Down the vegetable garden: peas in a pod

With the arrival of the longer and warmer days, it is some time since we started preparing the soil in the vegetable garden by incorporating our own compost and manure that a farmer from the village delivers from his farm. Adding organic matter to our heavy clay soil helps to improve its structure resulting in less work and plants that grow healthier.
This year we are starting our growing season earlier by sowing vegetables such as peas and mange tout in drainage pipes cut in half and planting them in the prepared soil once they are big enough. This process entails chitting the seeds in moistened tissue for a few days until their roots have started sprouting. Taking care not to damage their vulnerable root we than plant the peas in the drainage pipe. Within four weeks from starting this process the young plants are ready to be planted in their permanent position in the vegetable plot. Growing them in this way as opposed to sowing them directly onto the ground is time consuming but guarantees the crop as you can create and control more favourable conditions then if you plant them in the soil were birds and rodents can get to them. If you make use of a south facing wall, you can have earlier peas. There has been times in the past when we have needed to sow peas three times. Talking with friends in the village who are keen gardeners and with whom we share an interest in gardening, this year they needed to do several sowing of peas and still have few plants. It is nice to share our experiences and tips with them. We look forward to our first peas, if everything goes well, by the end of April or very early May. We have also used this method of growing with the beetroots and they look very happy and advanced compared with previous years. Worth the extra work. We look forward to the first crops.

Avocados

Avocados grow really well in Asturias but there are not many trees around. Those that grow locally are mainly ornamental and rarely do people collect the fruit. There is a mature specimen in the Village - approx 10 meters high. Huge fruit. We have a new avocado tree growing from a stone. About 1 meter high. These are not our fruit - maybe another 10 years for that.

Wentworth and Gawber

Those of you who follow our blog will know that it is over two years since we brought home our two cats, Wentworth and Gawber, in an attempt to reduce the numbers of a rodent locally knowns as a "rato" in our garden. They both are very good hunters and spend most of the time outdoors other than when the weather is bad. Although they live in the workshop, we enjoy their company while working or sitting in the garden; they regularly join us in the house during the evenings. As you know, cats are creatures who enjoy their comforts and our two are no different. They love to come indoors when it is cold or wet outside and we have a fire blazing away. As you can see from the photos, they both love to catnap and dream of ratos whilst listening to classical or chillout music. Although Wentworth likes a touch of Black-eyed Peas now and again. Purrfect.

We have been trying out new foods with them in the hope we can reduce the commercially bought cat food. Most of the cat food available commercially is either ecologically unfriendly i.e. unsustainable fishing industry or it is nutritionally poor. Sadly, up to now the options we have tried and substituted for their regular meals have been sniffed at and in the main left. Anyone out there with suggestions please get in touch. Someone suggested roadkill but there are limits...

Jerusalem Artichokes

Normally we would have lifted our crop of Jerusalem Artichokes earlier in the year but as the winter has been so mild we decided to leave them in the ground until now. We lost a few to the rodents but we are really pleased with the crop overall. Cleaned, roasted with olive oil...nutty and tasty. Some people react in a very windy way to these little tubers but if you can tolerate them, they are delicious. Soup is also good and last year Luis incorporated some into Tortilla. Not for the feint hearted.

One for the botanists amongst our readers: Does anyone know what plant this is? We came across it on a recent walk near home.

Territorio Nomada

This week we visited a friend of ours who has opened a Mongolian settlement with over 20 themed Yurts here in Asturias that is nestled in a beautiful green valley near Arriondas. Begonia travelled through Mongolia some years ago and dreamed of returning to Spain and sharing her passion with school groups, tourists and locals alike. Each Yurt is themed i.e. histroy of Mongolia, food, religion, games room etc. They are such lovely structures and heavily decorated. The smell of inscence, sunshine glistening through the open roof and gentle winds rustling canvas it is easy to imagine yourself living life in a Yurt. The construction of a yurt is fascinating and there is even an opportunity to have a go at erecting the wooden frame that supports the felt, canvas and linings. Here are a few pictures and also a link to a couple of television interviews she gave about Territorio Nomada.



