Homegrown Flower Confetti

We have a very special family event coming up soon so I decided to try make some confetti with flowers from the allotment and garden. Ta dar! I’m very impressed with the result. I’ve used Oxeye Daisies, Calendula, Sweet Peas, Coreopsis, Leucanthemum, Cornflower and Mallow. There’s also a few Dahlia petals and I might add…

Bombay Potato and Spinach Pies

One of the best things about having an allotment is cooking and baking with your homegrown produce. Last week we visited RHS Bridgewater near Manchester. For lunch we had pies from the little takeaway van in the gardens. They had chicken and leek or potato and spinach. It all turned out the vegetarian pies were…

Size Does Matter

I can’t believe we’ve had 5B for almost 6 years. 6 years!! It’s crazy as we still feel like newbies but yet I suppose we have learnt a lot of skills over those years.  More importantly  we’ve grown actual real vegetables and we’ve eaten them too. Our allotment was definitely our safe place and refuge…

Pumpkin, Cranberry and Pistachio Blondies

I’ve never made a Blondie until now. I’m not a big fan of white chocolate so have always avoided eating them never mind baking some. Plus when I’ve seen them in coffee shops they often looked like hard overbaked cakes. I know, I shouldn’t presume I won’t like them! But white chocolate does that to…

Potatoes In A Cake?

Yes… Potatoes can go in a cake… no joke… and it’s absolutely delicious. One of my favourite cookery books was gifted to me by Lynn Hill of Clandestine Cake Club. As we had recently got our allotment she thought I might enjoy some new baking ideas and she was right, this has become a well…

Saag Paneer

When we went up to our plot last weekend we found I’d finally mastered growing spinach! I think the trick is to sow it mid summer so that it doesn’t have time to bolt but yet it has enough warmth to grow so that you can pick it weekly. What to make with a huge…

Photo stroll around our plot…

Our allotment is made up of two half plots, 5B and 4B. We’re on a small council allotment site that only has 19 plots although Plot 1 isn’t useable. We’re situated in West Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. Everything feels so happy on our plot this year. Some of our raised beds are already on their…

Allotment Fritters

It’s almost the end of July and we’ve been busy picking, pulling, blanching, freezing and eating lots of veggie delights from our plot. Sowing and growing seem to be the only things that are unchanged since Coronavirus hit the world. My dilemma this week was Kohl Rabi. What can they go in other than coleslaw?…

The most wonderful time of the year…

Summer…. When you have an allotment or vegetable garden this is the time of the year that most crops start to fill your trug with vegetable goodness! It’s mid July and so far this month we’ve dug up our first early potatoes. We don’t normally grow first earlies but we planted them the day before…

Welcome to our allotment

In March 2015 we took on 5B then 6 months later in September we took on 4B. After lots of hard work, blood, sweat and tears this is what our plots looked like on 14 June 2020. Hope you enjoy your wander around our Happy Place.

On the edge of summer…

It’s the 30th May 2020 and not quite the world we used to know. Covid19 has made this year unusual in many ways. In the garden and on our allotment nature is doing what she does best… growing. It’s 8.30pm and 18°C and both 5B and 4B are looking good in the evening sunshine. We…

Ginger Cake

As you know I love hiding vegetables in sweet treats. We’ve had success with courgettes, beetroot, pumpkin and parsnips… what next you ask? The humble potato! I baked this cake in a tin I recently found in a local TK Maxx. It’s very similar to a Bundt tin but cannot be called a Bundt as…