KW-33 Pure Garden Goodness

Great news, my pirates. This week, we are eating almost exclusively food freshly cooked and directly from the garden. Total food miles around here are measured in meters, and performed by humans!

Every day sees potatoes being dug, pumpkins plucked, courgettes tweaked and tomatoes teased from the vine. It’s the slowest week of the year in the garden, and the one with the greatest profusion of riches. I’m going to enjoy it for a week, and when we get into September, I’m going to really crack on with filling the stores. I’ve got a month to make as many jars of goodies as possible.

Filling the stores is the greatest pleasure of the barracks, and already there are things in there that have not been present before - a year’s supply of onions and garlic being the most obvious. Yesterday, I added 40 kilos of grown, harvested, threshed and winnowed wheat grains to the mix. I can’t tell you what a thrill that was. At 400 grammes for a small loaf of bread, I guess that works out to 100 loaves. Which also sounds like a year’s supply, but also, the chaff goes to the piggies and we have solved our straw problem! This feels very good, and slightly significant.

Last year, I slightly ran out of potatoes. Or rather, they started sprouting rather violently before the first earlies were out of the ground. I’m hoping that the grains keep a little longer, and I can eat carbs all year round. The rye and the corn are still to come, of course. There is going to be enough of it, the challenge, as always, is to keep it long enough.

I have been thinking about the leeks for a long time. I have had the distinct suspicion that they weren’t planted deeply enough, and that they would be funny stubby little things. I took the first one out today, and it looks marvellous. For the entire 5cm of it’s length!

But that’s enough of the food for now. This week, I am enjoying having the guests, the friends, the participants in the Collapse Laboratory. Every corner of the barracks is full of conversation and creativity. I’m excited to be going on this journey with everyone, and we are going to try (if we can figure it out technically) to have a two hour Collapse Live session somewhere online for as many people as want to come to experience a little bit of what we are getting up to here, and with some great guests already booked in. More details to follow, but it will be this coming Saturday the 26th at 18:30, Europe time.

Sir Anthony Marmalade Nutsless, looking imperious and glorious, but not exactly true to his name.

And so, I had better get up and go and get on with it all.

Until next week, my dear pirates, be excellent to each other and with much love

Your

Pirate Ben

xoxo