;  I also have a lot of tomatoes at the allotment, none red but maybe turning a little lighter green?  They are all really bushy in their containers and I haven't done anything to tame them;  since they are growing in composted horse manure they are extravagantly lush.  What's more, it's about time to harvest the allotment pak choi for a batch of kimchi.  Maybe I can do that next week, when school summer holiday starts.

I did have a moment of "what have I done" with the zucs;  I've given a few away, we're eating a fresh/marinated zuc salad every day--and I've dragged the dehydrator out to dry them, shredded.  These go well in stew/chili/etc in the winter.  I made a jar of refrigerator pickles;  I also sliced some thinly to use instead of pasta sheets in lasagna, salted first to draw out water (I defrosted some of last summer's tomatoes to make the sauce too:  really tasty).  And I've been sneaking the fresh shreds into burgers, meatballs, curry, everything. 

The heat/dry has rather put a hold on my seed sowing however.  I still need to start a few autumn/winter plants but doubt they will survive in this weather:  Chinese cabbages, spring cabbages, winter radishes and turnips.  Also the last sowings of beets and lettuce.  I just need it to cool down a little before I start these--I hope it's not too late in the season by the time it does.  Because we are so far north, we lose a lot of light by autumn--if cool weather veg are started too late they won't have enough light to carry on growing, even if the temps are still mild.

Zucs, replacing peas with fennel, raspberries, losing chickens

In the last week or so--after the heatwave--I've done as much as I can at the allotment:  we're expecting even hotter temps later this week so I've been in a rush to get things done.  This includes planting out:  fennel, beets, the last couple of spring caulis;  also keeping up weed maintenance on my wood chip beds at the allotment, mainly bindweed now but also some couch grass.  I've also topped up a few of the beds where possible (some are very dense with veg growth now) and the pathways between.

It might be shaping up to be a zucchini summer!  It's been three years since I had an overload of zucs aka courgettes.  I have about a dozen or so plants, some in states of excessive growth.  The daughter (age six) said to me, "monsters aren't real, are they?" and I replied, "except monster courgettes!"  Which one of my plants is trying to produce (and I'm desperately trying not to let it).  I prefer to harvest mine at about the length of my hand, though I know some people at the allotments let them grow arm-sized.  Like shoulder to wrist arm-sized--way too big.  One way I like to process them is kimchi;  another is to slice and marinate for an hour or two with salt and pepper, plus a little vinegar and olive oil, plus fresh herbs/diced onion/fermented garlic.  I made it with fresh basil the other day and it was amazing.

I think the hot weather did for the mange tout peas as they've stopped flowering, though my newer batch of purple podded peas are still producing (only a small batch though);  I'm going to save seed from both of these, so no more picking.  I pulled up most of one row of the mange tout in order to follow on with fennel seedlings;  the soil underneath was a bit hard and dry.  As the other row of peas next to it grew larger and more productive, I can only assume the soil under them is a bit better.  I tipped on two more barrowfuls of wood chips before putting in the fennel and the husband has been drenching them every night when he goes to water.  Hopefully the soil will improve and the fennel will grow.

The gooseberries are finally finished but we are still in the midst of raspberries.  And I'm experimenting with more no-sugar ice cream (rasp and dark chocolate anyone?).  I have a food mill with a very fine plate which works well for sieving out rasp seeds (gooseberry too, though they aren't quite as seedy).  I get a lot of use out of my food mill as it's handy for both pureeing and straining simultaneously.  Squash puree, applesauce, berries, etc.  No need to peel and core before cooking, as the food mill catches all the fibrous material.

We've lost several chickens in the past couple of months, down to six now.  Our last lost one really is lost:  she disappeared completely.  I'd let the flock free range in the evening and forgot to shut them back in after they went to bed;  when I went to put them back in the morning, one Birthday chicken didn't come running.  We've searched everywhere for a body (we have a lot of undergrowth, not all of it easily accessible by people) even though she was fit and healthy the day before.  Either she's dead in a hard to reach spot or she really flew the coop--also hard to believe as our fencing is pretty impenetrable;  not only that, to even attempt it she would need a very compelling reason to leave all her friends and the amenities of our garden (everything a chicken could want: grass, weeds, bugs, dust baths, a nice safe coop with unlimited food).  If it was a fox surely it would have left at least a pile of feathers or other evidence (we've never had a fox thankfully, not being close enough to the fields).  We're mystified.  

Hot again, carry on cucumbers, bugs and good bugs, ducks

We've had record breaking heat this past week, almost unbearable at my work (a school kitchen);  because it's been so hot I've not done as much at the allotment as I'd planned--it's been too hot to get things done after my shift.  Normally this time of year I'm there both morning and afternoon;  instead I've been going straight home after work to try and cool down in the ten minutes before I have to walk up to collect the daughter from school.

So in the 15 or 20 minutes I have in the morning before school and before it's got too hot, I've finished planting out all my leeks at last, continued picking mange tout peas (sold to me as snap peas, but these are definitely flat podded peas, not the round swollen pods I expected), picked the last of the gooseberries, carried on loosening and pulling bindweed from my wood chip mulch, and of course watering all my containers.  Not all of these jobs in one day, unfortunately!  Though the daughter has helped water in the morning and the son and husband have done so in the evening.

