I made a tomato salad this afternoon. The ingredients are the best of everything! Fresh picked tomatoes, extra virgin olive oyl, balsamic vinegar, buffalo mozzarella... needless to say it was divine! Just think of those long, long Winter months when all we have to eat here is crunchy, bland, tasteless, awful supermarket tomatoes. Enjoy them while you can!
Tasty Summer Tomatoes!
Now this is a picture that will bring back happy memories when I look at it next February or March!
I made a tomato salad this afternoon. The ingredients are the best of everything! Fresh picked tomatoes, extra virgin olive oyl, balsamic vinegar, buffalo mozzarella... needless to say it was divine! Just think of those long, long Winter months when all we have to eat here is crunchy, bland, tasteless, awful supermarket tomatoes. Enjoy them while you can!
I made a tomato salad this afternoon. The ingredients are the best of everything! Fresh picked tomatoes, extra virgin olive oyl, balsamic vinegar, buffalo mozzarella... needless to say it was divine! Just think of those long, long Winter months when all we have to eat here is crunchy, bland, tasteless, awful supermarket tomatoes. Enjoy them while you can!
More Autumn Colours
I love watching how plants react to the seasons! Plants are so sensitive to day length, strength of sunlight and temperature and they respond in colourful ways sometimes.
These are some Scotch Bonnet chillis that I grew from seed saved from a chilli bought in a West Indian market stall. You can see that they are responding to the shortening day length and cooler nights by turning colour.
Just in a couple of days these two orange coloured ones went from green to orange, then will go to red. This is the same process involved in tree leaves turning colour in Autumn when they respond to the seasons.
This one above you can just see starting to change, in only a day or so it will turn colour. These are fairly small plants and I might bring one indoors as a beautiful houseplant on a bright windowsill.
This little chap is a 'Bishops Kiss' chilli. I look forward to saving seed this year and growing more next year.
If you grow pumpkins or courgettes then this powdery mildew will be a familiar sight at this time of year. It happens every year, it looks horrible but it just seems to be inevitable that the plant will get this at the end of the season.
I have heard of people using various home concoctions sprayed onto the leaves, but it only delays the inevitable. It usually happens in dry conditions, but I just try to keep my plants well fed and watered for as long as possible.
Elsewhere, I am enjoying watching my Christmas Dinner growing on the plant. This is the first time I have grown Brussels Sprouts, and this variety Bosworth seemed like a good one to me.
These Crab Apples are looking glorious at the moment. I am always torn between leaving them on the tree for some lovely Winter colour in the garden, and to feed the hungry birds in the garden - or pick them all and make crab apple jelly. I can't decide!
Finally, just another reminder to email me a picture of your faithful canine garden companions for Matron's 2010 Dogblog. Send me a picture before September 29th and please include your blog address if you want me to put a link in. This old lady is my ex-dog Emma. We rescued her from Battersea Dogs Home in the 1970s and she was a fun and loyal companion for many years. I just found this photo, she had just been playing snowballs with me in the garden!
These are some Scotch Bonnet chillis that I grew from seed saved from a chilli bought in a West Indian market stall. You can see that they are responding to the shortening day length and cooler nights by turning colour.
Just in a couple of days these two orange coloured ones went from green to orange, then will go to red. This is the same process involved in tree leaves turning colour in Autumn when they respond to the seasons.
This one above you can just see starting to change, in only a day or so it will turn colour. These are fairly small plants and I might bring one indoors as a beautiful houseplant on a bright windowsill.
This little chap is a 'Bishops Kiss' chilli. I look forward to saving seed this year and growing more next year.
If you grow pumpkins or courgettes then this powdery mildew will be a familiar sight at this time of year. It happens every year, it looks horrible but it just seems to be inevitable that the plant will get this at the end of the season.
I have heard of people using various home concoctions sprayed onto the leaves, but it only delays the inevitable. It usually happens in dry conditions, but I just try to keep my plants well fed and watered for as long as possible.
Elsewhere, I am enjoying watching my Christmas Dinner growing on the plant. This is the first time I have grown Brussels Sprouts, and this variety Bosworth seemed like a good one to me.
These Crab Apples are looking glorious at the moment. I am always torn between leaving them on the tree for some lovely Winter colour in the garden, and to feed the hungry birds in the garden - or pick them all and make crab apple jelly. I can't decide!
Finally, just another reminder to email me a picture of your faithful canine garden companions for Matron's 2010 Dogblog. Send me a picture before September 29th and please include your blog address if you want me to put a link in. This old lady is my ex-dog Emma. We rescued her from Battersea Dogs Home in the 1970s and she was a fun and loyal companion for many years. I just found this photo, she had just been playing snowballs with me in the garden!Saving Tomato Seed
Just a few tips on an easy way to save tomato seed.
Pick the biggest, best, healthiest outdoor tomato you can find and make sure it has stayed on the plant to really ripen properly.
Squeeze the seed out into an egg cup and add just a couple of teaspoons of water. Leave this eggcup on a warm windowsill in the kitchen for several days. The tomato pulp surrounding the seed will start to ferment and break down a little, allowing you to separate it from the seed more easily. Don't worry even if a little mould appears on the surface of the pulp, that is fine, so long as the tomato flesh starts to decay it is ready.
Gently wash the seeds in a sieve and rub with your fingers to separate most of the surrounding pulp from the seeds. You won't get it all, but get as much as you can and this will prevent mould forming on the dried seeds through the Winter.
Spread out the seeds on a plate and separate them. When they are completely dry you might have to scrape them off the plate to store them in packets.
Pick the biggest, best, healthiest outdoor tomato you can find and make sure it has stayed on the plant to really ripen properly.
Squeeze the seed out into an egg cup and add just a couple of teaspoons of water. Leave this eggcup on a warm windowsill in the kitchen for several days. The tomato pulp surrounding the seed will start to ferment and break down a little, allowing you to separate it from the seed more easily. Don't worry even if a little mould appears on the surface of the pulp, that is fine, so long as the tomato flesh starts to decay it is ready.
Gently wash the seeds in a sieve and rub with your fingers to separate most of the surrounding pulp from the seeds. You won't get it all, but get as much as you can and this will prevent mould forming on the dried seeds through the Winter.
Spread out the seeds on a plate and separate them. When they are completely dry you might have to scrape them off the plate to store them in packets.
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