Time to eat allotment pie

I went to the cinema with my friends to watch the new Twilight film (Eclipse) on Thursday night.  I didn't enjoy the film as much as the other two Twilight films.  By the end I was beginning to wonder why everyone was causing such a fuss over Bella. I thought it looked like it had been made 'on the cheap', and I didn't think the story achieved much over 2 hours. I guess it was OK, but I wasn't that impressed.

I took a huge pile of veg from the allotment - tomatoes, broad beans, onion, garlic, oregano and courgettes - and cooked them up into a tomato-y sauce.  We had this for tea on Thursday, and then I turned it into a veggie shepherd's pie (I called it 'allotment pie') by topping it with mashed potatoes (also from the allotment) and grated cheese.  It was SO tasty!  I had it for my lunch again the following day.

I also made a homemade rice pudding with gold top milk, which was really yummy too.

Stef and Jo popped round with their new baby and I gave them their knitted baby gifts.

I tied up the dried garlic into a bunch.

On Saturday we went to buy two 10 foot pieces of thick wood to use for shelving in our living room.  Chris had the shelves up and varnished in no time and they look really cool.  We just need to decide what to put on them now.

I made some malted oaties biscuits with Ovaltine in.  I think I baked them for too long as they went a bit hard, so I had to dip them in my tea to soften them up.

On Sunday I went to the allotment to water and check everything was doing OK.  Chris harvested the onions and laid them out in a row to dry in the sun.  Yes, we finally got some sunshine!

Chris harvested all the seeds from the large sunflower head that had dried out.  We're going to use them as wild bird seed as well as giving them to my Mum's pet cockatiel.

Our friend Dan visited the plot and we sent him home to Sheffield with a huge courgette.  I also tidied our front garden, which has been a bit neglected, but looks tidy again now.

After the allotment I went to Duckworth Hall with my mum, and no surprises here, ordered cheese and onion pie, followed by Cartmel sticky toffee pudding.  Mmmm.

I booked the day off work on Monday, and thankfully it was sunny again, so I was down the allotment at 9am.  I pulled up the shallots which had done really well to say we only planted about 10 bulbs.

I tidied and weeded the brassicas, gave some of the cabbages and sprouts some more room, trimmed the grass paths, fed the tomatoes with epsom salts (the yellowing in the leaves had started to come back), planted some swede and chinese radish seeds in the onion bed, and sowed some spring onions and radish.

I pulled out the bolted spinach, and used the gap to spread out the kale (it was too cramped).  I hope the 4 kale plants I moved will survive.

The pumpkins are getting bigger and bigger, much to my delight.

The baby butternuts are so cute.

One of the marrows is enormous.

I harvested the first peas of the season, and picked some more French beans and broad beans for our tea.

I also picked the first of the sweetcorn, which was slightly overripe, I should have picked them sooner.

Rain was forecast so I took all the onions home to dry out, and our house now smells like onions and garlic.