Scenes from a village alloment

Purple Sprouting Majestey

Purple sprouting broccoli. (PSB)
You can click on any picture in the blog to enlarge it to full screen size.

I don't think that this counts as the first crop of this season, it's the last crop from last season. We planted this stuff in June 2008 and it's taken it's sweet time to arrive. But when it arrives you have got to be prepared.

We've got about 15 plants some early and some late spouting broccoli. Once the centre shoot develops a large head about two inches across you pick it out. (See below) This encourages the plant to produce lots of smaller heads all over the crown of the plant. Little purple spring fireworks everywhere.


I have the beginnings of a PSB glut. How is that a bad thing?
We have to keep this netted or it escapes.
They turn green when they are cooked. Huh! Still at least you know when to remove them from the steamer.

A quick teaser. Greenhouse watch continues....
Yup. It's as greenhouse.

On Sprouts Pt ii

I'm taking you under the canopy into the surprisingly light and airy world of the sprout.

The average sprout has a very architectural air about it. Look at the formality of the stems. The elegant ellipse markings before the leaf. Beautiful form and function.
Any old leave can be described as architectural. Sprout leaves have water features!

I love the way that the light is reflected around this quite graceful plant.
Look at the formation of the actual sprouts. You can see where I've removed the lower leaver popping out like tiny cabbages on an elegant helix production line.
You can see how firm the sprouts are. I did make sure that the ground here was nice and firm before I planted. If the ground is soft for Brassicas you end up with soft leafy badly formed sprouts that rot. Also this is a very to heavy plant with big spoon shape leaves that catch the wind. If the ground is not firm the sprouts will not last the Autumn.

On Sprouts Part i

The humble sprout. The least sexy most berated and even hated of all veg. If the sprout was an animal it would be a slug or a wasp.

Like the parsnip, the sprout suffers from early onset vegetable hatred. Everyone went off parsnips when they left a roast potato on the plate so that it could be eaten last, only to discover it was a roasted parsnip. Parsnips are nice but they ain't no roast potato.

Sprouts get a bad rep because they are the least enjoyable part of the world’s most enjoyable meal.

Whilst I'd be the first to admit that Christmas in this country has gotten way out of hand, nothing is greater than the traditional Christmas dinner. Even the vegetarian option is a wonder to behold. The sprout has made its name as the pantomime villain of the Christmas spread. Kids from early ages are expected to eat them when to the Child's palate your average sprout is basically poison.

Perhaps, like alcohol, we should not let children have some veg until they are older. No honey these are Daddy's vegetables. Eat your carrots. You can have sprouts when you are older. After all sprouts taste better than beer does.

In praise of "greens"

OK they are not cool or exotic. You know I think its the lovely greenish blue haze they seem to give off.

These funny looking things are Itallian Black cabbage. Steam them on their own for five minutes, drain and then toss them in some olive oil and a tiny bit garlic and add half a finely chopped fried onion and tell me you don't like cabbage.