Potato Order

The potato order is in. We went back to Alan Roman's site again this year, mainly because he is one of the few suppliers to stock Stroma which has become one of our favourite early red skinned spuds.

This year:

Swift has been our first early of choice for several years. I like Epicure and would have given International Kidney a chance but Swift worked last year and success is hard to discount.

Ambo, pictured above, always a favourite in heavy soils, great for all round use. So ordinary there is nothing much to say about it but it's reliable, hardy, strong growing and a good cropper. Recommended.

Stroma, as I said, a favourite because it's early, comes out of the ground so clean and has good cooking qualities.

Kestrel, a potato we've both loved and hated over the years. The first year we grew it, it was hard and cooked to an unpleasant texture, tasted nothing special and the plants were low yielding and weedy. When we tried it again after a few years break it grew magnificently and produced quite tasty, pretty potatoes that were virtually slug free, long keeping and fine in the kitchen. This will be a first time for them on the farm and it will be interesting to see which way they fall.

British Queen which we think makes the best chips ever. It's an older variety which might not be as disease and pest resistant as more modern types but worth the effort in our opinion.

Pink Fir Apple, chosen with some trepidation because it's so prone to blight. Last year, Ratte was the first to succumb and the shallow rooting tubers were nearly all lost to blight. I don't think PFA will fare any better but we love the taste and can only keep our fingers crossed.

We would have bought Sarpo Mira or its close cousin Axona but they appeared to be sold out. Pity.

One potato we tried last year that I wouldn't try again; Winston. The plants were vigorous, gave a good yield despite the blight and produced nice looking potatoes that we really don't like to eat. Something in the texture is quite unpleasant and I can't find a way of cooking them in which they excel. So I was wrong to get them last year, sorry Paul.

After the failure of the potato plantlets last season, faults all round but ultimately finished off by massive slug attack, I wasn't going to try for any novelties this year but Alan is offering packs of seed tubers of the heritage varieties I find most appealing, Salad Blue, Highland Burgundy Red and Shetland Black so they were added to the order as a treat. We've now got so many spuds I don't think we'll bother with the Potato Day at HDRA.

Forward planning

The future is veiled.

Outside the window there are small but perceptible signs of the planet's turn. Snowdrops planted up from bought bulbs last summer in pots so that they can be planted out 'in the green' this spring are showing their shy white flowers, there is a lesser celandine shining on the lawn, teasel seeds gathered at Welney are germinating in their modules.

It's time to plan the planting for the season.

All planning needs to be based on experience and even then there is no guarantee of success. This year I'm hoping to keep a grip on my aspirations and actually produce better quality crops albeit in a more limited range. I'm going to stop myself buying many more seeds, keep a planting diary so that things are sown on time, be realistic about what can be grown in the open in the average Normandy summer, so no okra, chillies or aubergines this year. No melons either, but I've never been able to grow those, indoors or out.

The broad sweep, then, looks something like this:

Potatoes, definitely Ambo and Stroma for their high yields, early maturity and fair blight resistance with maybe a small handful of other varieties if we make it to the Garden Organic Potato day in February (there is a day open to the general public on 3rd Feb).

Cabbages, red for pickling, white for coleslaw and sauerkraut, winter for greens. It'll be interesting to see how these do because I'm not great with brassicas. Also Kale and Sprouting for winter cropping into 2009. These will all have to be netted against butterflies.

Alliums, I've already put in a row of garlic and must plant up some more in pots for transplanting on the next visit to France. I will probably take the easy way out with onions and buy sets. We'll need a few shallots and leeks for the deer, obviously. There is a patch of Babington leek already there which I hope to bulk up.

Salad vegetables are not always easy. Cut and come again lettuce, purslane, coriander leaf and rocket are all essentials. Sorrel might be missed this year as it can be gathered from the wild, chinese vegetables like red mustard are excellent but I don't want to be too ambitious this year. Some chicory or endive for the winter would be a great addition.

Grass and seed crops, this will be the first attempt at sweetcorn at the farm. I've also got some rainbow quinoa as a trial. I've grown amaranth in the UK with success so hope the quinoa will give a good account of itself in Normandy. As usual there will be sunflowers and I'm wondering about a few poppy seed poppies - that wouldn't be too much would it?

Tomatoes; these have been a disaster area two years running. I'll have to try again but I'm not hopeful. Along with the toms, I'm going to grow some tomatilloes this year. They are hardier than you might expect, seem to be blight resistant and carefully harvested will store into November or even December for making fresh salsa.

