There are too many plants that can be started off indoors/outdoors in March to name! But here are a few to get you started…
Carrots – Carrots – sown one trench outside under fleece
Spinach – Salad – Spinach – planted out ‘Turaco’ spinach sown last autumn in a cold frame with fleece and started off indoors ‘Barbados’ and ‘Emelia’, onto ‘Samish’ soon…
Lettuce- Salad – Lettuce – planted out lettuce sown last winter in the cold frame with the spinach and sown some seeds indoors
Radishes – Salad – Radish – sown outdoors under fleece between other crops
Chickpeas – Sown indoors, first time trying them this year!
Broad beans – Broad Beans – ready to plant out under fleece
Peas – started off indoors but can be sown directly now – post hopefully coming soon…
Okra – Okra – couple damped off so planted some more indoors
Rocket – Salad – Rocket – sown indoors, not doing so well…
Watercress – sown indoors
Herbs – sown the parsley and coriander so far
Fenugreek – damped off, need to sow some more indoors
Cucumbers – Cucumbers – sown indoors, doing best at moment, please stay that way!
Tomatoes – germinated very well indoors
Potatoes – time to think about planting them outdoors under a lot of earth and some cover
Turnips – just sown some
Purple Sprouting Broccoli – just sown some (as well as some more Calabrese Broccoli) indoors AND just harvested first batch of last year’s crop the other night to have with some of the last dug up potatoes from last season with baked beans, cheese and frozen homegrown runner beans – yum!
Sweet Corn – on my list but I know from experience that I can still get away with sowing it in May, indoors
Rhubarb – Rhubarb – time to feed and start forcing
Fruit Trees/Bushes – time to feed!
There are bound to be plenty more veggies to sow/plant out as we plough on through the first month of spring. Temperatures are finally warming up but hang onto some fleece – the fruit trees might be lured into a false spring, deadly for blossom and fruit production… Make sure anything you sow outside/ plant out is wrapped up under cover, nice and snuggly. It will be a shock to the system if they are exposed to Britain’s ‘spring time’ too early!
FLOWERS TO SOW INDOORS:
French Marigolds
Cosmos
Viola
Lavender
Geraniums
Calendulas
Lupins
Sweet Peas – they are ready to plant out under cover
What to think of growing for next winter’s hungry gap?
Kale
It will start to flourish in the most ‘hungriest’ gap of all, around February when all of your stores have dwindled. Boil, steam, fry or add to stews, curries, soups, pizza toppings, lasagnes, bologneses, casseroles, etc and it will wilt down to nothing but is so good for you!
Kept under only insect netting, cabbages can be grown for an early spring crop or throughout the autumnal and winter months for a warming cooked green due to their hardiness.
Huge plants that should last for two-three years once sown. They are frost resistant and produce huge green leaves that you harvest like kale. Pull them off, cut them up, and cook like cabbage/kale. They taste just like them.
Purple Sprouting Broccoli
This one will not be ready until just before spring each year, but it will give you an early green before the calabrese broccoli has even been planted out into the ground. Snip off the little flowers as the grow and boil or steam for some homegrown goodness before the rest of the veg is ready for harvesting. The plants are frost hardy during the winter months.
Swiss Chard
Giant spinach that lasts all year round and self-seeds magnificently. Plant a few and they will die back when they get worn out but will regrown pretty quickly. You will want to cook these leaves as they are a bit strong – avoid the stalks, they are not very tasty. I like putting mine on top of homemade pizzas or chucking them in a stir fry.
Potatoes
Plant lots of potatoes, store some and cover the rest in the ground with tonnes of soil and some horticultural fleece to prevent frost damage. They might suffer a little from slug damage but I promise that they will still be completely edible and wonderful! They last a lot longer in the ground than they do in storage.
Swedes can be left in the ground, like potatoes, all winter long. You don’t need to fleece them but can if you like. They will be exhausted by mid-spring so aim to pull them all up then.
Turnips
Same as swedes.
Beetroot
Cover your beetroot with fleece and they will stay in the ground throughout the winter.
Carrots
Again, keep covered with fleece and dig them up throughout the winter months. The green tops will die back but the roots themselves will stay fresh in the ground.
These should be ready to harvest after the frosty time, during December and throughout the winter months. They can be roasted, boiled, mashed, made into soups, added to stocks etc. for a nourishing root vegetable.
Watercress
I was surprised when our watercress flourished in the cooler months than it did throughout spring or summer. Grow it in pots and cover with fleece and it will be a salad leaf that will see you through winter.
Rocket
It won’t last as long as watercress in the cold months but it will see you through a majority of it as long as you keep it fleeced.