Youtube Part one.

Youtube Part two.

Broccoli

Mountains of it...sweet and tender purple, early sprouting broccoli. Lightly steamed until just tender - divine or lightly steamed, sauté and add a splash of balsamic vinegar - Mmmmm!

Vegetable Accounting

Hi to everybody who reads this blog. As Winter is passing with longer hours of daylight, it is time to take stock of last years experiences in the vegetable plot before we make final decisions on this year's stock. As we mentioned in a previous blog entry, when we sow vegetables directly into the soil we lose many of the seedlings because of the leather jacket larvae which likes to feed on the roots of the young plants. There is some chemical control you can use to combat this pest but we aim to be as organic as possible and prefer not to apply chemicals. Instead, last season we experiemented with sowing vegetables in drainage pipes cut in half and then grow them on in the pipes until they are strong enough to withstand the pest attacks before planting in the ground. The results have been great. For example, we used to have to sow beetroot directly into the ground at least 3 to 4 times before we could manage to get sufficient number to survive the attack and since we tried the new sowing method, we have managed to grow them and harvest them successfully in good numbers per sowing.


Another successful trial has been that of the tomatoes, a fruit susceptible to blight in the high humidity that we normally have during early Summer. In the past we have tried blight resistant varieties with no luck, we also failed to crop many cherry tomatoes that are usually more resistant. There is a chemical that may help to control the blight but it fails to protect them entirely. This year we copied a local's method of growing tomatoes under partial cover and we sprayed them with copper sulphate before the plants start to fruit (a practice allowed in organic vegetable growing). We also grew two different varieties, Alicante and Brandywine, the former performed better than the latter variety. Last season we ate lots of tomatoes straight from the vine and were able to bottle several jars of pasata (a tomato sauce) to be used during the Winter.


Earlier last Spring I also mentioned that I grafted one of our cider apple trees with a nice russet variety. I did a total of 4 grafts and three of them have taken, not a bad starting point for a neophyte. I would have probably had a 100% success rate if impatience had not had the best of me - I could not resist having an early look and in the process I damaged one of the grafts. Never mind, I am very pleased with the results.

The final trial  I want to share with you is the results of our crop of onions. This year we planted them, 400 in total, as the locals do and they grew better and bigger than ever before. This local method entails the planting of the young onions in a trench filled with well rotted manure. The three varieties of onions we cropped have been really successful and they taste wonderful. We are still enjoying them now in February and they are keeping well.



Seedlings of beetroot, aubergine, turnips and many others are already nestled in their half of a drainage pipe ready for planting out when they reach a good size. If this year's harvest is as good as 2009, then we shall not have reason to complain.

Organic pest control on their winter break...

Carnival

Sunday:
There is something strange happening around the village......lunchtime brought strange and silent visitors to our door:


After supplying them with some vino tinto, they seemed appeased and went on their merry way.


Monday brought large crowds of people into town, some dressed in weird and outrageous costumes and others in various guises. It was Carnival time. As usual, times were fluid and the 11.30pm start of the parade was of course, delayed. Time for another drink in a much warmer place then outside again as we heard the band strike up. The parade had many groups and individuals competing for the 800€ first prize and lots of other cash prizes. The carnival was as always a great atmosphere and brought many people into town. We managed to escape sometime in the early hours of the morning before frostbite set in.

Celeriac

Celeriac: Described here

Roasted with oil, sprinkle of salt until just tender. Everything the dictionary says it is. Delicious. Managed to grow 10 this last year. This is the last one left. We'll need to grow at least 20 this coming year.....or more.

