Don't waste water - wash in Watneys!

Since my last entry, over two months ago, I don't seem to have had a minutes free time.

In February we visited Cyprus for three weeks and on our return the Prospect plot more resembled a paddy field than an allotment.

But after much hard work, either side of a weeks break in Corfu, it is now back on course and, dare I say, a little ahead of the game!

More and more of my friends have turned to "growing their own" so I thought, by way of a change and to give the Welsh Bard more material, to include some up to date gardening tips and recipes  to my forthcoming blogs.

Here are two tips for your tomatoes.

Tomato Tip 1

It would appear that aspirin is not only good for headaches and lowering blood pressure in humans.

According to James Wong, the ethnobotanist and BBC television presenter of Grow Your Own Drugs fame, spraying a very dilute aspirin solution on your tomato and strawberry plants can increase their growth and tolerance to pests & diseases, double the sweetness of their fruits and raise their Vitamin C content by 50%. Apparently, how this works is that the salicylic acid found in aspirin is the ingredient that helps the tomato plants ward off different diseases.

Simply dissolve a quarter of an un-coated 300g aspirin in a one litre of water and spray your plants once a month. Also soaking sweet corn seeds in the same solution prior to sowing will have the similar effect.

Tomato Tip 2

Another tip for growing sweeter tomatoes is to  sprinkle a small amount baking soda on the soil around your tomato plants being careful not to get the soda on the plant itself. The theory is that the baking soda absorbs into the soil and lowers the acidity levels.

So not only will you have to remember to take your own medication you will now have to ensure your plants have theirs!

One major problem with growing your own, especially on an open allotment, is that  having battled against every pest and disease known to man, including in my case the dreaded foxes and their cubs, fruit and vegetables have a habit of all maturing at once and you finish up with gluts of particular produce throughout the season. Remember last years cougette saga!

So I am always looking out for different ways to cook and preserve the fruits of my labours.

Currently it is Rhubarb Glut time.

So here is an interesting (but as yet untried) recipe for Spicy Rhubarb Chutney which apparently is spectacular with pork:

Spicy Rhubarb Chutney - Makes 6 x ½ pints 

2½ lbs. rhubarb, trimmed and sliced thin (about 8 cups)

1¼ cup brown sugar 
¾ cup honey 
1 cup apple cider vinegar 
½ cup chopped onion 
1 cup raisins, chopped (a food processor works great) 
1½ Tb. grated fresh ginger (or 2 tsp. dry) 
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
½ tsp. ground allspice 

1 tsp. sea salt 
1 to 1½ tsp. red pepper flakes

1. Combine all the ingredients in a 6 or 8-quart stainless steel pot. Stir well and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to a simmer (a very gentle boil) and cook, uncovered, until thick, about 30 minutes. Stir occasionally, and more towards the end as the chutney is thickening.
2. While the mixture cooks, prepare six 1/2-pint jars (or three pints) and keep hot until needed..
3. When the chutney is cooked, ladle into 1 jar at a time, leaving 1/4-inch headspace, wiping the rim with a damp cloth, and attaching the lid. Fill and close remaining jars.
4. Refrigerate any jars and use within 3 to 4 weeks. 

March heralded the first get together of the year in Oxford and the intrepid "OAP Trio" took in three new pubs (as well as two regulars) in their quest to conquer the Oxford Heritage Beer trail.

 ONLY 14 to go! Which equates to nearly a year and a half!

 The Welsh Bard celebrated our half way point by putting fingers to keyboard:

It’s Oxford, and the lads are on the sauce:
They find the rain’s not only on the Plain,
And, as they hurry damply for the train,
They dive for cover in the old White Horse.

And there, beneath a photograph of Morse,
They vow to see the dreaming spires again,
(But hopefully in sunshine, not in rain!)
For yet unconquered pubs they’ll set a course…

Around the Cape, they’ll travel by the Moon,
Investigating boozers near and far;
What better way to spend an afternoon
Than academic fieldwork, bar to bar.

I’d like to think researches such as these
Will be rewarded, maybe by degrees!

Earlier this month, as a way of a change, we met again to sample the delights of the pubs of Chichester and came across this reminder of how bad beer was in the 60's and 70's.

 On Wednesday we're off to Cyprus again and as I look out of the caravan window at Selsey's finest wind and rain, knowing that the temperatures in Pafos are already in the mid 70's and rising, I can't wait to get there.

In case you were wondering about the title of this entry, I encountered it above the sink of my room in The Castle Hotel in Tredegar during the water shortage of 1976 so before I leave you here's another reminder of the UK's first keg beer and what it used to do to the unfortunates who drank it! :

Hey Ho!