Micro-Greens
Grow these on your windowsill indoors. These can include speedy cress, sunflower seeds, beansprouts, alfalfa, pea shoots, and lots more sprouting seeds are available in the shops.
Do you have any winter veggies to grow through the ‘hungry gap’?
I am currently finding ways of eating courgettes that are new and exciting. That means boiling, frying and grilling them for different meals. Last night we had them fried with a gloop and spaghetti – recipe coming soon. Today though because it is so hot and sunny, I offer a lovely summer salad made special with that salty feta cheese that goes so well with courgettes. Enjoy.
Grilled courgette salad with feta cheese
(Serves 2)
– 1 medium sized courgette, sliced into circles – 1/2 cucumber, sliced into circles – 1 medium sized carrot, peeled and cut into matchsticks – x2 handfuls lettuce, torn – x2 handfuls of spinach, torn – x2 handfuls watercress – x2 handfuls of feta cheese, cut into cubes
Turn the grill onto high. Place the sliced courgettes on a lightly oiled baking tray and place under the grill for a few minutes. When they have browned, flip them over and cook the other side. Turn off the grill when the courgettes are brown on both sides.
Prepare the other salad ingredients and cut the feta cheese into cubes.
Put the salad onto serving plates, mixed in with the hot courgettes. Scatter the feta cheese over the top and mix in. Serve.
Made it back from our holiday abroad earlier this week. The one year we go abroad for a week and England decides to have a mini-heat wave, of coarse.
I am pleased to inform that the garden and animals all survived.
Before we left I was tearing my hair out over the sudden confirmation that our potatoes had blight but I came back to find some greenery still there, they were not all a sad bunch of brown twigs.
We have come back to the end of the first raspberry harvest, strawberries and most of the blackcurrants are gone too but there are still plenty to pick – too much to pick! Blueberries are taking off, jostaberries are still there, reducurrants, plums are getting juicy, I just picked the last of the morello cherries, we had a supper full of homegrown veg last night – potatoes, courgettes, runner beans, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, kale, onion, garlic, parsley, chives, tomatoes. The only things not homegrown were the butter, cheese and cream – and the cookies for pudding but I did make those at least and served them with the last few strawberries and blackberries growing in our greenhouse.
I also tried some of my watercress (it finally grew after all this time) the other day and I was pleased to say, it tasted of watercress – result!
Lots to do, I’ve started weeding and feeding old beds that are finished to plant my last glut of certain seeds before the end of July. I got in radishes, parsley, coriander, spring onions and the last carrot sowings yesterday. I am tackling spinach, rocket, lettuce and Alderman peas today.
I am currently writing a post on blackcurrants – it might be a little late but better late than never when it comes to blackcurrants.
Happy digging to all.
This is a photograph of the potatoes mum dug up yesterday. It is a whole bucketful – from ONE potato plant that was even blighted. I think it might be a second early variety. Fingers crossed the rest of the blighted ones do just as well…
All from one blighted potato plantLupin is flowering along with the white cosmos (background)Pretty pink sweet pea trailing up a blackcurrant bush
So there are plenty of fruits and vegetables in the world and only so many hours to talk about how to store them. Perhaps we should start with what is around right now and work from there?
Salad leaves – Lettuce, rocket, watercress and other cresses, like land cress or crinkle cress, (watercress wilts quickest) and spinach (wilts second quickest) are best eaten straight away once they have been picked and washed. To store it, I put mine in containers in the fridge mostly because I know I will be using it over the next few days. Other people keep theirs in plastic bags or between kitchen roll. If you have left the salad out for too long and it has wilted, leave it in a bowl of cold water to rejuvenate it before refrigerating it immediately. You can freeze green leaves, like spinach or lettuce but they will be incredibly soggy and are only useful for cooking. You might as well stick to fresh leaves rather than freezing them.
Carrots – If you are using them over a couple of days then they can be again kept in the fridge in a plastic bag or a container. Otherwise, the traditional way of storing them is in a cool, dark place in a box filled with dry sand. This can also be done to swedes, celeriac, sweet chestnuts, parsnips, celery and beetroot (celery will keep in the fridge for ages. Swedes and celeriac can be left in the ground for months at a time).
Peas – Best eaten as soon as they have been podded if consumed raw. If they are slightly too old to be delicate enough to eat raw, pop them into a pan of boiling water for 2 minutes, drain and serve. To freeze them, once you have boiled them, place them in freezing ice-cold water for a few minutes until cool. Place them in plastic bags ideal for the freezer, make sure no air has been caught inside. Freeze them and use over the next few months. This is the same technique for runner beans, broad beans or sweetcorn (by the way, sweetcorn loses its taste rapidly after being picked. It needs to be cooked and eaten or frozen asap).