Oranges, sweet oranges

We have always enjoyed oranges and in time our own orange tree will produce a fair crop. This year the few remaining fruits are doing well in spite of their small size. We were surprised to find out that shop bought oranges are waxed and dyed orange so that their colour does not change with the passage of time. On one of our visits to my family in Barrios de la Vega we ate the most delicious, juicy and sweet oranges that my family gets from a shop in Palencia. The owners of this shop have a contract for the whole orange crop of some orange groves in the south of the country. The good thing with these oranges is that they are not waxed or dyed and as a result you can use the the skins for making jam or liqueurs. In addition, they are the best oranges we have ever tasted.
This Winter and during one of the visits to my family I brought back with me 50 kg of oranges, some of them even with mud on their skins- that goes to show how unprocessed the fruits are and how directly from the growers you get the fruits. Although we have eaten many of them fresh, they also taste great when you juice them fresh. A few kg have been turned into a very nice jam, I would not call it a marmalade as the fruits are very sweet and you do not get the required bitter taste to make marmalade. Later in the season we will use some of it to make chocolate and orange cake as a treat for special occasions. Some of the oranges were used to make a nice orange liqueur based on orujo, a raw spirit obtained from the distillation of the vegetable remains after wine making. To make this liqueur, we add to the orujo a bit of sugar, orange peel and some orange juice. Once it has infused for 1 month we strain it and occasionally have it chilled- the best way to serve it. And as we say here in Spain: Salud!

Walking in Asturias 2

There are so many beautiful places to visit in Asturias. Last week we ventured to the Xanas Gorge just south of Oviedo. This walk had been on our list of walks to do for ages so with a good weather forecast and an early start we set off. The walk is either linear or circular depending on which route you take. We opted for the circular walk. The walk starts near to the feeding station for the semi-wild bears Paca and Tola. The path climbs around the edge of the gorge with spectacular views of the mountains above and waterfalls below. We saw many vultures as the day got warmer and managed to spot this little beauty foraging in a wooded copse (photograph by J. Shackleton). 

Artesania La Pasera

Well here it is.......Sue's House Number Plaque that she completed whilst here before Christmas - and doesn't it look good?
Since starting Luis' blog in May last year, we have built up a terrific following. With over 1000 hits per week and 20,000 hits in total, needless to say we are really pleased with its popularity. Given that it is only available in Spanish, that is a great result. Some translation gizmos will do a poor job of converting it to English if you are really interested, otherwise you can just look at the pictures from time to time. This next week or two we are developing a link to Flickr so that more pictures can be shown. The link to Luis' Blog is: www.lapasera.wordpress.com


In addition to ongoing chair restoration Luis is busy planning a series of mosaics to incorporate into the drive - a project we hope to complete these next few months.

Fennel

The fennel has done really well this year - sweet, crisp, fresh, with a slight aniseed flavour, tender......


We discovered (can't remember how!) that if you cut the fennel at ground level, leaving the main root in the ground, you get a second crop of baby fennel later on in Spring. Now that is the sort of vegetable growing we like.

Snow on the beach - Logs on the fire

La Pasera is just half a mile from the coast, nestled between a small mountain range and the sea, we rarely experience freezing temperatures or snow. I understand from fellow villagers that is was nearly 10 years since snow settled here. This week we saw lots of snow, hail stones, rain, ice, strong winds, thunder and lightening. The weather was bizarre to say the least. The snow didn't stay for long but never-the-less came, covered and thawed within the day. In anticipation of the cold spell we took the opportunity to stock up on fuel. We mainly use wood to heat the house and workshop so a quick telephone call and friendly negotiations with the woodman, brought us a load of good quality (oak, beech, ash etc) logs that will ensure we have sufficient stock to see us through the winter. The wood we buy, together with wood we are given locally, is a great renewable energy source and very efficient at providing heat. Recent storms have provided us with a couple of trees from neighbouring plots - Chainsaw and wheelbarrow beckons when the weather improves. Meanwhile, along with Wentworth and Gawber, we'll be keeping warm and toasty until spring arrives.

