Make do, Mend and Minimise in 2015

Floss

GQ, I fear I will be doing the same job next week, I created 2 small new strawberry beds this spring but both the original beds and the new ones have expanded prolifically and are like triffids!

Have you got much in your lottie for over winter? I have PSB, onions, leeks and regular broccoli.

GreyQueen

Floss wrote: »

GQ, I fear I will be doing the same job next week, I created 2 small new strawberry beds this spring but both the original beds and the new ones have expanded prolifically and are like triffids!

Have you got much in your lottie for over winter? I have PSB, onions, leeks and regular broccoli.

Yeah, Lyn, I text pals and arrange for them to come to the lottie for strawberry scoffing. They still rave about the fantastic crop of a few years ago when we stuffed ourselves silly. My Magic Greengrocer (3rd generation of his family in that trade) knows these kind of berries. They can't be grown commerically because you can't get them off the farm without bruising them. Heck, I can't even get them down off the lottie to the flat and that's a 1.25 mile journey. They are beyond delicicous.

Re winter veg, I don't do the brassicas, although I adore PSB, because the site is under constant strafing by woodpigeons and it would need a cage tall enough to hold it clear of them, and with fine gauge netting to keep the cabbage whites off it. Grew PSB one year but too much trouble.

I have a stonking great leek patch and the feral chard. I carelessly allowed a pkt of rainbow chard to set seed several years ago and as a result I have chardlings germinating in random places all over the allotment. I treat them as cut and come again salad veg. At the moment, I have two mahoosive chard plants, the ruby one is about 5 ft tall with multiple stems of tiny leaves, and the white chard is much larger leaved but half as tall. They were in an onion bed which had now been harvested, but I keep pulling bits off the chard. They will overwinter, too.

About mid Oct, I will be planting broad beans, which will grow to be about 6-8 inches tall before the lack of daylight and the cold stalls them until Spring. Most years, I have done this and then also sown more broad beans in mid Feb. And the latter have got badly damaged by blackfly; they're more succulent stemmed than the overwintered ones. So, this year, will just be overwintering ones. BBs are frost-hardy and mine have even coped with spells of snow but they wouldn't survive prolonged snow, but I am Dahn Sarf and we don't get much of the white stuff.

:cool: Well, unless you're refering to the bolivian marching powder......

moneyistooshorttomention

As the topic is currently on gardening - and I'm right now wondering what I can plant in some spare garden space...

I've got a few kale plants in to date. Now - I was fine with kale plants last year - but this year summat is attacking them:mad:. I'm not quite sure whether its slugs, snails or whether those darn cabbage white butterflies are the culprits. Who are the most likely culprits please and suggestions for dealing with them welcome? One of my poor kale plants has been so badly attacked that never mind chunks out of leaves - all that it has left are the central "stem" type bit on the leaves. Am currently leaving those plants there and hoping the attacks on them will stop and they'll have the chance to sprout some new leaves for me.

silvasava

MoneyTSTM - its probably slugs or snails or both! I make a little 'house' of 3 or 4 stones with a piece of broken pottery on top and put my slug pellets underneath near to my plants that need some protection. This stops the birds eating any of the poisoned stuff - pellets or creatures!

ivyleaf

fuddle wrote: »

The yoghurt in the slow cooker had minimal success. Very milk like inconsistency. I suspect it is down to my slow cooker. It's new and not a crockpot but instead and tin like inner that heats up very quickly so it will cool very quickly too. I have also read powdered milk helps thicken. So next time I will add that and try out the flask method.

In the SC today are mixed beans. I need to use them up as are no good for me so i'll add them to salads for the rest of the family. I have discovered that I can eat quinoa. With it being a seed it's not a grain it's made me very happy as it's a dry ingredient that I can stock and cook with come a SHTF situation. I can use it as a base in baking and cooking... when I learn how! I need to get tapioca flour for flatbreads and savouries and coconut flour for sweet baking but the only supermarket that sells it is Ocado. I've not shopped there before and given the cost of eating primally has already upped my budget I don't know if I can absorb a weeks shop there. It's either that or buy them online and pay for postage.

LynP you have been very busy. My Sunday was very lazy in comparison!

