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The Veggie Patch (May)
the podcast
by Sarah Heath | The Veggie Patch
http://thehexagon.space/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Veggie-Patch.mp3
Any self-respecting French country-dweller grows their own fruit and veg – it’s a matter of green-fingered pride. Actually, the fruit really takes care of itself – we are lucky enough to have so many different kind of plum trees, we could set up our own natural-laxative factory. But the veg needs love, attention and back muscles like an Olympic weightlifter.
Our little attempts often warrant more of a “Patchy Veg” than “Veggie Patch” title and over eight years of trial and error – we are still trying and erring! But Mother Nature is amazingly kind and we have lived off the fruits (and veggies) of her patient generosity with increasing gratitude – you haven’t eaten a tomato until you’ve eaten a homegrown tomato (coeur de boeuf our particular favourites!)
We proudly tell our friends of our pure-as-the-driven-snow produce. Not a thimbleful of chemicals are used in their tender cultivation. What we don’t mention is the fact that the next door fields of wheat/sunflowers (depending on the year) have the living daylights sprayed out of them with bug-killers whose names generally end in “…cides”. But we’ve persuaded ourselves that the wind always blows in the opposite direction on these spraying days so nothing touches our delicate shoots!!!
My husband has now added to his back problems by having just prepared the ground ready for planting. We always buy our veggie plants from the Foire aux Plantes in Gaillac on May 1st. The town centre is closed and gardeners can meander through the myriad of stalls selling seemingly hundreds of varieties of courgette and strawberry plants. We can’t tell the difference between most of them and are a bit nervous to ask in case we get into tricky conversations about soil type and land drainage – of which we, embarrassigly, know nothing. But each year we excitedly come home laden with the beginnings of delicious meals-to-be. It’s a bit like a lucky-dip some years: you might be expecting a lovely harvest of cucumbers which in fact, turn out to be courgettes. And who knew that certain melon varieties stopped growing when they reached the size of apples?
The soil-toil involved beforehand is literally back-breaking. Annoyingly, we spent €500 on a shiny new rotovator (for the uninitiated, this is the machine which turns the soil) only to discover a few weeks later through our friend Sally, that a method called ‘no-dig gardening’ (creating layers of organic material on the growing area to make a rich, fertile substrate) means…… NO-DIGGING! But we are stubbornly determined to get our money’s worth out of the rotivator even if it means spending half our lives at the physio for back treatment.
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the podcast
by Sarah Heath | The Veggie Patch
http://thehexagon.space/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Veggie-Patch.mp3
Any self-respecting French country-dweller grows their own fruit and veg – it’s a matter of green-fingered pride. Actually, the fruit really takes care of itself – we are lucky enough to have so many different kind of plum trees, we could set up our own natural-laxative factory. But the veg needs love, attention and back muscles like an Olympic weightlifter.
Our little attempts often warrant more of a “Patchy Veg” than “Veggie Patch” title and over eight years of trial and error – we are still trying and erring! But Mother Nature is amazingly kind and we have lived off the fruits (and veggies) of her patient generosity with increasing gratitude – you haven’t eaten a tomato until you’ve eaten a homegrown tomato (coeur de boeuf our particular favourites!)
We proudly tell our friends of our pure-as-the-driven-snow produce. Not a thimbleful of chemicals are used in their tender cultivation. What we don’t mention is the fact that the next door fields of wheat/sunflowers (depending on the year) have the living daylights sprayed out of them with bug-killers whose names generally end in “…cides”. But we’ve persuaded ourselves that the wind always blows in the opposite direction on these spraying days so nothing touches our delicate shoots!!!
My husband has now added to his back problems by having just prepared the ground ready for planting. We always buy our veggie plants from the Foire aux Plantes in Gaillac on May 1st. The town centre is closed and gardeners can meander through the myriad of stalls selling seemingly hundreds of varieties of courgette and strawberry plants. We can’t tell the difference between most of them and are a bit nervous to ask in case we get into tricky conversations about soil type and land drainage – of which we, embarrassigly, know nothing. But each year we excitedly come home laden with the beginnings of delicious meals-to-be. It’s a bit like a lucky-dip some years: you might be expecting a lovely harvest of cucumbers which in fact, turn out to be courgettes. And who knew that certain melon varieties stopped growing when they reached the size of apples?
The soil-toil involved beforehand is literally back-breaking. Annoyingly, we spent €500 on a shiny new rotovator (for the uninitiated, this is the machine which turns the soil) only to discover a few weeks later through our friend Sally, that a method called ‘no-dig gardening’ (creating layers of organic material on the growing area to make a rich, fertile substrate) means…… NO-DIGGING! But we are stubbornly determined to get our money’s worth out of the rotivator even if it means spending half our lives at the physio for back treatment.