Oink

We have just had our good friends Sue and Sam, Mother and Son, to stay for a few days just before Christmas. Despite the dreadful snow and ice in the UK, they managed, just, to get both out here and home again. We had a really chilled time and didn't feel the need to be dashing about. Sue and Luis decided to make a mosaic number plaque for Sue's house. For anyone who knows her, it doesn't take a genius to guess what Sue choose as an accompanying decoration....a Pig. For anyone who knows Luis, it doesn't take a genius to work out how he felt about the opportunity to talk Mosaics. Teacher and Pupil, Guru and Groupie or Mork and Mindy....take your pick. Needless to say Sam and I welcomed the break and took the occasional opportunity to irritate where possible. The goggles and hats were just for show - they both love posing.

The fruits we grow

One of our dreams at La Pasera has been to produce organically, as much fruit as we possibly can. To help us achieve this we have spent some time creating a small orchard. I was once told that to be able to say that you have an orchard you need a minimum of 6 fruit trees, we certainly have a greater number than that.

When we first moved to La Pasera, we inherited some mature fruit trees including 5 apple trees, two very old and hugh cherry trees, a walnut tree and several wild hazels. Of all the apple trees, we were lucky enough to have two varieties of nice eating apples, one of which is a russet (my favourite apple), the others are cider apples. With biodiversity in mind, we have planted two different types of pear (Conference and Manteca Hardy), a greengage and an orange tree, in addition, a selection of soft fruit bushes. The greengage and pears are still a bit young and we are hoping to start getting some fruits from them in the near future.

The orange tree was a birthday present from Ian´s parents and after blossoming last May for the first time, we now have a few oranges still hanging from the branches that hopefully will be ready for picking towards early Spring. The orange tree is an interesting tree as you get at the same time: blossom, very young fruits and fruits ready to be picked. As the weather gets colder, we are keeping an eye on when the locals start protecting their young orange trees so that we can do the same - they seem to have the experience and local knowledge to know these things! Last Winter we put a temporary frame that protected the tree during the few days we get, of light ground frost and, from hailstone. The photo shows some very healthy young oranges that we hope to taste in the future.

This time of year turns our minds to pruning, something that we are also slowly learning and putting into practice. The raspberry canes will need cutting, the apple trees further pruning and the young blueberries, gooseberries, red and blackcurrant bushes will all need tending and top dressing if they are to produce to their best this coming summer.                                              

Gawber on Patrol

Merry Christmas, Happy Holiday, Feliz Navidad.....

We have had a good year here at La Pasera with bountiful harvests, welcome visits from friends and family, good health and breathtaking walks. Luis' craft blog has also exceeded expectations with over 750 visitors a week. We are constantly amazed at the number of people who look at and read our blog. From the UK, America, Malaysia, India, Romania...etc etc...30 different countries since the start of November.Why not get in touch or leave a comment, we would love to hear about your life and ideas. We wish you all a prosperous and healthy 2010. Have a great Christmas.  From all at La Pasera. x

Reduce, re-use and recycle

Our green credentials are open to question on so many fronts however, where possible we try and have as little impact on our environment as possible. We were recently given the opportunity to have a tour of the Cogersa Plant near Gijon and Aviles. This is the main processing plant for refuse in our part of the world. This came about as we are a part of a pilot scheme they have intiated on composting. After a few presentations from key people within Cogersa and from a regional government representative, we were toured around the plant and exhibition. We were impressed with their efforts - especially the sheds for composting massive amounts of green waste - equivalent to 4 or five football pitch sized buildings. Another highlight was the demonstration of Falconry by the resident Male and Female Falcons used to control the potentially huge population of seagulls. They were flown and enticed the dive to catch a lure.....very impressive birds. The refuse processing plant currently puts into landfill any waste it cannot process - this site is almost full and European Law prevents further sites being considered. The only solution being considered is an incinerator.

