This week we ran out of apple juice. So far during our project we have used 24 x 750ml locally produced apple juice and the rest has been our own. Some of which we have mixed with our own greengage juice. All this covers is 150mls of juice for breakfast. So this week I picked 3kg of apples and juiced them to supplement our supply. Our old apple trees in the garden produce small cooking apples that invariably have scab. However, they produce a nice red juice. We are wondering if there would be a better way of using the apples to get a portion of fruit a day, say pureed and mixed into yoghurt as part of breakfast, that would be sustainable with seasonal fruit through most of the year so needs some thought.
Our sloes this year are huge. I picked a basket full this week and put them in the freezer to help their skins breakdown before making sloe gin and sloe vodka.
Now the allotment has been booked, a single site with the potential for expansion, I have been looking into apple varieties that will do well in Scotland and are good for juicing. Adam Powell from www.adamsappletrees.co.uk in Devon sent me an excellent list to work with. He also advises that for Pears Conference is the only one. Kellie Castle in Fife has a good orchard I believe so I may pop up and see what they are growing.
I finally cleared the carrot root fly infested carrots, the rabbits liked them. Thankfully earlier in the year I had under planted with beetroot which is now coming on. There was a gap left, not sure if I missed when planting the beetroot or they haven't come up, but there were two rows missing. So I planted two rows of broadbeans. We are not great broadbean fans but it will add a bit of variety to our diet next year.
For those of you who read about my poor bees last week, I fed them about 3 kg of baker's fondant. When I looked in on Saturday morning the lot was nearly gone. So whatever else was happening they were hungry. I therefore added another 3 kg on Sunday morning to keep them going.
We are still harvesting peas, beans, potatoes, salad, tomatoes, and courgettes. The egg laying chickens have slowed to about an egg each on alternate days. That is still plenty for us and a few left over.
Again we had visitors this weekend. My best mate and her family. We had goat's cheese salad to start with, followed by sausage and lentil casserole - see recipes - finished off with apple, bramble and raspberry crumble. Superb.
Our sloes this year are huge. I picked a basket full this week and put them in the freezer to help their skins breakdown before making sloe gin and sloe vodka.
Now the allotment has been booked, a single site with the potential for expansion, I have been looking into apple varieties that will do well in Scotland and are good for juicing. Adam Powell from www.adamsappletrees.co.uk in Devon sent me an excellent list to work with. He also advises that for Pears Conference is the only one. Kellie Castle in Fife has a good orchard I believe so I may pop up and see what they are growing.
I finally cleared the carrot root fly infested carrots, the rabbits liked them. Thankfully earlier in the year I had under planted with beetroot which is now coming on. There was a gap left, not sure if I missed when planting the beetroot or they haven't come up, but there were two rows missing. So I planted two rows of broadbeans. We are not great broadbean fans but it will add a bit of variety to our diet next year.
For those of you who read about my poor bees last week, I fed them about 3 kg of baker's fondant. When I looked in on Saturday morning the lot was nearly gone. So whatever else was happening they were hungry. I therefore added another 3 kg on Sunday morning to keep them going.
We are still harvesting peas, beans, potatoes, salad, tomatoes, and courgettes. The egg laying chickens have slowed to about an egg each on alternate days. That is still plenty for us and a few left over.
Again we had visitors this weekend. My best mate and her family. We had goat's cheese salad to start with, followed by sausage and lentil casserole - see recipes - finished off with apple, bramble and raspberry crumble. Superb.
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