What Preps are you doing this week? Part 8.

[jennyjj01]

Was I being insanely optimistic? When should I expect to harvest the beets? When the leaves start to die back? October?

Gosh I am no expert, but seem to be able to grow beetroot in containers without any problems. They grow really quickly and you can harvest them as small or as big as you like within a few weeks. We do feed them with Tomorite and give them lots of water but perhaps you got a dud batch of seeds or something wasnt quite right with the growing conditions. I've never tried chard but that recipe sounds so good I might have to give it a go next year. Still pretty new to growing veggies and finding out what we can and cant grow here. I cant grow decent caulis for toffee, which I am slightly gutted about.

After posting my question, I researched a bit further. It looks like 90 days or more from sowing to harvesting and I'd barely given 30 days.
So I GUESS 30 days are concentrated on growing the leaves and much of the next 60 days, those leaves feed up the roots. I need to be a bit patient and hope I beat the critters to it,

I'd never tried chard, and I'm not big on spinach, but I'm a convert. OK on salads and very pleasant distinctive flavour when cooked. Colourful too.

[Yorkshire Andy]

Eldest starts uni in a couple of weeks

Seemed very happy with his "bag of drugs" I got him today

Paracetamol
Iboprophen (spl)
Chemical bum cork
Sore throat lozenges
Antihistamines
Rehydration salts (ace hangover cure)


Nothing dramatic but stuff "just in case"

Already got him a decent small fak ( he's done first aid with army cadets)

Sorted him a basic but bright led torch and decent batteries

Immediate family have him enough food and alcohol to last him till Christmas

[jansman]

Was I being insanely optimistic? When should I expect to harvest the beets? When the leaves start to die back? October?

Gosh I am no expert, but seem to be able to grow beetroot in containers without any problems. They grow really quickly and you can harvest them as small or as big as you like within a few weeks. We do feed them with Tomorite and give them lots of water but perhaps you got a dud batch of seeds or something wasnt quite right with the growing conditions. I've never tried chard but that recipe sounds so good I might have to give it a go next year. Still pretty new to growing veggies and finding out what we can and cant grow here. I cant grow decent caulis for toffee, which I am slightly gutted about.

After posting my question, I researched a bit further. It looks like 90 days or more from sowing to harvesting and I'd barely given 30 days.
So I GUESS 30 days are concentrated on growing the leaves and much of the next 60 days, those leaves feed up the roots. I need to be a bit patient and hope I beat the critters to it,

I'd never tried chard, and I'm not big on spinach, but I'm a convert. OK on salads and very pleasant distinctive flavour when cooked. Colourful too.

You will find that your end result will be ‘baby’ beetroot now that daylight is getting shorter. Of course,you can eat the leaves too, as I am sure you know. I grow them in margarine tubs as micro greens. Chard and perpetual spinach are excellent in curries and pasta,oh ,and omelette too.

[jansman]

Already planning next year’s vegetable garden. Now we have the new fowls,laying like billy - o’ , Perpetual spinach is up there,as they love it.So do we. It will be a much simpler set up for 2022. I don’t want a load of greenhouse work tbh, so a lot of direct sowing will be the order of the day. Aside from a fewv( and I mean a few) tomatoes and chillies,it will be beans,greens and spuds.And our beloved squashes.

[rik_uk3]

Spent a good few hours today chopping wood with the chop saw to make room for wood we needed to collect tonight. Bank Holiday off work so planning to harvest some of the bigger bell peppers and chop and freeze them and harvest the beetroot and make a start on pickling. Mostly I have been working on planning out the new budget for when I reduce my hours at work and planning how I can cut down on shopping and in other areas. We are very much meat eaters here and I am looking at cooking a few more veggie meals to cut down on costs a little so any recommendations for good vegetarian cookery books would be much appreciated.

If you enjoy curry look at Indian recipes many of which are meat/fish free; many of the dishes served in Indian home cooking is meat free and will use a lot of basic prep stores like dried beans and pulses and you can use your dried onions/peppers/chilli's.

Use a basic tomato based pasta sauce with things like butter beans/chickpeas/sweet peppers instead of meat or use them with a jar of sweet and sour sauce.

Don't just freeze your sweet/bell peppers, you can dehydrate them (I'm sure you have a £20 drier), pickle them, preserve in oil and lots of recipes online.

[Le Mouse]

Eldest starts uni in a couple of weeks

Good luck and congratulations to your eldest!

As someone who works in a university, can I recommend that he reads any and all handbooks that he's given, partly so he knows where he can get help should he need it, but also read the fine print of the regulations (yes, very very VERY boring I know) because sometimes students fall over by inadvertently breaking the often labyrinthine regulations.

But mainly, I hope he has fun and enjoys all that university has to offer!

[Yorkshire Andy]

Eldest starts uni in a couple of weeks

Good luck and congratulations to your eldest!

As someone who works in a university, can I recommend that he reads any and all handbooks that he's given, partly so he knows where he can get help should he need it, but also read the fine print of the regulations (yes, very very VERY boring I know) because sometimes students fall over by inadvertently breaking the often labyrinthine regulations.

But mainly, I hope he has fun and enjoys all that university has to offer!

Remember the uni my sister was at trying to retain her bond due to a cracked ceiling tile... Funny thing was she had photographed every inch of her room when she moved in.... And reported the cracked tile on her arrival.. they didn't like it

[Arzosah]

Eldest starts uni in a couple of weeks

That's great! Seconding - I hope he has a great time

Seemed very happy with his "bag of drugs" I got him today

Paracetamol
Iboprophen (spl)
Chemical bum cork
Sore throat lozenges
Antihistamines
Rehydration salts (ace hangover cure)

Now you've got me googling something else! What is ... chemical burn cork? I'm assuming burn, not bum I found this https://osvilt.com/emergency-conditions ... hogax.html but its basically gibberish about cork.

So much knowledge is available!

[Jerseyspud]

*sneaks back in*

Hi all I haven't forgotten you all.... Just been busy being all loved up

Met someone new 2 months ago. And he knows about my preparations. And thinks they are a really good idea

[Arzosah]

Well ... hmmm ... I just had a short power cut. Long enough for me to pop outside and look at the rest of the street. Yep. My neighbour was rootling through his car looking for a torch. Yep, power cut, not fuses etc. I could have chatted on about my nice little torches/ candles/ solar lights, but decided to play dumb with the torch on my phone

All I'd have done if it *had* been off, at 8pm, was go to bed and read, truth be told - phone and laptop were up at 85%, so all good there.

We've had at least one other short one like this recently - there was a spell of them when I first moved here too, around 2010, maybe half a dozen. But I'm slightly concerned now about power worker/ engineer shortages? Can't find anything specific and recent.



ETA - jerseyspud! Hi! A very good reason for absence good for you