It is the beginning of July and the plot is looking very green....

Spring 2017 preparations

Plot 1b is finally starting to come together

Plots 4 and 2b are all planted up. The recent rains means that the crops are taking off, as are the weeds! Plot 1b is slowly improving and now I feel that it is starting to resemble an allotment. Except, for a small area of the plot, 1b had not been 'dug' for probably 10 years so it has been a long process to try and get it under control. Upcoming plans for 1b including adding a seating area and putting up a fence made from pallets. We will also use slabs dug into the ground to try and prevent roots coming through from the area infront. It is looking like it will be a good year for fruit and we have also planted a good range of flowers for cutting.

What progress was made in March 2016?

We have spent most of our allotment time clearing Plot 1b. We have made some good progress, although we do now have two 1 tonne builders bags full of couch grass roots! Am feeling confident we will have the whole of the plot sorted for planting this Spring; which is positive!

It's Easter weekend which means it is..... onion bhaji day!

This has become one of those 'Spring jobs'. We buy our onion sets via the allotment ground sold by the weight. You can work out how many sets per 100g, but you need a few extras right? Every year I plan to cut down and end up with 100's and 100's. We do grow alot of onions; probably far too many, but they are easy to grow and low maintenance. At this time of year, I am starting to sow seeds in the greenhouse, but this becomes quite challenging when all your seed trays are filled with onions!

These are the onions destined to be bhajis which have been stored in our greenhouse over winter.

To make the bhajis you start with filling a large jam pan with onions. I chopped these up into halves or quarters depending on the size. I then filled the pan with water and left it to simmer until the onions were soft. Once soft, I used a blender to produce the puree to which I added the spices.

I believe this is the secret to really tasty bhajis. There are many ways to make the batter for bhajis, bhajis are just onions in batter afterall. This recipe uses plain flour, egg and water. An article in the Guardian suggests that a 2:1 ratio of gram (chickpea) to rice flour should be used to make the "perfect bhaji" and discusses how different regions of India, traditionally, make bhaji batters of different consistencies producing varying textures of bhaji.

I have tried a number of different methods and have found onion puree thickened with plain flour gives a great onion flavour.

In addition to the spiced onion puree you need a large quantity of thinely sliced onions. I have found using a food processor saves your sanity a little here.

This is about half the quantity of onions I used to a full jam pan of puree

Mix the puree and sliced onions together and add plain flour until it produces a 'dropping' texture. This just means thicken enough that it will fall off the spoon in a blob similar to a cake mixture

Deep fry a tablespoon full at a time in a flavourless oil (e.g sunflower) at 185 degrees Celcius until a deep golden colour. This is about 4-5 minutes. Our fryer is not very big and I can fit 4 spoonfuls at a time to produce 4 bhajis. If you cram too many in they will stick together. If this does happen, all is not lost as you can tease them apart and drop them back in the fryer for 30 seconds. 

This volume of mixture makes ALOT of bhajis; probably 100 at least. Only do this if you want to store them in the freezer. You can, however, reheat from frozen in the oven at 175 degrees Celcius for 15 minutes. You can cut down the volumes, by using a smaller pan for your puree and the same principles. 

Mountain of Onion Bhaji's 

Ingredients:

• About 40 large onions
• 1kg plain flour (ish)
• Spices - equal quantities of black onion seeds, black sesame seeds, cumin seeds, paprika, cumin powder, garam massala, ground corriandor. (I add one heaped tablespoon of each).
• 1 tbs salt, 1 tbs pepper (this seems like alot, but it is a huge volume to season)
• 1 tbs chilli powder (optional, to taste really)
• 2tbs tumeric
• 5tbs mild curry powder
• A head of garlic chopped or a good 2 tbs of a garlic puree
• Oil for frying

Nb: the spice mix is 1:2:5 ratio as listed above if you want to add more spices or make smaller batches.

Method:

1. Add about half the onions roughly chopped to a large pan (e.g jam pan) and cover with water. Simmer until the onions are soft and blend to a puree. Allow to cool.
2. Add the spices, seasoning and garlic to the puree.
3. Use a food processor to slice the remaining onions.
4. Mix the sliced onions with the puree and add plain flour until a dropping (cake mixture-like) texture is reached. This amount used the whole 1kg, but just add until you achieve the right texture.
5. Deep fry tablespoons in the oil at 185 degrees C.

You will need a very large bowl, and alot of patience, to cook the whole batch so it may be easier to split the spiced puree and do this in two batches. You could freeze the puree to use another time.

 I would recommend frying the first bhaji and then tasting it. You can always add more seasoning/spices before cooking the rest if needed. In this case, just add these proportionally in the 1:2:5 ratio.

e.g. If you wish to make a smaller batch - 5 large-ish onions and 1 tsps of the spices/seasoning (2 tsp of tumeric and  5tsps of the curry powder) will probably give you about 10-15 ish bhajis.

