a corny tale

Last night, I ate my first home grown cob of corn. I've been watching the strictly vertical stalks grow hairy bulges, not at all sure about when to pick and eat them. The first bulge's hairy top had dried up so I peeled back the layers to check its readiness. I found beautiful yellow tiles.

The corn was soft, subtle and sweet. It had not developed all the way up the stem, and I'm not sure why. Otherwise, it was perfect.



I've also become re-obsessed with tabbouleh. I've had parsley reseeding all over the garden, which has supplied me with lots of happy green plates. My tomatoes have finally started getting into the groove, and I add those to the parsley along with spring onions and mint, which I've also grown. I also add burghul, the juice of half a lemon, some panfried pinenuts and olive oil.

A case of mistaken identity

I've been eating carrot leaves for months.  Why? Well, my neighbour gave me a couple of "parsley" seedlings late last year and I companion planted them (or so I thought) next to the tomatoes and basil.  I should point out that this is the same neighbour who gave me the 'broad beans', which weren't actually Broad Beans per se, but beans that were long (or in his reasoning, 'broad').

I never went so far as to make tabbouleh, but I put the thin (and in my defense) parsley-like carrot leaves in my salads, sandwiches and other cooking. 

It was my aunt, who came to visit me in Hobart from London just recently, who quietly informed me that they were the tops of carrots.  Sure enough, I pulled one up:

It looks like an animated mandrake root... arms and legs and tenticles....

The good thing about this (admit it) amusing mistake is that I haven't the same level of reluctance to try root vegies.  I've always avoided planting root vegies because I had an idea that they were incredibly hard, but this accidental carrot growing suggests that perhaps I was wrong.  Happy times!

thank goodness for Salamanca Markets

I finally gave up on my coriander, sage and curly-leaf parsley seeds.  They just didn't want to sprout.  My flat leaf parsley sprouted, so that rules out anything being wrong with the soil or compost.  So on Saturday I trotted down to Salamanca Markets, to the lovely woman who runs a stall in the middle opposite Salamanca Arts Centre, and purchased some pre-sprouted curly-leaf, coriander, some bok choy and some broccoli.  The broccoli has already been devastated by snails. grrrr....

On the upside, my beans seem to have got a second wind (of course, just after the markets), and I've had a few good meals of beans this week  (woot!)

Tomato envy

All my tomato-growing friends are waxing lyrical about their juicy friends, yet mine seem to be going through an extended childhood and/or teenage faze.  I have quite a range of tomatoes, all planted at different times, sourced from different places, all still yet to give me a red 'un for dinner.

Here's my flock:

sourced from New Town Station Nursery, it's the only seedling I bought from a shop this year:

A Roma tomato plant given to me by my neighbour Peter.  He's been passing seedlings over the fence for the last 4 months in everything from yoghurt containers to plastic cups.  He admitted that maybe he went a bit over the top last week.  It's great to have neighbours like that though, as I can also thank him for the cucumber, broad beans, a couple of cauliflowers, parsley (which you can see in front of the tomato), and only last week, 3 strawberry seedlings.  Mr Roma has the most green fruit on him so far.

Unidentifiable tomato plant bought as a seedling from Lenah Valley Primary school:

Gardener's Delight climbing tomato.  I have a row of these that I planted from seed a couple of months ago.  I've heard that I should thin them out, but I can't bear to kill plants that aren't 'performing' as well as others.

Another Lenah Valley Primary school plant.  I've had problems in the past with tomatoes doing this weird deforming thing.  It seems to affect all the fruit on those particular plants, but I'm not sure why it occurs.

A couple of tomatoes that my friends Tim and Mary gave me (Mary incidently has a great food/life blog called Utter Obsession with Foody Goodness).  It seems that a pumpkin or cucumber-looking plant has snuck in with it.  Tim and Mary also (deliberately) gave me a pumpkin plant that is going great guns.

Lastly, my precious 'Tigerellas'.  Like the Gardener's delight, I grew them from seed, and am having dilemmas about whether to thin them or not.  I really want to see the stripey tomatoes!