Of Beans and Peas

Now that my little plants are growing well I've been thinking about what do with them so I hopped on the net to look for some guidance.

My first lesson was that just because the seeds like kind of similar it doesn't mean that the plants grow in the same conditions!  I'd kind of assumed that because the seeds are kind of similar and peas are quite like beans that they must grow in the same way and thus I planted them all at the same time.  I should have checked what the bean packet meant when it said to plant 'mid spring'... seems dumb now but that obviously meant April/May not Feb/March!

So the peas should be fine as they like cooler weather, as should the broad beans but I appear to have planted the runner beans about 2 months earlier than I should have!  I'm not giving up on them yet but they may become unmanageably large before it's safe to let them out into the garden... we shall see.  I shall probably plant some more at the proper time; a nice backup in case these fail or an interesting comparison if they don't.

I planted all my peas/beans into the same little modular trays that I used for the tomato seed; in hindsight this may not have been the best plan... I can't believe how sturdy the little peas/beans are; such lovely thick stems... such active root systems.  I've potted them all on into 8cm peat pots today which will hopefully keep them going until the garden is ready for them but I had to do a fair bit more coaxing of roots out of the drainage holes than I expected.

From what I've seen the mange-tout's have fairly delicate stems and put down thready, wandering roots (which built their own network under the modules), they came out nice and easy but left all their soil behind.

Pea Seedling

The broad beans have very thick white roots which seemed to head straight down in a nice neat fan pattern; oddly there didn't seem to be any particular correlation between root length and plant size.

Broad Bean Seedling

The runner beans have crazy strong roots and took all their soil with them when they came, they also tended to put their main root through the drainage hole; longer roots definitely went with bigger plants.

Runner Bean Seedling

Amazingly every single seed I planted germinated; I originally planted loads of seeds to allow for my tendency to kill small things with alarming skill.  I guess it'll be a day or so until I see if I've inflicted any lasting harm on my plants by transferring them into the new pots, hopefully they'll make it but I wouldn't be surprised if a few are a little shocked from the transition.

Pictures from http://www.sciencephoto.com/ as my camera battery was dead!

Year 2

I missed my garden very much this winter; despite all the time it took last year it really was very satisfying to see the little tiny plants growing all big and strong and being able to eat fresh food from the garden.  I enjoyed it so much that I actually looked into getting an allotment... the 5 year waiting list kind of put me off though so I'll just have to stick to pots for the time being!


So that I can get started on the gardening earlier this year I decided to grow my plants from seed - it should let me have lots more plants for the same money and will give me something to ooh and ahh at for the next few months while I wait for the weather to cheer up.


I will probably end up picking up a few more bits and pieces later in the season, probably a fruit plant or two as these don't really seem to come in seed form but for now I've got the following:


Czar Runner Bean Mid Spring May-June!
Aquadulce Longpod BroadBean Feb-Apr
Pattison Blanc' Patty Pan Squash  Apr-May
Tondo di Piacenza Courgette Apr - May
Finissimo small leaved basil Apr - July
Azur Kohlrabi (Cabbage-Turnip... looks like an alien lifeform so I just had to have some!l)
Giant Red Carrot Feb-July
Golden sweet mange-tout pea Feb-May
Red Top Radish Mar-Aug
Latah Tomato Feb-Apr (Early tomatoes)
Legend Tomato Feb-Apr(Proper Salad tomatoes)


I bought my seeds from The Real Seed Catalogue which sells, surprise surprise, real seeds!  Which means that they're not F1 hybrids, GM or any such nonsense and I should be able to collect seeds from the plants I grow and never have to buy any more in the future... meaning I just bought a life time supply of seeds for about 20 quid!

And Indoor Plants...

Our other reason for visiting the garden centre was getting some proper pots for Rob's Chili Pepper plants - the big one in the middle was a christmas present from Nicky and the two smaller ones to the side were recent gifts from uncle Nick, who grew them from seedlings.  They are now happily settled in the kitchen and are already showing signs of fruiting :D

I couldn't manage a visit to the garden centre without coming home with a new plant; this little beauty is a Haworthia Fasciata, a type of succulent, and should be very hard to kill!  Whilst I seem to manage fine with outdoor plants my indoor plants always seem to die on me so I shall be trying very hard to keep this little fellow alive so he can brighten up my study over the winter.

Outdoor Plant Update

 
I went to the garden centre today to buy yet more compost to pot out the strawberry runners - they were beginning to look a little cramped in their pots so I've moved them all into larger ones (thank you uncle Nick!) where they will hopefully be able to see out the winter.  There are three plants in each of these pots/tubs so they have approximately the same amount of room as the ones I grew this summer - I'm thinking that I may try and make some sort of raised bed for them next year but commercial kits are looking very expensive so they may live in the pots for a while first!

 I also picked up these curved bamboo canes for the raspberries - they've been suffering a little when the wind gets up so when Rob spotted these I knew they'd be perfect.  They're a little more decorative than straight canes and they should be more likely to stay upright too (also no eye-poking out!)

Dried Tomatoes

I've been stockpiling cherry tomatoes all this week, they're ripening like crazy and there are only so many times you can eat tomatoes in a week before they get a bit boring, so on Saturday I decided it was time to do something with them.  Some sort of pasta sauce seemed like the most obvious use for them but the receipes I found all wanted them skinned.... I think not!

After a bit of searching I came across the idea of oven-drying them (an english solution to sun-dried tomatoes!) so I enlisted Rob's help to squish all the innards out of the little tomatoes and then left them in the oven for several hours with some olive oil and herbs until they came out all chewy and dry.  They taste just like the sun-dried tomatoes I've bought before with very strong tomato flavour (which to be honest I'm not all that keen on!) so I'm thinking I will try chopping them up and baking some tomato bread later on or just let Rob eat his way through them in salads etc.  Much better off this way than gradually going off in the fridge though - for now they are tucked up in the freezer until I get inspired to use them!

Cake!

From This...

Whilst not strictly made with produce from my own garden I think this still qualifies for a mention here - this is the chocolate and courgette cake that I made to celebrate passing my latest round of ACCA exams.  I used this recipe from the BBC Good Food website which calls for two courgettes both of which were donated from other peoples' gardens - a lovely yellow one from Angela and a more traditional green one from Domo at work.

To This!

It was a blissfully easy cake to cook and was delicious - much less rich than your average chocolate cake and with a lovely spongey texture to it, almost like a brownie but much lighter!

Agapanthus!

Isn't she pretty!