It might be a reference to chillies but when people say that “some like it HOT”, it’s also a reference to how summer vegetables react to hot and humid conditions.
Our Golden Bantam corn has been ripening at a fast rate with help from our organic fertilisers and irrigation from our dam. Planted in 4 different stages we’ve been harvesting up to 80 cobs of corn each week recently. The corn is then cooked over fire by the crew from Yellow Billy Restaurant and served in a variety of ways within their menu. When the corn plants have finished producing we cut them down as a mulch cover for the soil, and eventually the mulch will be dug back into the topsoil to add organic matter to feed the worms and soil microbes.
The kitchen gardens at Piggs Peake have a mixture of pest insects and predators that like to eat them. The Eastern Sedge frogs appreciate that minimum to no use of organic sprays in the gardens allows them to do their thing in helping to clean up a lot of the insect pests.
There are reports of a world decline in the number of bees. Maybe they’ve all migrated to Piggs Peake, in particular to the corn patch where masses of bees have been spotted doing their thing in the corn flowers every day.
Slow and steady wins the race is a good analogy for growing beetroot and potatoes. While it takes a bit of time to reach a good size, we’ve been picking a few container loads that go straight into the menu equation for Yellow Billy Restaurant.
Summer and cucumbers are two words that seem to synchronise frequently. If we take our eyes off the cucumbers for a few minutes it seems like they double in size. The same can be said for the zucchinis and squash.
“Not more tomatoes” seems to be a common cry from the kitchen crew a few times a week recently, yet the heirloom tomatoes have been so tasty this season, and the Roma toms are making a splash in the passata mix. Even some of the green tomatoes have found their way into a magnificent tomato relish which is based on a recipe handed down through the generations of the family of Head Chef Sam Alexander.
If you would like to revisit our website again soon to check our Blog Piggs in the Garden we’ll be back with further updates on the progress of our summer gardens.
cheers,
andrew