Pod and eat peas and broad beans boiled straight away or freeze after boiling and cooling briefly
Onions – Once pulled out of the ground, lay them out on newspaper to dry out, turning them over so that both sides are dealt with. Then, suspend them from the ceiling in a cool room or inside hessian/netted sacks. We use our utility room as it is very cool and is not too light.
Dry onions out on newspaper before hanging up
Garlic – harvest the bulbs whole from the ground and place in a cool, dark place. We keep ours on a low-down shelf in out kitchen. When using, take one segment from the entire garlic bulb at a time, peel and use. From my experience, homegrown garlic tends not to keep as long as shop bought garlic so only pull them up from the ground a little at a time, don’t be tempted to harvest them all at once.
Potatoes – I worked out last year that potatoes can be left in the ground for a long time and you do not need to rush to dig them up unless you have a wire worm or slug problem. Even if they have blight, they will keep better in the ground rather than out of it. However, to store them once they have been harvested, copy the same technique used for drying onions, laying them out on newspaper and turning them over. Then put them inside hessian sacks in a dark place, like a cupboard under the stairs to prevent them from turning green and becoming unusable.
Berries – If you can’t eat them all fresh at once because you have a glut or want to spread them out for later in the year, freeze them in plastic bags or containers once they have been washed and slightly dried. To use them, defrost well and drain the excess liquids that will taste a little to fridgey. Some berries like raspberries, blueberries or grapes should taste fine uncooked once they have been frozen. Other berries, like strawberries, have such a high water content that they will taste strange once defrosted raw. I prefer to use my frozen fruit for jam or inside cooked puddings, like muffins, cakes, stewed fruit dishes, crumbles or pies. I save the fresh fruit for eating uncooked.
Summer squashes: Courgettes – You might have been starting to pick some already. These are best sliced from the plant, washed and cooked straight away but can be stored in the fridge for a couple of days, depending on the variety and the ripeness of the vegetable. Best stored in an air-tight container or a plastic bag. Boil, fry, grill or roast them. Courgettes cannot be frozen because of their high water content, much like strawberries. Winter squashes (e.g. Butternut squashes and pumpkins can be frozen once they have been roasted – Slice, into small pieces, lay out on a baking tray and drizzle generously in olive oil. Roast in a preheated oven of 180C for about 40 minutes or until they are browned. Allow to cool. Place in plastic bags and freeze straight away). Courgettes and cucumbers will only become sloppy mush when frozen so do store them only in the fridge or eat straight away.
Courgettes are best eaten straight away or stored in a fridge – do not freeze them or cucumbers (below)
Cabbages: Can be stored whole in the fridge for a few days. If the outer leaves start to brown, wilt too much or go mushy, peel them off and discard them and use the rest if unaffected. If cooked, cabbages can last in a container for about three days. This is the same for cauliflower and broccoli (broccoli seems to brown slightly quicker out of the two when stored in the fridge).
Romanesco cauliflower prepared for boiling
Spring Onions – Can be kept in the fridge for a couple of days. If the outside skin starts to dry up or the stem wilts too much, cut and peel the outside coating off and use what is underneath if it is unaffected.
Radishes – Likewise, they can be stored whole in the fridge or cut up and kept raw in a container for about two or three days before they will start to brown and become un-appetising.
Kale – Store in an air-tight container, raw, for up to a week maximum inside the fridge. Once cooked, store in a container for two or three days in the fridge.
Oriental greens – Think Pak Choi, Tatsoi, Komatsuna, Chinese Cabbage, Mibuna, Mitzuna, Mizpoona… Once cooked, they can be stored for about two days. Raw, they might be able to last a little longer in the fridge before they wilt or turn to liquid. Treat them more like spinach, liable to becoming soggy after some time being picked.
Tomatoes – It might be slightly early to write about tomatoes but it is getting close enough. I did not know until last year that tomatoes keep their looks and taste longer if stored outside the fridge. Gardner James Wong (‘Grow for Flavour’) suggests keeping them in a fruit bowl. We tried this last year and it does work well. It also allows some of the slightly under-developed ones to ripen. If freezing the tomatoes, dunk them briefly into a pan of boiling water to shed their skins before placing them into cold water, likewise for the beans and peas. Store in plastic bags in the freezer and use in dishes where you would use cooked/tinned tomatoes or make tomato chutney.
The Kitchen Garden Blog 