Murray's 'round the back garden

I’ve eaten one kamokamo now. I picked it at the size of a large fist, quartered it, and steamed it for about ten minutes or so, then shared it in a meal with the neighbour who gave me the plant in the first place. Kamokamo are delicious! I have two more on their way. I’ve found that they need a lot of watering or they just won’t produce anything but leaves. Once I started givning them about 10 liters everyday, they started filling out.

I’m picking beans regularly now. A few people have asked me what kind they are and I honestly cannot remember the name. It starts with ‘B’ I think and they are an old ‘heritage’ variety. They are a yellow/green when growing, bright pink (as pictured) when mature, and green when cooked. They were given to me by a neighbour who told me they are exceptionally longkeeping. I have planted beans that were over 6 years old and still got 100% germination.
Can anyone tell me from the picture what kind the variety is called.

We caught the end of a cyclone earlier this week. A few plants got damaged including my potatoes. They got thrashed by the wind so I decided it was time to harvest them anyway.

I got a total of 8kg of spuds. Less than I had hoped for but the size of them was impressive, There were several potatoes weighing 450g or more each!

Anyway I have bagged them and put them in a cool dry corner of the laundry room for storage and eating over the winter months.

I did discover that two tires high is enough as the third tire doesn’t really produce any more potatoes. I think this is because by the time your putting the third tire on they are already flowering nicely. Anyhow next years will be two tires each as a result of that little experiment.

Since the last post about my rasberries I’ve picked another 400g, which I added to the 400g I already had and made into a batch of jam. It made two 600ml jars. And this afternoon I just picked another 700g which I am about to make into more jam. At this rate I’ll be picking again on the weekend.

So total raspberry yield so far = 1.5kg (and counting)

Yesterday I picked 1.8kg of ripe blackcurrant from the five plants I have. They are now sitting on my kitchen bench in the form of about 6 litres of homemade jam.
More pictures here….
http://radio.weblogs.com/0128644/2008/01/03.html#a1067

I picked about 400g of raspberries destined for my jam pan. There’s heaps more fruit coming through too. I think I’ll be picking again in just a few days.

The bird netting is working superbly protecting my blackcurrant crop. Looks like I’m going to have plenty for jam. I just looked up the recipe and it seem blackcurrant jam is one of the easier jams to make.

3lbs. Blackcurrants
4lbs. Sugar
1 pint water
Just boil the sugar and water for 6 minutes, add the fruit and boil rapidly for 4 minutes. Cool quickly and pour it into jars. Too easy aye?