in my garden….
I’m loving the abundant harvests as well as the pretty flowers from my runner beans. They’ve been added to the equally plentiful courgettes, onions, garlic and tomatoes, cooked slowly in a sort of ratatouille with extra olive oil, basil and parsley added at the end.
In my garden….
…. along with the increasingly dewy mornings and darker evenings, the colours are getting richer. Purple hues from the ripening figs at the front of the house, the dusty skinned damsons in the hedgerows, verbena and the ubiquitous orache that’s rapidly going to seed. Magenta, violets and deep pinks from sweet peas and the last few knautia. It’s lovely to still have some fresh lime greens to enjoy in the nicotiana and dill flowers amongst all these bold, late summerv colours.
In my garden….
...
….if you start looking amongst the still lush growth, it’s not hard to spot squashes lurking everywhere. Another reminder that Autumn is just around the corner. The uchiki kuri and mother hubbard squashes I’ve grown this year seem to have grown so speedily (helped by a perfect summer of course) and some of them are HUGE. Some of those silvery grey squashes have an other-worldly quality to them. I just hope they’re tasty as we’re definitely going to have plenty of them.
In my garden…. 
Although I’ve been as tardy as ever on the weeding front, the one area I’m really making an attempt at keeping weed free is the newly planted asparagus area. I grew about 30 plants from seed this year, they germinated really easily and I really want to give them a chance. I know I have a long wait (3 years) before harvest. Still, the thought of freshly gathered asparagus, taken straight from garden to kitchen, with no chance to lose any of that wonderful flavour, is encouraging even me to weed fastidiously.
In my garden……
The beets are feeding us well. The chard, with its vibrant ruby red and sunny yellow stems lifts my spirits every time I wander into the garden. While there is so much beetroot it’s being roasted, grated in salads, boiled and dressed with balsamic. And given away.
In my garden…..
….the cold-frame is pretty much abandoned as everything has long since been planted out. The only seedlings still sheltering there are my chop suey or chrysanthemum greens. a regular favourite of mine at this time of year, they grow quickly and easily, while providing tasty green leaves and very pretty flowers into the Autumn months, when most things are going to seed or are rapidly fading.
The Autumn fruiting raspberries are providing tasty pickings daily and the Quince tree appears to still have about 25 fruit on its branches. I have been counting each one of these in awe as our only previous harvest from this tree (the first we planted in this garden nearly 3 years ago) has been the grand total of one.
All this mellow fruitfulness gives me mixed feelings. Lovely to have new harvests to look forward to, but all these signs of Autumn approaching keep reminding me we only have a couple of days left of the summer holiday. Soon there’ll be a lot fewer weekday hours of children rampaging around the veggies, picking the calendula and sweet peas. At least I’m glad that the last few days have seen the garden full of children running wild; toddlers dipping in the paddling pool then playing in mud; the strength of the hammock being tested by piles of children and the tent and tree house being played and picnicked in. Lots of squashed and trampled plants around the edges of beds. Surely exactly as the last few days of the summer hols should be.
Have really been enjoying Lizzie Moult’s Garden ShareCollective, offering a peep into gardens around the world and would love to join in again this month.
Your garden looks amazing!
I spent the afternoon on a friend’s allotment yesterday and it was wonderful, with very similar sites to your garden. I just made pizza with home grown tomatoes, purple basil and some chorizo de bellota I brought back from Barcelona 😉
Thank you and your pizza sounds wonderful. We’re nearly out of our home-grown chorizo, may actually need to buy some soon.
My garden is the exact opposite to this right now! Sigh
I bet it’s a bit less wild than my very scruffy one!
Love the look of the mother hubbard. So good to have a bumper year in the veg garden. I think we deserve it for not losing faith after a couple of difficult growing years. Enjoy your garden.
I think you’re right, we do deserve a good growing year – it’s going to make me feel all optimistic about growing all sorts of things for next year if I’m not careful.
Your garden looks wonderful, mine suffered from a 10 day holiday and no one to water it. A lesson for next year. GG
I know how you feel, I lost a few things when we went away too – had foolishly planted a few seedlings out far too close to other things, forgetting quite how quick growing some plants can be during August.
Your runner beans and squashes are doing so well, and I love the orache, nicotiana and dill combination… might just make a note of that one to try next year!
To be honest I think it was an accident! But I’m pretty pleased with it all the same.
Pingback: Garden Share Collective: 2nd September, 2013
Andrea, what a beautiful post! Isn’t rainbow chard just the happiest vegetable? I love all the early Autumnal hues..
I love the Autumn colours too, despite wishing our lovely summer could go on forever, I do love our changing seasons.
Those squashes look amazing! It really has been a perfect summer this year for growing, lets hope we have many more to follow, we had plenty of awful ones! My Autumn raspberries aren’t quite ready yet, looking forward to daily pickings. I’ll have to try adding runner beans to ratatouille, haven’t tried that and it sounds lovely! Hope Ruby is enjoying her last few days in the garden before term starts.
Thanks Alex, just tried the first of our squash in a thai curry tonight and it was lovely – relieved it tasted good as have a lot to eat!I Last day of holiday for us tomorrow, I couldn’t resist having banana bread in the treehouse with Ruby this morning wanting to make the most of lazy, sunny morning while I can.
I love the colours in your garden – it all looks very romantic and productive at the same time. Asparagus is well worth the wait and the weeding even if the harvest only lasts for six weeks.
Thanks Anne and I hope my asparagus survives, it’s the first time I’ve tried growing it and I do love eating it.
Those squashes are from out of this world, what do you do with them? It doesn’t really get cold enough at my place for squash I don’t think but at the same time I don’t know how to really eat them.
Still glad to see colour in your garden even though summer is slowly slipping away. You have just inspired me to grow my asparagus from seed. I have a packet and thought that instead I would buy a crown, now that I have seen your dedication maybe this is what I need to do too.
Your climbing beans are looking healthy too.
It’s the first time I’ve grown Mother Hubbard squashes but planning to use them as I would butternut squashes – roast them (sometimes with woody herbs and/or garlic and chilli) make soups, use in curries, make crisps, add to pasta bakes with spinach and ricotta etc. I seem to have a lot of them though so grateful if anyone has other ideas!
As for the asparagus seed, it seemed worth a go as a packet of seeds is so cheap compared to cost of lots of crowns and I was encouraged by a local commercial asparagus grower that they’d be easy to grow – definitely have been.
Hey Andrea … great blog. I like you, love being able to see what people are doing in other places. Aren’t Scarlet runner beans just superb! I adore photos too and yours are super. Your flowers look amazing, my vege garden is full of them! J
Thanks lots for visiting and yes, I love growing flowers and veggies together – a bit of a jumble but the bees and butterflies love it as much as I do. The flowers of runner beans are beautiful aren’t they, I sometimes think it’s worth growing some of them fpr the flowers alone!
Your garden is just amazing. I love everything, the flowers, colours and natural feel of relaxed yet abundant flowers and vegetables. It makes me wish for summer again, I do love the brightness of light and the vivd colours. Must get planting bulbs to make up for it!
Thank you! I’m missing summer already too, there’s still lots to eat from the garden but it isn’t quite the same dashing out in the rain to get it!