Beans. For some reason runner beans just haven't done in France. I might try again but think it's time I tried to grow out some of my saved seed varieties of purple climbing french beans and other heritage varieties so the runners might be overlooked. Oddly, not many French people seem to grow runner beans either, perhaps there is a reason for this over and above national pride.

Pumpkins will do well as usual if the weather is kind. My favourite varieties for cooking are still the Moschata types but I've succumbed to another variety of Butternut squash. The butternuts have never performed well for me so this may be another disaster waiting to happen.

Root crops of carrots, beetroots, radishes, mooli perhaps with some parsnips and Hamburg parsley. Celeriac is too much of a faff.

And finally, my pet projects. As well as the usual two types of oca (which I nearly lost through mismanagement last year) I've bought some of the creamy white variety sold by Realseeds. Must try harder with these. I've also taken some ulluco tubers which will be a real wait and see.

And even with all that, I still think I've forgotten something...

Encore

I can't believe I did a NY post about the weather and yet, that's all that came to mind in my determination to create a message, something, anything to mark the change of the calender year.

What I did on my hols was read, first a biography / autobiography of the man who wrote "Ring of Bright Water" written by his friend which was far more absorbing than the 50p I paid for it in the RSPCA shop would suggest, then Dr. Zhivago, one of those omissions in my literary experience I can't explain, a book that is so profoundly Russian I almost became annoyed. And what is it with the weather there? These charity shop bargains were succeeded by my Xmas present from my son and my ex, a complete hardback set of the Harry Potter books.

I held myself aloof from Harry Potter during his reign of the popular book market. I bought one copy of a book as a present for a niece who was underperforming in her reading, hoping it would provide inspiration and I think, during one of those 3 a.m. wakeful periods caused by excessive alcohol in a strange house, read two thirds of the first book before the dawn came and I could get a train home. It didn't strike me as worthy of much of a second glance but under those circumstances it's hard for anything to shine.

But I love a long read, and a seven volume light weight fantasy has its attractions for the individual hoping to lose themselves. I read these in seven days, and lost myself most satisfactorily. I don't find Harry or any of his fellow characters appealing - it could be said that this is actually the cleverest part of the writing - they are all sufficiently off putting to inhibit closely identifying with their characters (or maybe I'm just very odd) but this helps the story stay uncluttered. I did find myself wondering in the later books just how much JK was influenced by the expectation of the stories being converted into film.

So, not great, but nowhere near as bad as they might have been. I wish one day someone might say something like that about my writing.

Happy New Year

We've been having some wonderful weather for the last few days on 2007 which have followed on into 2008, calm, clear and surprisingly warm in the low sun. The Meteo is offering a poor outcome for the rest of the week but it's a been such a wonderful few days of peacefulness and quiet in remote Normandy.



Even this bad black cat has been enjoying a few moments of fresh air before settling back on his heated bed pad in front of the roaring fire.

Best wishes to all for a wonderful year to come.

Yule

It's a bit early but isn't it pretty?

A silly season moment

Maybe I should try harder.

If you want to try this at home, watch out for the advertising link they sneak into the graphic.

Wildlife in Abundance

Aren't they cute?

You might think so, I couldn't possibly comment. In the last 24 hours the humane mousetrap has captured 5 guilty subjects, now released away up the field and into the forest although I have no confidence they won't be back, just as quickly as their little legs will carry them.

This place is a wonder for the quantity and variety of wildlife it supports. We were sorry to discover we had interrupted the winter hibernation of a fire salamander, something the books don't say will be resident in this area. My pictures of this were rubbish so here is a drawing I found.



There are also butterflies hibernating all over the house and we move around in fear of waking them up before the nectar plants are blooming again.

Not everything is quite so wonderful as the world of nature. The car battery, the same one as caused all the trouble last time so I have only myself to blame, has finally turned up its toes, just as I was about to sally forth to find one of those small garages where men in greasy blue overalls suck their teeth while telling you the car is beyond economic repair but they'll see what they can do. So I am well and truly stuck and have succumbed to inviting a British peripatetic mechanic to come over and bring a battery with him. He tells me the earliest he can get here is Thursday which was a day I had in mind for travelling back to the UK for a visit so it's just as well I've not booked a ticket yet. Still have not the faintest idea what this little adventure will cost us, hopefully I'll get an email tonight and all will be well.