Spring Has Arrived

Hello Everyone,

….and doesn’t it feel like Spring has Sprung…..brilliant, just one week after we had snow!

The daffs and tulips are peeping through. Little buds are appearing on bushes and trees. Snowdrops are everywhere. It even feels a few degrees warmer. It is certainly warmer in the polytunnels. More importantly, it is much, much warmer in the greenhouses. I realise the heater inside helps enormously, but now the dial on the heater can be fixed at ‘low’.

Inside greenhouse number one all the seedlings are growing very nicely. It seems that, during the last week, they have exploded into action. So much so, we will be planting out the beans and peas (probably on Sunday) this week coming.

Greenhouse number two is also chock-a-block…..not with seedlings, but with strawberry plants. Over the last two weeks Bob has been taking out the strawberry plants with their runners from the existing strawberry patch. We have then been potting them up. We are hoping this will make them each a much stronger plant (particularly the new runners) and when they are planted into the new strawberry patch, we get another bumper crop of summer fruit. So far we have nearly seven hundred pots filled….about half way there for the first new strawberry patch!!!

We did have a bumper crop of strawberries last year. So many that we froze quite a few strawbs. The intention was to make fresh jars of strawberry jam as and when it was needed….to be honest, we have not had the time! However, I have made some this past week, so, if you want a taste of summertime during this springtime, strawberry jam is now back on our website now. Apparently, it tastes lovely (Bob says), it smells just like a strawberry patch on a warm summers day. To be honest, the jam is softer than shop bought jam, however, our jam is purely organic strawberries and organic sugar, no pectin has been added. The jam is fab as a preserve, but it is also great as a coulis over ice cream or part of a cake topping. Enjoy.

We also have some lovely pork, on our website, to enjoy. In a couple of week’s time we are sending three more pigs to market. We will then have more sausages, bacon, gammon and joints. As we seem to be short on a number of our products, we will take this as a compliment. As a thank you, we have put a number of joints of pork on offer. As our pork is delivered to you frozen…why not take this opportunity to fill your freezer with pork for the coming Easter season. More great organic produce to enjoy.

We are at Jesmond Food Market this Saturday. The weather is set to be sunny with a temperature in double figures. The market is always a great day for us. If the weather is set to be as good as the BBC says, then we are really looking forward to seeing many visitors on the day.

Till next week,

Ann