Thyme can be used in lots of dishes and it comes in different flavours to add a different touch to your food. Try these exciting flavours of thyme and enjoy a new dimension in your cooking as well as your garden. The bees love thyme flowers too so another great plant for encouraging insects.
Thyme Plant Collection – 5 jumbo plugs – 1 of each variety from Thompson & Morgan £8.49
One of the most useful kitchen herbs for stews, stuffings and bouquet garni. This aromatic, evergreen thyme will grow almost anywhere in containers, rock gardens, borders, and even cracks in paving. Ideal for creating low, matt forming groundcover that will attract bees to the tiny, pink blooms. Thyme is particularly useful in coastal areas where it copes well with winds and dry conditions. Height: 30cm (12”). Spread: 35cm (14”).Thyme Plant Collection comprises 1 plant each of: Variegated Lemon Thyme Thyme ‘Archers Gold’ Thyme ‘Creeping Red’ Compact Thyme Thyme ‘Silver Posie’
Whilst you can buy it at the supermarket – about 70p for a few sprigs, you’ll find it easy to grow and keep in your own garden.
It’s a fantastic plant to grow as it smells beautiful, can be used in cooking, has pretty flowers and can even be used as a hedge!
Have it on the allotment or in the garden. Once the neighbours know you’ve got some you’ll be supplying all their rosemary needs.
Rosemary Miss Jessops x 5 plants from Blooming Direct £7.95
Perennial woody herb that has many uses for bringing out flavour in all sorts of foods. Evergreen shrub, frost hardy, requires well drained soil. Cut back frost damanged wood to healthy wood in spring. Rosemary is also a great addition to ornamental planting schemes and is highly scented. In cold areas try growing against a south facing wall.
Leeks are a great winter vegetable as well as being grown for summer eating.
Summer leek types are generally smaller than overwintering types; overwintering types are generally more strongly flavored. Varieties include King Richard and Tadorna Blue.
If you love leek and potato soup then they are an essential to get growing.
Grow from seeds in modules and plant out. Easy!
Dib your hole for the leek, put in the hole and water in. That’s it. Don’t trim the leaves and roots as some old books say to as this doesn’t help the plants at all.
Leek soup, leek and potato, use with chinese duck too!
What is land cress?
Also known as American cress, bank cress, black wood cress, Belle Isle cress, Bermuda cress, early yellowrocket, early wintercress, scurvy cress, and upland cress, is a biennial herb in the Brassicaceae family.
It can be used in sandwiches, or salads, or cooked like spinach, or used in soup. Anything watercress can do, it can do.
Growing land cress – needs full sun and frequent watering (or grow near but not in a stream or other water source) – might do well as the bottom of water barrels that overflow.
It is a hardy salad crops which will stand outside all winter in pretty much any weather making it perfect for planting for eating over winter. Let it go to seed and you never need buy a packet of seeds again.
Sow from Spring to September.
Cress American Land Seeds from Plant Me Now £1.49
Delicious peppery flavour, an alternative to watercress. Easy and fast growing, it is quick to crop, even in containers. Excellent source of vitamin C.
Urban Allotments have kindly told us about this promotion they have on at the moment – they will be sending out their dwarf fruit tree orders in November, so now is the time to place your order to ensure you get the variety you want. Dwarf fruit trees are suitable for containers, borders, raised beds. So balconies, patios and roof gardens needn’t be fruitless next year. Just type in FREESTUFF in the discount code box at checkout to receive a free pair of Wilkinson Sword Ratchet Pruners with every order of 3 or more fruit trees or bushes. The code will be vaild until the end of November or until they run out of pruners!
Easy!
You need egg white and castor sugar (or granulated and a blender!) and some flowers!
I think it’s a bit late to be finding flowers after the last weeks winter chills!
Well I’m already feeling the cold but have yet to put the heating on! It might happen sooner than I think though if it snows as forecast as early as October Exacta Weather predicts
“As we head towards winter, I expect to see the first signs of some moderate to heavy snowfalls as early as October or November in certain parts of the UK. In terms of the meteorological winter, I expect December, January, and February to experience below average temperatures, with the heaviest snowfalls occurring within the time frame of November to January across many parts of the UK.”
What will this mean for the garden?
Well instead of sweeping up leaves it’ll be snow!
Get your garden tidy now – if it’s going to be windy again sort any problem trees or plants out now.
Trick or treaters might have to come wearing big coats and no costumes!
Tooled Up just added these new items
Roughneck Round Emergency Mini Shovel 27" Long £9.95
The Roughneck Micro shovel is ideal for use in confined spaces such as the bottom of trenches or shovelling bagged materials. Ideal for keeping in the car for snow or off road emergencies.The 14 gauge blade is manufactured from industrial st…
I have lots that are still green so it’s time to start thinking about green tomato chutney!
I’ve been told that putting epsom salts in the water would have helped them ripen, and I’ve also read that Monty Don told people to take the leaves off the tomatoes to get them plenty of light. My friend Catrina says put them in a bowl on your windowsill with a tea towel over them and they’ll ripen that way.
Sadly I think it’s the sun we’ve not had that has been the biggest problem.
I should learn to can or bottle the tomatoes – storage without running costs is something to consider as electricity prices go up again.
