Healthy nutrition

Managing my health has become the focus of my daily activities. Including as much fresh organic produce as well as growing my own have been instrumental in making a road to feeling better. There are certain foods that appear regularly because I want to eat them. When I have lost interest and awareness in them I understand that they are not instinctively needed. When the sudden urge arrives for a lemon , I know there is something in that fruit that is a missed element. My weekly favourites are avocado, blueberries, spinach and mango. Very seasonal are strawberries( just a few), fresh lettuce, purple snap pea, mint for tea and parsley. The garden suddenly is very abundant and I have spotted a few miniature tomatoe fruits. It’s all immediate and grounding and provides plenty of opportunity for gratefulness .

Permaculture

The frost has still been hanging around but I have been creating my plan to grow my permaculture paradise. It’s very small but being and working in the garden growing food is very pleasing for body and soul. It will be a 5 year ongoing project but I am trying to work with nature and understand the working relationship. Gardening and being in nature provide exercise, sunshine and food that has not been tampered with. It’s an essential part of my new reality. I may not be able to garden in the conventional way but being in a wheelchair should not hold me back.

The birds and the bees are regular visitors and all is well in my nano garden.

Bacteria

To improve my digestion I have taken the same science as if improving the soil in my garden. I equate that what happens in here is the same as what is happening out there. I changed to starting to eat in season and increasing the diversity of ingredients in my food. Instead of eating just rice, there would be millet, quinoa and couscous too, more variety in vegetables and fruits and telling myself that yes I can eat that but checking whether it fits that formula. This week it’s local asparagus although in the supermarket it comes from Mexico. Little changes do build up. Having a local veg box also provides me with local bacteria that will further enhance my wellbeing.

Painting with plants

Exactly what I am doing with the garden? The aim is for it to be beautiful and edible. I will be sharing and caring for wildlife hopefully creating mutual beneficial relationships.

My resources in space and energy are limited but that does not mean I cannot garden, preserve and champion.

The front garden is a typical country cottage garden but instead of seeing the garden from the outside to its best advantage, it’s at its best looking from inside because that’s where I am mostly. 

Last autumn my helpers planted over 200 bulbs and it’s a spectacle to behold. The bees have plenty of flowers to visit while I plan additions to the garden that will be edible. So far amongst the flowers we have rhubarb, artichoke and rosemary but more planned. 

The back patuo which is accessible provides a salad garden mostly with edible flowers. Going around the space in my wheelchair provides exercise, fresh air and sunshine. Everything we need to grow.

Rhubarb and Date chutney

Since having lost a few motor skills I can no longer make big batches of preserves but that does not prevent me from starting a little chutney. It took all day but once it was on the stove I just needed to stir it occasionally . This chutney will need to ripen a few weeks but it’s full bodied and a nice dark colour. Recipe from Rosie makes a Jam http://m.rosiemakesjam.com/recipes/howtomake/rhubarb-and-date-chutney/index.asp#.XK4QORbTUlT

This handy website lets you enter a quantity of one ingredient and will calculate the recipe. I went for 1 lb of rhubarb. 

Will be adding that to the pantry.

A lot has happened to dampen my goals in life however, after 7 years I am back in the land of the living. My life was devastated by a neurological condition leaving me wheelchair bound and ill for a very long time. I had to move and adapt to living with a damaged body and I have become differently able. My goals are still the same, my direction is still the same and whilst my options are seriously reduced I am adapting to a reduced energy life. I am finding alternatives. I continue to grow food and explore available options but ' life is not as we knew it' Pointing north this platform will document my process. Thank you for being here.

10 fruits to grow in the garden

Fruit trees, bushes, crowns and canes are an investment to start with but after 3 to 4 years, cared for, they will provide you with a return each year.

Three trees were gifted to me this year, apricot, greengage and victoria plum.

Here is our selection to provide fruit throughout the year:

1. Rhubarb- purchase them as crowns. These are the very first fruits of the season, make excellent pies, leaves used in mordanting fibre, crowns can be used as a dye.

2. Strawberries - lush, easy to grow in pots or as groundcover ( works well with rhubarb in a pie)

3.Apricot - tree, needs to be planted where the sun shines most day as it is a warm weather tree.

4. Blackcurrants, white currants and red currants : bushes providing berries in July/ August, excellent for jams, jellies and cordials.
5. Cherries - A morello cherry tree can flourish on a north facing wall and provide a good crop provided it is netted when the cherries ripen, otherwise the birds will strip the tree.
6. Gooseberries - a prickly bush, makes good jelly as it is high in pectin.
7. Plums,greengages, damson - eat fresh, can or freeze, jams and jellies.
8. Berries - Raspberries, Tayberries, Loganberries, Blackberries, Mulberrries, Blueberries cultivated and wild.
9. Apples and pears - If you have space you can create a succession of harvests lasting from October to January.
10. Quinces and Medlars-

Edible flowers

Viola Cornuta "Violet Flare" (Horned Violet), Evergreen Perennial


There are many flowers that we usually cultivate for their ornamental value but surprisingly some can make a wonderful addition to your salad bowl. It makes a green salad look very special indeed.
Here are some to try raw.

Violas are pretty with pastel colours, they are easy to grow and have a delicate flavour.
Borage- pull the blue flower away from its hairy base.
Calendulas - rip the flower apart and spread the petals in your salad.
Chives - break the purple globes up and spread the petals in the salad.
Nasturtiums - these have a strong and peppery taste but add very pretty orange colours to the feast.
Rocket - when the plants start to bolt, leave them in the ground, strip the leaves and the flowers as they have a really hot peppery flavour.

Later in the season courgette flowers offer an opportunity to be fried in a tempura base.But I am ahead of myself here.

Tea from the garden

L'Heure du The

As part of a healthier eating plan, I have reduced and nearly eliminated all types of caffeine and tea from my diet and most hot drinks have been herbal teas.

It seemed only time before I would explore how to include plants that could provide me with a surplus of leaves for herbal infusions. My favourites are mint, lemon verbena, verbena and lavender but there are others that could well be useful plants. I have not used any of the following plants although all of them in one way or another have edible parts that make tea.
Do not try this unless you are sure which parts to use.


Hyssop - hysoppus officilanis
Mallow - hybiscus syriacus
scotch heather - calluna vulgaris
anise hyssop-agastache foeniculum
chamomile
columbine - aquilegia vulgaris
creeping thyme
peppermint - menta x piperita vulgaris
spearmint - mentha spicata
honeysuckle - lonicera spp.
marigold flowers

Lemon verbena is beginning to grow at the moment. It is quite an invasive plant and keeping it in a container makes easy picking. A few leaves, crushed and steeped for 5 mins give a refreshing brew that has the ability to calm the nerves.