The cucumber saga continues:  the plants growing in my kitchen garden are indeed growing, while I've lost a few more to slugs at the allotment.  Regardless, I feel a little more confident about the possibility of harvesting some, at least at home.  However, I may not be able to save seed as I have two varieties growing practically in the same bed:  a pickling variety and a salad variety.  I don't want cross pollinated seed as I really do want both types;  I might have to buy seed for next year.  Though if the salad variety at the allotment manages to produce I may be able to save some uncrossed seed from them.

It's only in the last week or so I've seen the cabbage white butterflies out and about, fluttering around my brassicas.  I've even found a few inside the insect mesh at the allotment;  the cabbages have grown so tall they've pulled the netting up enough for butterflies to sneak in.  While I have a few unprotected plants at home--the mature spring cabbages I've been gradually harvesting and a few late-sown kohlrabi--I put my last small piece of mesh over my newly planted pak choi bed.  

On the positive side, there are also a lot of hoverflies in my kitchen garden this summer.  And I mean a lot!  I've read they eat aphids in their larval stage, so I can only assume they've been busy earlier in the year.  I think they're really cute, hovering around my flowers and plants.  While not as populous as the hoverflies, I've also seen a lot of ladybugs and larva going about their business.  I let all the bugs get on with it for the most part in both my garden and allotment, and let the resident predators take care of any problems for me, a la permaculture.  My policy is live and let live and the only active role I take is against cabbage caterpillars, but not with insecticide or anything like that;  I pick them off and give them to my ducks.

Speaking of ducks, it's been about three months since we adopted those three nervous Snowflake ducks--how are they getting on?  We officially combined the whole flock in April, about a month after we brought the Snowflakes home.  They are much less quacky now, less scared of everything and used to free ranging in the garden;  we still lock them up overnight and let them out again in the morning.  Boy Duck still chases them once in a while, but they don't freak out about it and he's much less aggressive about it too.  Girl Duck has gotten really slow and trips over her own feet when she tries to run;  I worked out that she's actually about 10 years old now, and Boy Duck is 8.  The Snowflakes, not yet 1 year old, are all laying an egg a day:  big tasty ones with lovely white shells.

Harvest time, planting time, getting a handle on the grass, delicious gooseberries

All systems go!  I've gone from picking a little here and there, to all things at once:  lettuce, cabbage, mange tout peas, broad beans and onions (just harvested all of these), beets, new potatoes, gooseberries, raspberries, currants, cherries.

In addition to harvesting all of the above (mostly at the allotment), I'm still in the last stages of planting out.  I've finally put in all the last cucumbers, split between home and the allotment;  same deal with the pak choi.  My patio table, full of trays since spring (I kept transplanting out and then refilling the trays) at last has empty spaces.  I'm not quite done sowing seeds:  I'll do a batch of Chinese cabbage and at least one more of lettuce and maybe beets;  and a little later on hopefully some spring cabbages and possibly onions to overwinter.  I'm also planning on direct sowing some radishes and turnips later in the season too.

The whole family helped clear away the broad beans in order to replant the bed with leeks, all three trays waiting patiently since March.  Though it was a hot morning, we got it done (mostly me actually--the husband's leg isn't quite better, the daughter's only six, and the son was dragging his heels):  we pulled all the plants, stripped the pods off, forked the bed lightly to remove any weeds and grass roots, then mulched heavily with wood chips.  My composters are full to bursting. 

Actually, this bed has had two more crops since I grew potatoes there last summer:  Chinese cabbage in autumn/winter and broad beans this spring.  So this is the third time I've sifted out grass roots and actually there were a lot fewer this time--it was teeming with them after the potatoes came out last July.  There were some clumps of grass growing amongst the broad beans, but it wasn't completely swamped and the soil was fairly soft under its light mulch of wood chips--I last topped it up when I sowed the broad beans in February.  I spread a much thicker mulch on top this time.

I'm still doing weed maintenance on my wood chip mulch, little by little:  just loosening roots out with a fork (almost exclusively bindweed and couch grass, no other weeds).  However the newest sheet mulched bed is sprouting grass and it's not yet soft enough underneath to simply loosen it out.  Instead I've been topping up with more wood chips, but until it really composts down below, it may have to stay grassy.  Unlike the broad bean bed, which had no existing growth when I deeply mulched with wood chips, here I'd laid down cardboard sheets over some very vigorous grass/weeds and mulched on top of this.  

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What do I do with gooseberries?  One year I made jam--then gave it away as we are a mostly no-sugar family.  This year I experimented with making sugarless gooseberry fool using sweetener (we prefer a stevia/erythritol blend), only I may have gone a little overboard with the whipped cream.  As I sampled it after folding it all together, it reminded me of ice cream, so of course I immediately popped the whole tub in the freezer.  It turned out great!  A little sour, well balanced by the creaminess.  It was literally just gooseberry puree (cooked, cooled, then put through a food mill), a spoonful of sweetener, and a lot of whipped cream.  Delightful.