A rainy day at La Pasera

The rain in Spain falls mainly.... Well, let me tell you that at times it seems that it should be: "the rain in Spain falls mainly in Asturias" That came to my mind this afternoon when I decided to go for a cycle ride in the rain. It had been raining all day and I wanted a change from mosaic making and chair caning. When I first set off, it looked as if the rain would stop and I thought that if it continued it would be nice to cycle in the warm rain. At the end it rained almost all the way. Todays route took me up some villages off the beaten track and to a small mountain. I would not like to guess how high but it was a smallish mountain to get me started on my training regime before I have a go at cycling up to the lakes that you find in the heart of the Picos National Park. It appears that the cycling route up to the lakes is the toughest in the cycling tour of Spain (La Vuelta ciclista) and I have decided to do it this month after Ian returns from his latest visit to the UK. Ian will provide my with an easier alternative way of going up as he will follow me with the car. In total, the route is about 20 K climbing nearly 3000 feet with an average 6'87% inclination and the greatest incline is at the site known as "La Huesera" (place of bones), 800 m between 12 and 15% ascent. Wish me good luck. If I succeed I will let you know when I do it. Needless to say how much I enjoyed a hot shower when I got back.
In spite of the rain and dripping with rain, I could not resist stopping at Saint Antolin´s beach on the way back to admire the views on a day when the sea was very rough. The photo shows the beach I am talking about on a sunny day.

A walk to the cliffs of Hell

One of the pleasures of life at La Pasera is the beauty of the landscape that we explore on a regular basis. One of our favourite walks takes you to the Cliffs of Hell - Acantilados del Infierno and Tomason (Tomason is shown in the photograph above).

Starting from La Pasera, we walk down the lane for a few meters until we join the famous pilgrim´s route to Galicia or "Camino de Santiago" (St James´ Walk). This is the coastal route that starts at the border with France, there is also an alternative route that takes you through the heart of Spain.

To walk to the cliffs we join the Camino de Santiago and soon leave behind the apple orchards that line the first part of the route. The apples have just been harvested to make the famous Asturian cider. Within a mile or so, we join a path to the right that leads you straight to the coast. As you walk past the meadows and hedgerows, you may come across some domestic animals grazing and if you are lucky enough a variety of wild animals and birds such as song birds, pheasant, deer, insects, lizards, snakes and a variety of raptors. With regards to the flora, it is very interesting to see many wild forms of plants and flowers we had in the garden in the UK. The wild flowers you come across on this walk are a treat and there is always some to be admired regardless of the season. The best time of the year for the meadow flowers is late Spring before the farmers cut the grass when the abundance and variety of flowers and especially the orchids is very impressive.

As you get closer to the coast, you can smell the sea and hear the waves pounding against the cliffs especially if the seas are rough and the waves crash over the cliffs.

This walk is very beautiful on a nice sunny day when we enjoy the tranquillity and beauty of the sea views. If you turn your back to the sea, you can admire the mountains. At times we just let time pass by while we observe the fishing boats and distant mountains. During a storm when the sea is rough, this walk offers a completely different experience with the drama of the sound and views of the rough sea as the next photos and video show. The coastline is littered with Bufones (blow holes) where sea water is forced through holes in the limestone - some of them are extremely dangerous and people have died in the past being blown of their feet - thrown up in the air and land on sharp jagged rocks.

Ladybirds in the garden

There is no doubt that since we started gardening at La Pasera we have altered the nature of the original meadow where our home has been built. This change has been inevitable and to compensate for it, we try to garden in an environmentaly friendly manner incorporating practices that encourage biodiversity in the garden. To achieve this, we have created different environments or areas of interest to different sets of animals, insects and plants. A sign of encouragement is an increase in the number of ladybird sightings that we are experiencing. Let us hope that such an invaluable gardener´s ally continues to thrive in the garden.