I sowed too many pumpkin plants this year and gave some away to some colleagues at work and we have now competition to see who can grow the biggest.  This photo is to just show them how big one of my Red Kuris is currently! (I’m keeping my Burgess under wraps for now….)

This is the first fruit of my attempt to grow an outdoor cucumber.  It goes by the charming variety name of Burpless Tasty Green, as I gather older outdoor varieties would cause indigestion. It really did taste quite different and superior to the shop-bought ones I have eaten all my life. And not a single burp…

Yet again I seem to be enjoying flowers. Although much of the attraction for this wonderful 6 ft giant sunflower is that the kids sowed it.

Last year, I attempted to grow my seedlings in one of those little 5 foot high, 4-level, mini-greenhouses that is about 1.5 foot square. It was ok but the weight of the seedlings was too much for it and it eventually collapsed.  I knew I needed a greenhouse but I didn’t know where to put it, how much it would cost and even if I could afford one.  The “proper” wooden ones started at about £4000 even for a small one!

But, I bought one this spring (6’ by 8’).  It only cost £299 from a shop on Ebay.  Dad came to help me put it up in March which took MUCH longer than anticipated.  In short, the base is the important bit.  Getting it secure and level is very important and quite tricky.  Once done, the rest of the construction is relatively simple.  I would allow 2-3 days for the whole project, depending on how much help you have.

But, I have had so much use from it. The warmth allowed me to start seedlings early and the heat now that we are in summer is perfect for the tomatoes that are coming on a storm. As with so much at the allotment, fruit are swelling but can’t be picked yet. The anticipation….  But, if we avoid the tomato blight that scuppered my outdoor allotment toms in last year’s wet summer, I hope to be eating slices of warm ripe juicy tomato with some vinaigrette and crunchy crystals of maldon sea salt with my own basil within a month.

From the next door plot…

One of my regrets this year is that I didn’t plant nearly enough peas.  It’s as much as I can do not to eat them there and then on the plot, shelling them raw straight into my mouth.  The sweetness is incredible.

We picked all the ready ones last weekend and the kids particularly loved them. But we have had to wait another week for some more to ripen.  I shall pick them tomorrow morning for Sunday lunch.

So, the sight that greeted me this morning with the beautiful sunlight back-lighting the pregnant little pods, showing the tiny peas within was almost too much to bear.  Roll-on tomorrow, but the question is whether they will even make it home to share with the family?

I think of the raspberry as the more refined and sophisticated cousin to the brash and showy strawberry. A bit like Melburnians think of themselves (without any evident justification as far as I can see) in comparison to Sydneysiders in Australia. Or maybe an Uma Thurman to the strawberry’s Jordan/ Katie Price.  With the end to the strawberry glut hoving into view, it is exciting to see the very first ripe raspberry. They won’t really get going til next month and if last year is anything to go by, will keep going til October.

I inherited these canes too (like the strawberries) so I don’t know the variety.  I guessed correctly that they were autumn-fruiting raspberries and therefore all canes get cut back to the ground in the winter, but other than that I don’t do anything to them.

I am determined this year not to let any go to waste.  Raspberry jam is on the cards, as are frozen raspberries, raspberry ripple ice cream and just the simple pleasure of a bowl of sun-warmed, straight-from-the-plot raspberries with some cold cream.

Bring it on.

Perhaps this blog would be better titled “One man went to hoe”.  I think it is easily the most useful garden tool I have.  I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time hoeing weeds –which is ironic as in my ordinary life I am not the world’s tidiest person.  Even with all this hoeing, I am fighting a constant battle against many different weeds – most of which I have no idea about the name.  A battle that I think will soon be lost.  But I find that if you take the hoe with you every time you go to the plot and spend 5 minutes slicing through the little buggers then its not so much of a chore. Its also quite satisfying.

It pays, though, to buy a short metal file to keep the edge sharp.  The soil round here in the Chilterns is pretty stony and flinty, which will blunt the edge over time.  Two minutes with a file can keep the hoe sharp for months.

The last week has seen the hottest weather of the year in the UK.  Thankfully it has now cooled but was up to 33 degrees centigrade in this corner of England.  While the rest of us were melting in commuter trains (the aroma of which was described by someone I know as “the smell of despair”), my few sweetcorn plants were loving it. Last year’s cool and wet summer was not to their liking and frankly the crop was a bit of a failure.

I thought this year’s crop were going to fail too as I had a nightmare getting the seeds to germinate.  Out of a whole packet of seeds, I think about 8 got going.  I’ll try a different variety next year.

Sweetcorn likes a lot of heat basically and that is what they got last week.  As a result they have shot up and their feathery flowers are just beginning to show.  I’m hoping that by early September we have enough for at least one family meal.  Not a great return on investment but if they turn out right, it will still be worth it.  They say that before you harvest them you should put on a pot of water to boil, pick them and then run not walk home before any of the natural sugars turn to starch. I’m salivating already…