Successes in a wet, windy & overcast year + a chicory recipe
I started to write this post about the various reasons why this has been a particularly difficult year for growing.
But after reflecting on the fact that we’ve still picked plenty of tasty food, this seemed a bit of a negative way to begin posting again after the summer break! So, instead, this post celebrates the few things that have grown well this year - and I’ll write about the challenges another time.
Adding up the harvests from my container garden in July and August I find that we picked:-
- 36 different crops in July (full list below), weighing a total 5.3kg, including 1214 grams lettuce, 795 grams spring onions and 274 grams peas.
- 23 different crops over 2 weeks in August (we were away for the other 2 weeks), weighing 4.1kg, including 1.57kg Courgettes / zucchini; 1.55kg French beans, and 562g spring onions.
In other words, we ate about 1 kg of high quality fresh home grown food (mostly salads and herbs plus a few veg) each week in July. And about 2kg a week (for the time we were here) during August.
It makes me so happy to be able to pick all this fresh, organic food for my family from the front yard. And it does make a real difference to our day to day meals, too. We eat home grown salad with a mix of leaves and herbs nearly every day, and freshly picked organic veg most evenings. We're also able to eat a more diverse range of plants as much of what we grow is not readily available in the shops.
If you glance down at the lists of harvests below, you’ll see I grow quite a few different salad leaves. These can work really well in urban container gardening because they are highly productive in very little space. They are also nutritious and expensive to buy. Luckily, they also still grew well in the cold and wet months we’ve just had!
One salad leaf I’ve rather neglected to grow much over the years is endive / chicory. In part because I’ve not known how to use the bitter tasting leaves. But after getting an email from Vital seeds in Devon singing their praises, I decided to give them another try this year. I sowed them in early July and they’ve grown strong and well.
Mixed chicories and endive grow well in a container. I am harvesting by picking the outer leaves - and also thinning the plants out as they grow.
How to use them? As well as adding small amounts to mixed salads, I tried this classic recipe that pairs the leaves with apple, blue cheese and walnut.
- Large handful of chicory leaves, shredded.
- One apple or pear, cored, and cut into small cubes (I used an apple from the tree in our front yard).
- Handful of lightly toasted walnuts
- A small handful of chives or baby spring onions, chopped (optional)
- A few small cubes of blue cheese (I used gorgonzola)
- Salad dressing made with cider vinegar, olive oil, a little mustard, and a lump of blue cheese, whizzed together with a stick blender.
Simply mix the above together before serving.
It’s a delicious combination of textures and flavours, with the bitterness of the chicory perfectly complementing the sweetness of the apple. I can definitely feel myself becoming a convert to chicories and endives. If you can recommend any other recipes that use this leaf, do please let me know.
Here are the July and August harvests details in full (the fruit harvest is a fraction of normal for reasons I'll explain another time!):-
July
- Lettuce: 1214 g
- Spring onions: 795 g
- Sunflower shoots: 409 g
- Pea shoots: 304 g
- Mangetout: 291 g
- Peas: 274 g
- Plums: 243 (the first plums the tree has produced!)
- French beans: 201 g
- Courgette: 187 g
- Radish shoots: 178 g
- Basil: 141 g
- Raspberries: 136 g
- Marigold flower: 105 g
- Blackberries: 97 g
- NZ Spinach: 93 g
- Raspberry: 79 g
- Mint: 76 g
- Nasturtium leaves: 64 g
- Sorrel: 49 g
- Broccoli microgreens: 36 g
- Nasturtium flowers: 35 g
- Orach microgreens: 34 g
- Rocket: 33 g
- Kale microgreens: 33 g
- Sage: 32 g
- Blueberry: 25 g
- Land cress: 22 g
- Marjoram: 22 g
- Oregano: 21 g
- Watercress: 19 g
- Day lily flowers: 12 g
- Rosemary: 12 g
- Chives: 9 g
- Lovage: 6 g
- Coriander: 6 g
- Lemon verbena: 3 g
- Society garlic flowers: 1 g
August
- French beans 1556g
- Spring onions 562g
- Courgettes 420g
- Tomatoes 382g (proving very slow to ripen this year)
- Runner beans 365g
- Rocket 305g
- Lettuce 179g
- Tomato 123g
- Chicory 103g
- Coriander 89g
- Sorrel 33g
- Basil 32g
- Rosemary 32g
- Red Russian kale 29g
- Mint 28g
- Thyme 12g
- Oregano 8g
- Nasturtium leaves 5g
- Marjoram 4g
- Salsola 4g
- Summer purslane 4
- Edible flowers 3
- Scot's lovage 3
- Bay 2
2 comments
Good morning from Bend, Oregon
(i wrote a message a few minutes ago and it seemed not to go through. so if by chance it did make it, then this is more of a copy of the last note)
I think it is very interesting hearing the challenges you are having with your garden, because we've heard of many people here in Bend complaining of similar challenges.
I have a small backyard with 4 raised beds and lots of containers. The salads are doing well (as you mentioned too) but my tomatoes are just ripening (slowly) now in September. Our first frost date passed with no frost (thankfully) but our temps are down into the 40's at nite now. Our summer was moderate, so the garden should have done well, but so many items regularly bursting with veg are very slow and slight, including spaghetti squash and zucchini. I have a nice harvest of elderberry and our beans are now coming in, so the jury is out unless we get a frost which could come anytime. My beets are looking good this year, I wish I'd have planted more. I loved your suggestion about sewing rocquette now. I'll do that and some coriander and lettuce.
This year I had some old arugula seeds and decided to scatter them in some containers to see if they would grow. The oldest packet produced the least, but still producing 2 months later. So i'm thinking of doing that with most of my old seeds to see if I can squeeze out some more veg. We are planning on building a hot bed this year to see if we can start our garden earlier. I do have a green house, but havent been too successful. The summers are too hot and the winters too cold and if I heat it the pots produce lots of fungus gnats which kill off my seedlings. I've learned some remedies for that, but after loosing so much, it takes time to be re-energized to start over. I'm still not giving up, however.
We're Just trying to figure out how to grow here. It's a beautiful place to live, but for gardeners it poses difficulty because of the temperature differentiations. We can have a day that hits 90 degrees F and go down to freezing at night. (not often, but just one day like that can really be challenging). Bend is normally a very sunny location, but dry (not like other parts of Oregon).
I always wonder how often to feed. The big beds aren't as much a challenge because we use a good layer of compost (home made). The containers get compost too, but i'm not sure how to feed them or how often and when I do, its hit and miss. (I use fish emulsion or liquid kelp usually).
thank you so much for your book. I will say that it is the BEST of all my collection. Especially for me, because I do so much container gardening.
all the best to you and your family!
Carol Hill
Very good to hear from you in Oregon Carol. How interesting to read that you have been experiencing similar challenges the other side of the Atlantic - my tomatoes are ripening at least a month later than usual, too. I'm glad your salads are doing well, despite the weather. It sounds like your climate is quite tricky to grow and lots to learn. When I moved from London to Newcastle, it definitely took me a few years to adjust (London feels quite tropical in comparison!).
I think feeding is always hard to judge - but in general liquid feeding with a dilute feed, exactly how you are doing, seems to be beneficial, particularly when done in conjunction with good quality compost.
I'm so glad the book has been helpful! Very best wishes, Mark
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