Ahhhhhh, the bragging rights chapter, or look what we have grown!
We have had many successes, and a few failures. It’s part of the fun of growing your own. Nothing beats watching what you have planted develop, grow and produce, particularly if it has commenced from little more than a tiny seed. And there is nothing better than tasting your own produce; so much better than the rubbish you get from supermarkets. We spend Aust$3.00 on a packet of seeds and get a season of tomatoes or cucumbers. Salads at our home are completely our own. Our greengrocer bill has halved.
We have grown what we eat, and what we have over we give to friends and neighbours. One of our most successful vegetables has been the zucchini, which we produce in both quantity and size. And that comes from just five (5) plants. All five are prolific growers and produce at least six new zucchinis per week. Makes wonderful soups.
Potatoes! Pink Fir, King Edwards, Dutch Creams, the list is endless and the taste of a good potato is just so different. The larger ones make brilliant roast potatoes and done in a little duck fat they are superb. What rubbish have we been eating for so many years? And now we have introduced our neighbours to what we produce and already we have put away the root stock for next season. And we are learning the benefits of hilling up when growing them.
Cucumbers, both the Lebanese and the Little Potato, a gourmet variety with an unusual colour but a wonderful flavour. Both great in salads. Tried the Lemon variety last year and would still recommend it. Cucumbers grow very well in and out of a greenhouse, and need very little maintenance. Just try to keep it off the ground when growing. Far better when it is trellised or mulch well so that what you grow doesn't touch the soil.
The problem with strawberries, which we currently grow in the greenhouse, is that my wife eats them before they ever reach a plate. This year the plants will be split in half and grown under a cloche in the garden. With any luck I may actually eat one or two. Brocollini grows prolifically and needs very little care. Just cut them as they mature. This was our first year at growing cauliflower and the crop was small but superb. Make sure the white inner flower (what you eat) is covered while increasing in size.
A little more brocollini (we did produce quite a bit) and some round red and french breakfast radish. I sow radish seeds every month during the spring/summer months since they mature within 35 days. They grow brilliantly within a greenhouse but just as well outdoors. Great sliced in salads or just eaten raw.
Multi-coloured beetroot is popular in season and onions, whilst slow to grow, are very popular. In fact during the summer months we grow the Long Red Florence, Australian Brown and Evergreen Bunching Spring Onions. Red Marble has been added this year. Last year we ended up with sixs months of the Lemon Cucumbers and we collected enough seed to propagate all we need for this year.
Pak Choy is a regular crop, and whilst I have only showed mint and water cress here, we grow herbs in abundance, both inside and outside the greenhouse. They include basil, sage, oregano, thyme, lemon balm, and both lemon and thai basil. Some are grown just outside the greenhouse in pots, some have been distributed around a pergola and the rest on the back veranda. We never have a shortage of herbs.
But our most successful crop has always been the tomatoes, squillions of them. Before we were introduced to heirloom seedlings we never knew just how many varieties of tomato existed, and we now grow eight of them; tommy toe, tigerella, jaune flamme, mortgage lifter, kumato, cherry roma, and we now have two new ones to plant; broad ripple yellow and wapsipinicon peach. We pick so many our neighbours don't have to buy tomatoes themselves and as per the first photo I am now making tomato puree and tomato paste; anything to preserve them for later use.
We now call ourselves the "real fresh food people", because we pick as we are about to use. To prepare a salad our vegetables are five minutes old, and as far as convenience is concerned it takes me another five minutes to pick what we need. How long does it take you to drive down to the supermarket and buy your produce? Safeway only play at being fresh and to us they are completely inconvenient.
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