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We working our way through our first pumkin, wish we wasn't though - it's an Italian variety (don't know the name, we were given the seed by an Italian) and athough it looks like a Crown Prince I'm sorry to say the taste is - awful, sickly, insipid.

For me in order of preference for taste it's Uchi Kuri, Butternut, and then Crown Prince and Potimarron about equal.

Millymollymandy wrote:And Bonnie I hope you have your OH what for!

Think that was supposed to say GIVE him what for.

grahamhobbs wrote:We working our way through our first pumkin, wish we wasn't though - it's an Italian variety (don't know the name, we were given the seed by an Italian) and athough it looks like a Crown Prince I'm sorry to say the taste is - awful, sickly, insipid.

For me in order of preference for taste it's Uchi Kuri, Butternut, and then Crown Prince and Potimarron about equal.

Why bother eating it then Graham? You must have got plenty of other lovely things to eat.

Still picking runner beans although they are coming to an end as there hasn't been any flowers for a while, French beans, Borlotto beans, sprouts, savoy cabbage, cauliflowers, leeks, pak choi, turnips, beetroot, parsnips, carrots, celery, celeriac, mange tout peas, lettuce, cucumber, spring onions, tomatoes, myrtles and a late apple tree (Winston) still has fruit to be picked.

I'm hoping for some new potatoes later in the month. Even though I dug up EVERY one of my first earlies back in June, there are about 10 that have grown into respectable sized plants. With a bit of luck there should be at least a few new spuds worth having.

I wonder out of interest how much of that would you still have if it wasn't in a polytunnel - I mean I doubt if you've had a serious frost yet!

I'm still picking lots of salad veg so have a last few lettuce, rocket, beetroot, spring onions and radishes not to mention all the tomatoes still ripening up indoors.

Never got around to blanching the celery cos I am too lazy but the stems are pretty spindly and wouldn't be fit for anything other than flavouring in soup or stew anyway.

Our autumn rasps are finished and I'm now harvesting the summer ones! There's something gone horribly wrong here as all next year's ones have fruit on..... Whether they will ever all mature and ripen I doubt and I fear for next year!

Then I have a fair bit of winter veg too but need to eat the salad stuff first. Also my veg patch has been taken over by coriander in all the empty patches and the dill and borage are still self seeding.

Millymollymandy wrote:I wonder out of interest how much of that would you still have if it wasn't in a polytunnel - I mean I doubt if you've had a serious frost yet!

Just checked my weather station memory and the lowest temperature in the last month was 9.8c, so no problems with any sort of frost.

I have a row of runner beans outside and they are still fine but finished flowering some time ago now, also of course the potatoes are outside.
Probably everything else would be OK outside too (although not in such good condition) except the tomatoes and cucumber, and the carrots would certainly be OK but riddled with root fly.

While doing my rounds this morning I realised that I had forgotten yellow peppers, autumn raspberries and scorzonera (or is it salsify, I can never remember).

If the root is black it's scorzonera. That won't help you until you dig one up of course! I just dug up the most forked salsify you could possibly imagine - and this in sandy soil with no compost dug in. It looked worthy of some scary Halloween decoration!

Still got some slug ridden celery out there - pre-chewed, as a friend calls them - good enough to give some flavour to soups, though. Had had my last two courgettes last week (under fleece, otherwise they would have long frozen off). That's it for this year. Although, I seem to remember some rogue tatties in the compost heap - must investigate!

I wish I had pumpkins, they just don't do here unless under cover, or in an exceptionally good year...