Saturday 27 June 2015

Grow your own bounty

Typical of growing veg; one day you are celebrating the odd bit of purple sprouting and a strawberry or two and the next it looks like a veg war has broken out in the kitchen!  All the cook  books are out and I am researching preserving and new ideas for cooking.
A daily picking of broad beans is a bucket of pods which is 1kg of beans when shelled (it takes an episode of James Martin's The Box cooking challenge to prepare that many!).  There are now 4kg in the freezer and still lots to go.
I had a good crop of broccoli.  I have experimented with freezing some as chunky florets and I made 8 pints of broccoli soup!
I tried a new recipe for chicken and courgettes which went quite a long way.  Gentle fry garlic and onions, add sliced courgettes and a teaspoon of oregano Add enough stock to cover and simmer, add some partially cooked pasta and some chicken pieces and simmer. Add a couple of tablespoons of cream cheese.
I stirred in some spinach - just because its going to seed in the sudden heat!

I could really do with some tomatoes - the price of tinned ones is unbelievable,  I popped into the Co-op and they wanted 65p for an ordinary tin!  Our tomatoes are struggling a bit even in the greenhouse and the polytunnel.


3 comments:

  1. The size of those heads of calabrese!! My favourite way with it is salmon, broccoli and pasta bake with cheese and breadcrumbs on top and it freezes well. We are still waiting for our first broad beans - Food glorious Home grown food!

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  2. If you have a look in the Asian/Polish food section of Tesco they often have tinned chick peas or tomatoes at 4 for £1. They don't keep these near the other tinned veg for some reason. We buy 12 at a time when we see them.

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  3. Your broccoli are to die for. Blimey! I hope my cauli and cabbage could do so well. Were they grown outside or in a tunnel? My toms are doing very well.

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