This is about 2/3rds of the way through cooking this year's bhaji mountain!  These will be heading into the freezer and used for our weekly 'curry night' with friends.

How to dispose of cooking oil

Not long till Spring now

Spring bulbs on LottiePlotFour

The sun has not been out much in Manchester (yet), but there are some signs that Spring is coming. Daffodils are flowering and those annoying weed seeds are popping through in places. It has still been very wet, but we are lucky that our soil drains quickly and it doesn't become waterlogged.











Despite the poor weather, we have made progress on Plot 2b and now have new raised beds in the middle section.

Raised beds with covered paths for easy maintenance

Taking a risk with early broad beans

I have been itching to plant something so decided to put some broad beans in. These are pretty hardy so I think they will okay. We haven't planted broad beans for a while; probably because the crops can be so big we ended up getting a bit sick of them! In this section I have planted about 40 seeds in a block pattern. As these come through I will probably space them out a little so they are in double rows.








At the end of last summer we decided to take on this half plot. It had been left unattended for a while, but it does have a nice greenhouse and patio area - so potential! This middle section was full of annual weeds, but really not too many of the real baddies. All the weeds had gone to seed so we 'blasted' them with a weed wand before cutting them down and covering the area with ground cover fabric over the winter. After uncovering this, I am pleasantly surprised; it doesn't look too bad!

The plan is to work on clearing this area for planting in Spring.

Last year I managed to just about stick to a planting plan, so this is 2016's effort.

Happy Gardening All! Click here for a larger version of the plan.

It does get much easier!

We signed the tenancy agreement for LottiePlotFour in late summer 2007. This season will be our 9th on the plot four and our 10th year as allotmenteers! So where are we going into our 9th year on the plot?

Well, I now have a few grey hairs (well hidden mind) and Ant has a few more (not well hidden!). The weather has been so terrible over winter that we barely went to the plot at all.

The last week I have spent a few afternoons preparing the plot. Whilst enjoying the winter sun, it did get me thinking! In two afternoons, I managed to clear the majority of the plot. Back in winter 2007/spring 2008 we were spending all of nearly every weekend digging out bindweed or hacking away at bramble roots with pick axe. I still remember Ant's response when I came home to tell him I had secured a full plot for us. It went something like "It better not be that s*** plot four" Would this have been able to happen if we had taken on a similar plot this year? Possibly not without further challenges; the weekends have been a wash out!

Taking on a plot that looked like this was a mere 'small challenge'.


Washing baskets of bindweed did not deter us
  

The addition of path was a momentous occassion.

I guess the weather was on our side, but that is gardening! If there is a will there is a way. If you have taken on a plot and struggled with the wet weather then start getting down as soon as you can. There is some good advice on our allotment ground website about 'getting started' 

Would I take on a plot that was so bad now? Not sure - I am more aware of the amount of work required! However, it really is worth the effort. The slogging away soon becomes a distant memory when you are sitting on your plot in the summer sun surrounded by all your home grown produce.

How can you beat the fact that, in January, you can still eat your own veg?

Today we picked a few veggies for Sunday dinner. The remaining potatoes are now cleared and will be made into mash to be frozen.

These Oca were something new to try last year and are totally delicious.

A fellow allotmenteer gave me some parsnips - "The sweetest he has ever grown".

What is planned for this year?

A little extension to the pergola with a corregated plastic roof for shelter - a 6x4 foot shed full of stuff is quite a squeeze for 2 adults when it is chucking it down with rain! Lots of successful crops (hopefully). We have also taken on Plot 1b (gluttons for punishment!) - watch this space!

The spring is almost upon us again!

It's the end of Feb already! In a few weeks it will be potato planting time and then full steam ahead with the 2013 planting season. So far has been a slow start to the year as it has been so cold. Even the last 2 weekends the snow has been slightly falling again! Our manure delivery didn't make it until almost Christmas due to the wet ground. So, the first job of this year has been to manure the beds for planting. We have managed to cover most of the beds on LottiePlotFour; except those reserved for root veg of course. We have decided to make some big structural changes to the middle section of LottiePlotFour. This is mainly because maretail has taken hold on many of the paths here and they really need a good dig over again to knock it back. Maretail is a real nightmare of a weed which is very difficult to get rid of. Saying this, it has taken a good 4 years to start being a problem again from our original clearing so if we battle on we will hold it back. The fruit bushes to LottiePlotFiveA so we can clear the area and put some new 10x4ft beds in. In order to transfer the fruit we had to dig a rather large area out of the back of LottiePlotFiveA, removing much couch grass and a globe artichoke plant. We are not particular fans of the artichokes and the plant roots were so tangled with couch that it was much easier just to get it out. Ant dug out last years compost bin to provide compost to cover a new strawberry bed. We used existing beds from LottiePlotFour to build a 3 section composting areas and a large strawberry bed in the area we had cleared. ...and made sure we added lots of manure before covering with the compost. The bed was eventually filled with 47 strawberry plants grown as runners from an existing bed on LottiePlotFour. The new composting and fruit area is situated at the back of LottiePlotFiveA. We moved these established blackcurrant and redcurrant bushes onto LottiePlotFiveA along with some pink gooseberry plants. This left a messy area in the centre of LottiePlotFour which needs to be dug over and weeded to make room for the new beds. We dug up the herb bed, tidied up the plants and re-planted this also on LottiePlotFiveA. Here you can see the new area completed. Other jobs included pruning the autumn raspberries and the bramley apple tree. We extended the raspberry frame with some runners. Life even springs up in a recently exposed bit of manure on the flower bed. There is still alot of manure left to move. Fortunately there is quite a bit of space left to cover. We now have LottiePlotElevenA so watch this space!! Some crops do still remain including Black Kale seen under meshing. Behind the kale there is a bed of potatoes which still seem very good; we better get these up soon though as they will sprout as the ground warms up! Plenty of leeks. Rhubarb sprouting through. Swedes. Spring bulbs giving us hope of some sunshine soon.

