It's finally that time of the year that we've been waiting for. Our hard work and lots of hours invested in our garden are paying off. We are getting many compliments from our neighbours telling us that our garden is so good for our first year of gardening, and we are also so proud of what we achieved and I am happy to share it with you.
Let's start!
When you've been following our gardening journey then you know that our most important plants are our chillies. My husband loves snacking on them and in total we have almost 100 plants. Most of these plants have 10+ chillies growing on them, and he can't wait to harvest them all. We already picked a few of them that were finally ripe and I find it fascinating to watch them becoming red. It takes ages for them to start turning, but once they start then it only takes a few days for them to become bright red, and they are HOT!
Most of them are still green, but it's good as we don't want to be overflown with them. It's better to pick a couple of them every now and then or when we need them.
We have so many pepper growing! We have various sorts and they also keep growing in batches. We made stuffed peppers, grilled some of them or at them fresh, and I think that we will have enough for a few more months. Many of them are still blooming, so if it won't be too cold in September we will have endless supply of peppers.
Our bell peppers are growing slowly, but steadily. I planted yellow, orange as well as red, but for now they are all green, so I don't know in which colours they will end up.
I was a bit desperate with corn as it was green and lush, but it was not putting any cobs. Then it suddenly started over night and we have more than 30 cobs growing on a few plants that we have. Success!
I planted beans in June and we have baby pods already. We will harvest them green as we loved grilled green beans with garlic and butter. I also planted another batch of beans a couple of weeks ago with our neighbours telling me that it's way too late, but they sprouted in two days and I'm sure that we will have great harvest in a few months.
It took ages for our broccoli to grow, but now I can't stop admiring how pretty they are. I have already harvested this head a added it to our vegetable stir fry. It was yum!
I think that this is one of our last zucchinis. The weather wasn't so good for them this year as it was too hot and then suddenly too cold, but they did their best...
Perfection! This is the right size for us. I see gardens with zucchinis which are 4 times bigger than mine, but we don't like them so old.
My biggest pride are my cauliflowers. They don't look as perfect as those from the shops, but they are delicious. I covered the heads with the leaves that I tied together to protect it from sun scold, so they stay white. It was a surprise to see how big they were when I opened the leaves again.
I have to stop myself every day from harvesting beets. They look so good, but I want to can them this year, so I have to wait until they get a bit bigger.
Celery is ready for juicing. I don't like the taste, but enjoy the vitamin boost 馃檪
The flowers of tangerine sage attract tons of pollinators and the eyes of other gardeners as well. It's not a common herb in our region, so we are getting questions and share cuttings with others.
Our African blue is growing like crazy, but we cannot find the right use for it. It is too strong for sauces and we don't drink so much tea either. I keep drying the leaves and I might share them with others just to get rid of it. Don't get me wrong, it is super delicious and it smells heavenly, but it's simply too strong.
Roses are putting the second round of flowers...
Our tomatoes will be used for canning and we will enjoyed them later in the year. We still have many fresh tomatoes, but need to can part of them as it's too much for us.
We will mix tomatoes with peppers and onion. This will be the base for pasta sauces...
And there will be a lot of bruschetta in the coming days 馃檪
Chilli parade - makes me happy!
I hope that you have a great gardening year too!
Thank you for following our journey!