Want a plot? Come on Down!

We attended the AGM of our allotments at Nunsmoor in Fenham, Newcastle today (it's just by the BBC). Apparently, and in contradiction to what I'd always presumed about allotments in general, there isn't a waiting list at the moment. So, if you want a plot and don't want to wait, gimme a shout and I'll pass on your details to the relevant authorities!

A Full Day (and a bit)'s Toil, Plus Double-Newt Action

Things looking pretty tidy from the gate

You've got to love bank holidays, that extra day makes all the difference. Saturday was, allotment-wise, a write-off as it rained pretty much all day. It was that fine rain that gets you really wet too. We thumbed our collective nose at the elements and headed to Tynemouth and Whitley Bay for a traipse round the market and second hand shops, and to get some shit-hot chocolates (Salted Caramels and Malbec Truffles both great) at Gareth James and really amazing coffee from Ouseburn Coffee Co. Sunday, however, was a peach of a gardening day, the sun coming out regularly but also disappearing often enough to stop it getting too hot to want to work.

Pickle my seed

After picking a bunch of nasturtium seeds from the plants in our border on Tuesday, I've now got them pickling away. If this works out then I reckon we're onto a total winner as regards future cheapo birthday/ chrimbo presents; "I grew these and then pickled them myself" I'll regularly exclaim, as various relatives and acquaintances unwrap yet another pot of macerated seedage, their faces full of wonder. After all, who can refuse a delightful home-grown gift? So thoughtful, so personal, so authentic. And so very, very cheap.

brining my seeds

Harvest (in the nick of) Time

When, in the depths of winter, we're plodging around in freezing mud like idiots in order to try and get a patch on the allotment sorted, it'll help to have a record of a day like today. A day when, after work we popped down to the allotment and dug up the remainder of our spuds (Marfona 2nd earlies- no main crop for us), three cabbages, 4 massive courgettes, some rhubarb and a few berries. Good frigging times.

Pottering On

With Kasia being away for the weekend, and it only taking about 2 minutes out of the day to feed the cat sufficiently, I had plenty of time on Saturday to spend on the allotment, pottering about.  It was really great to sit in the sun, read, and watch the pigeons rapidly chew through the seeds which actually we put out for their less sizeable cousins.  Ho hum; if they're stuffed on wilko's finest birdseed, perhaps they'll be less inclined to fraternize with our crops.

Storm Sandwich

A day of mental weather on Sunday meant that two slices of allotmenteering had to fit either side of a big meaty filling of a pretty serious thunderstorm.  Not for the first time this year, chunks of Newcastle found themselves underwater.  Things were fine down on the plot early in the afternoon and when the sun came out it was red hot.  Then it got muggy as hell, we were treated to a ferocious thunderstorm and then the heavens opened.

A storm brews over Fenham

Don't quarrel with sorrel

What a rubbish post title, sorry, couldn't think of anything else that rhymed with sorrel.  Anyway never mind that; to the topic at hand.  We'd been enjoying plenty of sorrel in salads but I fancied cooking it, and found a really simple sauce recipe from good ol' Hugh F and set out to make poached eggs with sorrel sauce for a weekend breakfast.

Autopilot Plot, And A Polytunnel Out Of The Blue

We've been a bit rubbish lately, not having been down the allotment as often as we might have done.  My excuse is having had a turbo-powered dose of man flu.  Happily enough, a lot of things are quite content to grow in your absence.

Things looking nice in the sunshine

Actual, proper, genuine, sunshine!!

It's been over a week since I wrote anything on here, and with good reason; we've barely been down the ol' plot.  The weather has been what they refer to at the Met Office (probably) as "utter shite", with the only question being how many months worth of rain will fall on any given day.  But hey, you know all this right?  I mean you noticed didn't you?  Thought so.  I was all set to write some grumbly screed about how awful it all was when KA-POW!!, we've had a weekend where it only rained a tiny bit, and the sun even came out!  Weird.

Blue sky not photoshopped.  Seriously.

Rhubarb, Rhubarb, Rhubarb...

Some things seem to just want to grow despite you.  We got given a crown of rhubarb when we got the allotment last May and buried it in one of the first patches we cleared of weeds.  After a few months there didn't seem to be any growth on it, so we dug it up to make room for a couple of blackcurrant bushes and lobbed it on the weed-heap.  A couple of months later and Kasia noticed it had, phoenix-like, managed to spring to life.  It was re-dug into a new patch and, hey presto, we've just harvested our first rhubarb from this  unlikely specimen.

After the Deluge

Apparently the weather is discussed 282 times per second in the UK, which isn't very surprising when it's as mad as it has been in Newcastle over the last few days.  See here, here and here for three of the more dramatic vids of the downpour.  We were down the allotment earlier in the day when it was raining a bit, though there was no suggestion of the drama to follow.

The View from the gate on a damp morning

The Season So Far...

Leeks! Garlic! Me!

So here we are in late June, roughly halfway through our first proper growing season.  After getting all excited about it, especially in March when the weather was (briefly) amazing, we've seen a fair chunk of our efforts completely scuppered by one of the wettest and coldest summers on record.  Seeds haven't germinated, courgettes have perished in record time and things have just generally been as sodden and grim as.... well, let me know if you've got a really good "cold and wet" metaphor, I can't think of one.

In The Beginning...

Day 1; The view from the gate

So, it's been more or less a year since we got the call, got shown round a bunch of weed-stricken plots and made the choice of our own half-plot of smallholding heaven.  We'd been on the waiting list for about 9 months on a couple of different allotments.  The one we ended up on has a pleasantly unfussy, slightly ramshackle feel to it; a lot of the other plots didn't exactly look like Monty Don was at the helm which was reassuring, considering that, at least in the near future, neither would ours.