Today I need to make eldest DD's birthday cake. I am going to run red hearts through basic sponge and decorate with fondant icing. I am not ashamed to say I bought ready to roll icing. I did the costings of how to make it with ingredients. Given I had very little of what it needed in stock, it would have been more expensive to make my own than to just buy it plus the margin for error is minimal in something I am not really very skilled at.

fuddle I've had cake made using potato flour and it was really nice, that's if your tummy is okay with potato of course.

EmberJ

Havent managed to catch up yet, will read through tomorrow, but I thought I'd let you know that things have gotten better here. I spent two weeks with an old friend, and matt told his dad we wanted to move without him - since then his dad has been much better, and on top of that I got a voluntary job writing reviews for a music zine! really excited, enjoyed my first day immensely.

Hope you are all well,
all my love to you wonderful ladies!
Em xx

Nargleblast

Hope things work out, Ember. At least you now know that if you did have to move you could handle it, having looked into the logistics.

fuddle

ivyleaf wrote: »

fuddle I've had cake made using potato flour and it was really nice, that's if your tummy is okay with potato of course.

Thank you The jury is still out on potatoes but I will be testing it soon. I tried rice a few nights back and it was a no no. I so hope spud is ok.

Using sliced courgette for pasta tonight so I'm learning to adapt with it. Also using squash rounds as pizza base.

Question about tomatoes if I may? Why do they split? I have a plant in my garden. I have tended to it all season and now being rewarded with lovely toms but just as I was harvesting more before, a few of them have split.

My yarn has arrived this morning. I will be finishing my crochet cardi very soon Also knitting a head/ear warmer for my youngest. Yes I did say knitting :eek: ... and adding some basic fair isle in there too. Mmmhmm. Auld stress head here might have bitten off more than she can chew :eek:

misstara

Afternoon all,

Not much to report in the way of MMMing - I've been off on holiday from work but still seem to be have very busy. I had an interview yesterday for a temporary senior job at my work and got it Full time hours and a pay rise

It's a beautiful day here, I'm working later but will leave a bit early so I can slowly wander to work in the sunshine. Hope everyone else also has sunshine

celtic_moon

Hi All!

Glad you're all reaping your bountiful harvests - the recipes you're all up to at the minute sound very interesting. I would love any recipes that do not have wheat in them, especially any good bread ones if you wouldn't mind? I am resembling the inflated Aunt Marge of H@rry P0tter at the minute as I am eating wheat simply because I can't afford the wheat-free alternatives right now

We are getting there now - yay! Business wise we are doing quite well at the minute - although it is the run up to THAT time of year so it is expected to some point but even so it is a little more than we had hoped for so....... Then, last night, our fb and tw1tter went mad as one of the chefs on the Great British Menu used a bottle of our mead. We had no clue until friends and customers started on the various social media sites so we had to go onto 1pl@yer to watch it as we don't have a tv :rotfl:

We had a tip off about a 'tricky' question from a former DWP worker and have finally secured Working Tax Credit :T so we can now re-apply for housing & council tax benefit too. Hopefully this will tide us over for the foreseeable future. I have had to cut my hours of student support as I am being assessed for carpal tunnel surgery (although it will have to wait until after DH shoulder operation in November)

Unfortunately, the day after we received the award letter for WTC, we received a Notice Seeking Possession (first step towards eviction) from the Housing Association. We are the princely sum of £455.90 or 5.26 weeks in arrears! And considering I haven't had a proper wage packet since May yet I have managed (ebay selling, odd days work etc) to pay the other 8.75 weeks in that time I am rather :mad: CAB are not willing to do anything other than give me telephone numbers to phone and I feel like I am banging my head against a wall.

I am struggling to speak to the HA at the minute because I know (having worked for them) that it is their policy to bully the likes of me into paying because it ticks the boxes for the government, by increasing the number of people who have got out of arrears. They leave the ones with the huge amount of arrears and know how to play the game. I have been a tenant since 1996 and it is only in the last 2 years, since going self-employed, that I have struggled! I was hoping that the CAB would do that little bit for me so I don't end up being wound up into saying a barrage of things that could get me into trouble.....

Apologies for the rant, and I promise I am keeping my chin up overall, but I am seriously ready to pull my hair out. Once I get over this hurdle, I am confident that it will all be good and I will be able to get in front with the rent ready for the same period next year. I am staying focused on the end outcome and hoping that a bit of finger crossing and wings and prayers, will get me through.

Keep on keeping on (yes, I will take notice of this too ) xxx