Last of the Christmas sprouts

The garden equivalent of a spring clean happens now. 


No point waiting until the lambs are bounding in the fields, the eggs hatching in the nest and the clocks going forward. By that time, you'll need your hands free to be planting all those seeds that you bought in earnest last year, only used a few of and have had sitting on the shelf hoping that they're still good for the following year.


Besides, third on your list of new year's resolutions was 'keep on top of the garden'. 


Yes, third. Right behind 'keep on top of the house' and 'keep on top of the finances'. Also one ahead of 'get fit', which is now dropping down the list of resolutions because it is so passe. Anyway, rather than join the gym or hire a personal trainer it's much more fun to get fit by taking up an allotment, doing an active sport like climbing or having more sex. Sorry, and having more sex. This may be a gardening blog but I wouldn't want starting an allotment to ruin your sex life.


I digress, but for fear of a solitary life, I've not yet taken up an allotment. Instead I've been out there in my garden, still pruning, cutting and clearing. 


Today it was time to cut back the raspberries. I learnt last year that once raspberry stalks turn brown, after a year's fruiting, you have to not just behead them but cut them off at their ankles. 

It seems quite brutal. A waste of so much potential fruit. Surely there is some value in keeping the stalks say half way up? But no buds means no fruit, so off with their heads, shoulder knees and ankles.

Raspberries are the femme fatale of the fruit world so don't - as I did - feel bad for them. They seduce you to let them grow, and then they wrap themselves around the heart of your garden bed until they totally control it. They smother the space and light around, and it's not until you put them back in their rightful place that you suddenly realise what else has been hiding.


And in my case, raspberries had been supressing a line of garlic and a red onion. I was certain that the limited garlic and onion I planted last year had been harvested, but no. Treats revealed themselves as I cut back the tangled raspberry stalks. Clear ground has shown healthy sprouting and I'm truly stumped how this has come about.

Did I plant more than I realise? Do bulbs split underground? Are these the runts of the litter? Or is the mild weather allowing growing conditions where normally there would be no signs of vegetable life? I have no idea.


Once again, the garden has surprised me with its voracious ability to produce food for the table. Tonight, I feel a lucky lad.

This little piggy...

Two comments I often get when I mention this blog to friends:

"I never had you down as a gardener," (even my mum said that)

"I just don't get Twitter"

Gardening began as a way to keep me and my mind occupied in the months after a relationship ended. My motivation was the anticipation and intrinsic pleasure of eating something I'd grown. It didn't need sharing or talking about because it gave a very personal, very private happiness.

But when I began writing, and got a bit carried away with the joy of this particular craft a Twitter presence was recommended by the friend who got me writing in the first place.

I have just this evening polished off quite possibly the best meal I have ever cooked. Now, I'm about as creative in the kitchen as I am skilled in the garden but tonight I got so excited I got my whizzer out to get all sorts of ingredients singing together in honour of one prime piece of pork belly. However, the real story lies behind the supporting cast which I hope will become clear

I love crackling. It's a vice of mine, but I haven't often cooked my own. The other day I wrote about fennel seeds (sowing the aniseed of love) that were a present from my friend Ruth. I originally met Ruth through Twitter and we have found a shared passion for growing your own, and she has been trying her hardest to inspire me to get into the kitchen.

After writing, I asked followers on Twitter whether they loved or loathed the fragrant/pungent seed of the fennel plant. Two of the responses tickled my tastebuds with passionate responses. @Grajeras and @AKentishKitchen both professed their love of the seed and over the course of a conversation persuaded me to crush the fennel into pork skin and accompany with caramelised apples.

You only have to say the word caramlised to start drooling

So this evening I donned the apron and got crackling...

I followed @grajeras' advice and mixed crushed fennel seed, crushed garlic and salt together.

I rubbed the mix into my pork belly, which I had the butcher score for me given the lack of anything but blunt kitchen knives in my home. On this occasion I went to a butchers (Ruby and White, newly opened in Bristol) for my meat. I thought, my  accompaniments are of the highest quality, so should the star be.

Because it's the accompaniments that meant I've treated this meal as if I was eating at a Michelin quality restaurant. The garlic was planted in my soil as a clove in February and when I pulled up my first one I was thrilled (Clove Tuesday) has treated me on several occasions now. This was my last bulb.

To roast with the meat went apples and onions. Sadly I'd run out of home-grown onions, but for apples I have plenty because I made it my ambition this year to cajole, coax and convince the tree to bear fruit, which it had almost failed to do last year (Ripe for a tart). So three were cut into chunks and laid in a roasting dish with onion and some olive oil, meat rested on top.



I decided to go with a comfort of my childhood and roast some potatoes. My potatoes have been long eaten, but in with the ones I bought went more garlic, and some rosemary. Now I've not written about my rosemary because I forgot about it. But a year ago a friend gave me a cutting from hers and said 'see if it takes'. For a long time it didn't, but the other day I noticed it had started to spread. So torch in hand I went out and cut myself a stalk.

And an hour later, out the oven, a meal in which I, friends and acquaintances have created. Sadly for the others the distances between Bristol and Poole, Kent and Andalucia respectively have meant that the pleasure, including the best crackling I have ever tasted, is all mine this time. Although naturally I burnt the potatoes...

Clove Tuesday

Garlic. The stuff of vampires, the French and pizza express dough balls. When the world moves at breakneck pace, nothing like some old fashioned stereotypes and lack of imagination to bring things to a grinding halt.


Back in March, it was quite something to undress a garden centre bulb, peeling back the delicate layer to reveal a cleavage of promise. I didn't really think about how garlic starts out but it all comes from planting a clove. Apparently, you shouldn't plant supermarket garlic - it's often from abroad and not resistant to our pests. Given that garlic repels everyone from a first date to creatures with fangs, wings and an ability to Count (ha ha ha), it perhaps shows why garden diseases are the hardest things to fight.


I read that the secret to growing good garlic is, ironically, protection. From weeds. It needs nutrients that weeds are only to keen to get their roots into.


And of course, leading a busy fun filled life as I like to think I do but probably don't in the eyes of your average university 'student', I let the weeds take over. As a result, out of my 5 cloves planted this year I only got one bulb. But it did something only onions are supposed to do, it made my eyes water. Well, actually no, but I did get quietly emotional at successfully lifting out this small thing, possibly a little early but its leaves had withered and it had to be rescued from impending weed doom:

I'm sure many of you have got those bunches of garlic tied up, drying out and looking all continental ready for a winter of fragrant warm dishes to banish les bleus, and one day I hope to join you. I know a friend Jess of radish fame is even experimenting with elephant garlic, so these pages may yet reveal more impressive photos than what you see above. But for now, I take mini pride in what I grew and those cloves will undoubtedly make my roast chicken that little bit classier... 


A bientot