An update for June 2012: Late frosts, down-pours and droughts!

Well, terrible terrible weather! May had a 2 week drought. The temperature was approaching 30 degrees on a few days and then the rain came, and came; it has been lashing down ever since. Luckily the ground is pretty free draining at the plot so you can get on quite soon after a down-pour and do some work. This sort of weather can make it very difficult if you work fulltime; if weekends are a blow out you can miss essential planting times. The temperatures also really dropped in late May and we had to hold back on planting most of the tender plants until recently. This has accumulated in a very slow start to the season. Saying this, both plots are just about planted up now. Here's to hoping the weather improves from now on.

An update for April 2012

During March and April we have made good progress; Plot 5A is now cleared and ready for planting. We have planted the early and second early potatoes (international kidney, anya and kestrel). Plot 5a has a large onion patch with around 100 overwintering and 300 maincrop onions. The garlic that was overwintered in coming on strong. The rhubarb patch is looking good and all the fruit has starting growing. So far, we have sown some seeds - beetroot, carrots, broad and dwarf beans. We are due frosts again soon so hopefully these will survive.

What goes on at an allotment over winter?

It's been a while since we have had an update here at LottiePlotFour. We are determined that this year we will go back to the video updates and keep uploading these to youtube. You may think things are all quiet at an allotment over winter, but this needs to be a very productive time if you are going to have a plot prepared ready for spring. Here are are few things we have been up to:


Pruning the bramley tree. This tree is very productive. It was on the plot when we took it on and is planted far too close to the path. This does mean we have to try and keep it under control, but since we have been able to swop a sackload of these for a good few pounds of sausages at our local butchers, it really is worth the space. In addition, we have that much apple puree that I am still using this for preserves, desserts and breakfast items now! The green item handing in the tree is a codling moth trap. It contains a pad with a pheromone on that attracts the male moths to stop the breeding cycle. We have found these to be very effective.




The autumn raspberries have been chopped down to allow new growth. We extended the raspberry frame; now double the length filled with newly transplanted canes.



Don't forget that some crops still grow over winter. Over winter we left in carrots, swedes, black kale, parsnips and leeks.

Even in mid feb, the swedes and black kale are still going strong.





There is signs that spring is just around the corner.

Chives are sprouting through.



Clementis 'Montana' is showing new growth.



Spring bulbs are making an appearance.



Autumn planted garlic and onions have survived the winter.





Most of LottiePlotFour has been covered with straw from around November. The beds were dug over before covering.



These beds contained root crops that were overwintered. They have recently been cleared.




LottiePlotFiveA is under-going a major clear out. After taking the plot on last year we had decided to leave the area behind the flowerbed due to the large number of raspberry plants. Whilst the crops were great, the whole area was badly infested with bindweed and brambles. By the end of the summer it was in a real mess; this year the plan is to get the whole of the second plot into a more managable state.

We started by digging out the raspberries and brambles. Superfically it doesn't look too bad here. The first 6 foot of the plot isn't too bad as we dug this last year; the area behind this is a different story!



We decided to put all the roots into a 1 tonne builders bag. We have layered these with chicken manure from our chickens we keep at home. On top of this we will put a few bags of multi-purpose compost then cover with builders weed suppressant membrane. Through this we are going to plant a giant pumpkin. The huge leaves should hide the bag and we should get some great compost from this eventually. The idea is that, as we are tightly packing the roots in, they won't escape and will eventually rot down.

The bag is nearly full of roots and poop!



There is even still life underneath all this! This is a dahlia tuber that we dug out of the flowerbed. I planted these last summer and they survived the frost. Hopefully that means the other tubers may still be alive and the flowerbed may bloom at no extra cost.