Just strawberries and blackberries for fruit but the veg is plentiful. I can feed the two of us modestly every day at the moment with the veg we’re growing. If I plant a similar variety next year it will be plentiful and I’ll be able to do some preserving too.
We’ve planted lots of different things to gauge what grows well where and understand the light, shade, and soil of our garden. A soil test revealed fairly acidic soil at 5.5 so I’ll be adding lime, as well as manure, come the autumn. We keep the knotweed down and continue to reduce in order to claim back our garden.
I’ve not planted in strict rows. I’ve gone for a bit of wild permaculture and let the vegetables do their thing. I’ve planted chard in chard (funny joke (we live in Chard) the salad card is bitter, but the insects either love or hate it, any way they stay away).
I’ve planted early and late to see what fares well. As the weather changes so much I think we have to be adaptable. I’m not going mad with weeding just allowing the plants to do their thing and shade out the weeds.
I’m interested in the art of preserving and fermentation but fear that we may be able to start our personal wind farm if the veg growing becomes too bountiful. Not in too much danger of that this year. I suspect it will be the usual green tomato chutney this autumn as I have no greenhouse at the moment to get tomatoes started early.
Here are a few pics to see the progress:
Hi Nicola,
Regarding the abundant knotweed; did you try any recipes with it???
https://www.finedininglovers.com/article/4-recipes-fall-love-japanese-knotweed
https://foragerchef.com/japanese-knotweed/
https://www.bonappetit.com/test-kitchen/ingredients/article/japanese-knotweed-recipes
https://www.thespruceeats.com/japanese-knotweed-pickles-1337865
http://the3foragers.blogspot.com/2011/05/japanese-knotweed-recipe-knotweed-jelly.html
And there are many more pages on using it as free food….
I’m really interested if knotweed is as eatable as the recipes suggest…..
Johan.
Hiya Johan,
I’ve not tried it yet Although I’ve seen recipes and they look delicious. It’s certainly on my list to do.
The main reason I’ve not tried to cook and eat the knotweed is that chemicals have been used in our garden to poison the knotweed before we arrived here in France.
I’ve started all of my vegetables off in raised beds for the short term and I’ll be working to improve the soil taking regular test samples to see what the content is before making expanding our planned permaculture garden and landscaping. I don’t have major concerns but didn’t want to go ahead planting food to eat before being sure about the soil.
Now that we are getting the knotweed under control there will always be a patch to harvest and experiment with cooking I’m quite sure of that.
I really want to expand my knowledge of fermentation, canning, and preserving. For now, the barn roof renovation is keeping us very busy.
Thanks for the post and for the links to recipes. We’ll be trying those out next year I’m sure.