Fig Jam and Lime Cordial

It’s mid-Autumn here in Sydney, but you wouldn’t know it from the glorious sunny days we’ve been having. Not too hot, not too cold, it’s a “just right” time of year.

The garden is certainly thriving under these conditions, although we’ve been a little short on time and energy to tend to it these past couple of months.  But that’s ok – we’ve never been stressed out by garden chores – we simply do whatever we can, when we can.

Thankfully, the four tromboncinos we planted last year are still producing, which means there’s always something green in the vegetable crisper drawer. The plants have now scrambled out of their original bed into two others, climbing over the fence and the neighbouring camellia trees in the process…

They keep producing babies, and we keep pollinating them…

We collected seed from our last crop of Little Gem lettuces, but found that they grew into regular cos when planted. Not that it’s a problem, as these cos seem particularly sweet and tender…

Sage, which we’ve always struggled so hard to grow, seems to have come into its own this year. It likes being in a bed far more than in the herb garden – it obviously needs more water than oregano and rosemary…

Eggplants are a staple in the garden – they always seem to do well here, although their capsicum and tomato relatives struggle…

It wouldn’t be a garden update without a photo of our perennial leeks – the babies are growing like grass, and whenever we get the energy up, we transplant them into the beds to fatten up…

…like this…

The new lemongrass plant is going gangbusters – our neighbour Nic comes over to harvest leaves for her weaving projects…

 We have lots of lovely lemons on our tree, but none of them seem to be turning yellow…

As you know, we don’t have much luck with tomatoes in the garden. We don’t plant them, but will occasionally let the self-sown ones grow – hopefully this one won’t succumb to wilt as the others have…

Most of our basil plants have now gone to seed now, except for this little one that’s still producing leaves for our kitchen…

A late planted zucchini patch – Black Jacks this time – is keeping us in fruit.  The Lebanese zucchinis were very nice, but these darker skinned ones are our favourites…

At the end of last year, lovely Jo from Queensland gifted me with comfrey and arrowroot tubers, both of which are growing well in our garden. The comfrey will hopefully provide us with  mulch, but it also has medicinal uses…

..and the arrowroot has taken off!  Look at what a beautiful, tropical looking plant it is! We’re planning to use it as a shade plant around the garden…

Apparently you can eat the tubers of the arrowroot, so we dug one up to try (with a little imagination I can see how it got its name).  We peeled it and soaked it and baked it tossed in oil and salt. Sadly, nobody liked it – it tasted a bit swede like, only not nearly as nice. I wonder if it might be good in a soup?

Jo emailed me recently to say that she had heaps of arrowroot and comfrey tubers to give away to fellow Aussie gardeners – you would need to send her a self-addressed pre-paid parcel post envelope.  If you’re interested, please leave a comment below and I’ll put you in touch with her.

A photo of this morning’s pickings…

How’s your garden looking this month?

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It’s been quite a while since our last garden update!

The strange Sydney summer we’ve had – with 46C days followed by torrential downpours – continues to be unpredictable.  The garden has coped quite well, although the powdery mildew is proving a problem for our new zucchinis…

The snake beans continue to thrive – we’re picking a large bunch daily.  The beans seem to grow exponentially – each flower produces a pair of beans, and when they’re picked, each remaining stem grows a flower, which in turn grows a pair of beans! I’m not sure how long the season will last for, but I will certainly miss these when they’re done…

Sage has finally returned to our garden – we have great trouble growing it in the herb garden, but it seems to be doing well in the beds…

Our Little Gem mini cos are a staple, and seem to grow and grow with very few pests.  It’s actually been a good year for pests – I’m not sure if that’s due to the weather, or increasing predator numbers as the garden becomes established…

Eggplants galore! We have both the fat bottomed ones…

…and the skinny ones. They’ve all been delicious…

Our tromboncino bed is still going strong, although it’s now making a lot of leaf rather than fruit. Having said that, there is always a tromboncino in the fridge waiting to be used…

Linda’s flat capsicums are fruiting – fingers crossed, as we don’t have a lot of luck growing caps here…

Our neighbour Nic bought Pete a lemongrass plant for his birthday last year, which was timely, as the clump we’d had was dying off.  This new one is quite stunning…

Purslane is going gangbusters – we planted this on purpose, even knowing that it could become a weed – and have been cheerfully giving it away to anyone who will use it. It’s a delicious addition to salad, and I stirred a handful through mash potato recently, without any complaints…

My basket of French marigolds has grown back, and offer a little colour to the garden…

The purple and blue lake beans near the house are growing well and cropping heavily. Having now tried climbing beans, we will never go back to dwarf varieties…

Last Christmas, Nic wove this basket for us, using the dwarf papyrus from our pond for the handle. It’s filled with echeveria hens and chicks…

Our succulents have either thrived or died – this summer has been a test of fire for them.  Several have outgrown their pots, so I spent a little time repotting them on the weekend…

Perhaps not surprisingly, the succulents in the old self-watering pot have done particularly well…

In January, Uncle Steve came over and built a new outdoor setting for us, to Pete’s specifications.  He recycled our old Blackbutt A-frame picnic table and added new Merbau to make this long bench seat, with a companion table and stool…

And because my husband is both clever and pedantic, the back of the chair is contoured to provide lumbar support…

We missed a giant tromboncino at the back of the dome, so decided to keep it for seed. It was well over 3kg by the time we brought it in…

We’re picking eggplant and tromboncinos regularly…

…and this many beans almost daily!

How are things going in your garden?

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This year, we’re growing cucumbers in a pot.

And we’re getting more fruit than we’ve ever had before – as you can see from the photo below, the plants are covered in flowers…

On a whim, we planted four seedlings into the old self-watering pot that we’d used to grow our indoor tomatoes a couple of years ago. We’ve learned the hard way over previous years that the most important thing with cucumbers is sufficient water – without it, the fruit is often bitter, and the plant doesn’t produce a good crop.

The pot was positioned on the driveway and a plastic trellis erected against the fence.  The plants are growing in a mixture of old potting mix enriched with cow manure.  The fertiliser might not have been necessary if we’d used new potting mix, but it seemed a shame to waste what we already had.

The plants are kept well hydrated throughout the day via the self-watering pot, which needs refilling at least twice a day (cucumbers need a lot of water!).  As there isn’t a lot of soil, we also give them a feed of worm juice and fish emulsion every couple of weeks or so.

We’ve been rewarded with a bumper crop of sweet, crunchy Lebanese cucumbers!  We’ve already harvested dozens of them, with oodles of new ones popping up every day…

Even if you don’t have garden beds, it’s definitely worth trying to grow cucumbers in pots!

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