I've Missed this Style of Gardening| September Greenhouse update| Irish Garden

So today we'll have the greenhouse update. I'll answer a couple of questions that I got after last week's video and I have really exciting news about my channel or this channel. Well hello and welcome back. We're in the greenhouse. We haven't been here for quite a And I was actually hoping to be in the kitchen garden today because we have updates in this area of the garden as well. And I also want to just catch up some more of the September jobs, likes of sowing more and just show you a little bit around the garden as well while everything's still sort of green. But it's been drizzling dreadfully this whole day really. It was supposed to be only in the morning but it's just continually been doing it. And I've come into the shelter of the greenhouse because it's also been really humid and this place was absolutely just covered with blighted foliage. And I was mainly rushing to get this place cleaned up and obviously there's so many tomatoes to harvest anyway. But it was because of this table. I just needed to get this harvest table in here. I really really missed it. Obviously for the summer I put this table outside. It was handy for seedlings but as far as the harvest table went this year it was unnecessary because there really was none of this kind of bumper harvests. So yeah as I said it was still handy for the seedlings to be out there and to give me more space in the greenhouse. But otherwise as far as now the temperatures have been dropping and for me to catch up with the sowings and any kind of sort of the pricking out jobs which I sort of need to do in here as well. This table for me is invaluable and I really want to get it back in here. Nice and cozy sheltered situation and that's why I absolutely love this greenhouse for it. So first thing I did when I came into the greenhouse is I actually took out the two pots of cucumbers I had growing here. And as you see I did have actually really large fruit on them. One on each of the plants really. And those were telegraph variety. First time ever for me to grow them. And to be honest about it these plants did not work out for me at all. Straight away at the mildew I tried to treat that but it kept coming back. Then a couple of fruits I took off them. They were very bitter. Kerry from Dog on the Plot had issues with having bitter cucumbers from some of her varieties as well. But I believe they weren't the same variety. And previously I've always grown the Amelie F1. Never once had a bitter cucumber and always had loads of fruits off them. So the telegraph yeah. Some of the fruits were bitter, some weren't. But overall I think we should probably as our family should just stick to this kind of smaller snacking cucumbers rather than these massive long ones. And for the space here as well. So that did not work out. So I just physically took out those pots, those plants and gained a little bit of space back. And then because of the cold season we were having the sweet peppers I had. So I had three different varieties here. The Yolo Wonder and California Wonder. They're so sour. Slugs obviously attacked all of the fruit straight away and early in the season. So a lot of the fruit rotted off quite quickly off them. But then the Corno de Toro they have been doing the best. So these were my own saved seeds from previous years of harvests. And they definitely have been growing the strongest. So I'm nearly starting to debate now if I'm going to bother growing sweet peppers in the coming years. Or maybe I should consider growing them outside in maybe these kind of polytunnel hoop houses. I've seen Danny from Grow Up at the time when he was still in the Grapevine Garden channel doing it. Steve from Steve's Kitchen Garden. He's doing them all the time like that. I'm just not sure. Maybe they didn't get enough sunlight and then the heat as well sort of fluctuating in here. I have to think about that. But the sweet peppers haven't been that great. And obviously in the last video I already mentioned how I took all the chili peppers out of here a couple of weeks ago. Because how cold it actually got inside the greenhouse. Because the summer has been just cool in Ireland. I'll just try to sift some of this compost through before I start pricking out. I have winter cabbage seedlings here and pak choy. Maybe there's two different varieties of pak choy. But there's definitely one that I have labeled. As far as the tomato update goes, some varieties were more successful than others. And obviously just still I keep checking how we're eating, what we're eating, so that there's no waste. And I'm definitely even going to take note of the amount of different plants I had growing. Because what we were gathering, and obviously there's still plenty there to actually harvest, there was way too much. Just for the three of us there was way too much. And then the two heritage varieties were the ones that actually got blight and grey mold. So both of the diseases got them the quickest. The heritage varieties, the Irish lucky leprechaun and Italian variety apricot selex. So I've physically fully removed those plants now. Taken off every bit of the fruit, green and ripe. And I'd say with the green ones, I really would want to just cook them up straight away for a green tomato chutney. And I'll leave in the description below how I usually do it. What's my sort of standard mix of ingredients, what I put into that. Because I did get asked about that. And then a variety I'm not going to be growing next year, I'll take a break from that variety, is actually moneymaker. So that's a variety I've been growing a couple of years. And it's been a lovely salad tomato, this kind of a middle sized, yeah, sort of salad tomato. But I just find that we so enjoy those cherry varieties of sweet million and sun gold, that there's just no need for that, the moneymaker. And I think I'm still going to do the Italian heritage next year, because it's such a different looking fruit. It's big, it's juicy, it's beautiful for a salad, a sliced salad with just balsamic vinegar and like say mozzarella and basil. So it's just a little bit different that way. Now I had San Marzano's here as well, there's plenty of them. They actually did really well this year. And maybe because I was able to keep the blight off them a little bit longer, because they are very vigorous growers as plants otherwise. They keep shooting out new leaves wherever they can. And I have to think about that, because I still have some of the tomato sauce leftover from last year as well that we never ate. So maybe I can take a break from that next year as well. Yes, but I can't give you too many tomatoes. I'm not supposed to be good for you. Good girl, Rosie. Yes, bossum. And even taking note of what area is the greenhouse, I probably wouldn't put plants in anymore, because again, those areas get the blight the quickest. And after me changing the that central bed, that central oval metal raised bed is an absolute treat. That is the best, because obviously it gets the best airflow as well. But definitely it has good height for the plants. And it's really easy access as well. So that has been an absolute winner so far. But I'd say, yeah, we can definitely reduce the amount of plants that I have inside here. And I know I already reduced the amount of plants I was growing from previous years. There are a couple of new varieties of tomatoes I'd like to try next year. And Chris from Veggie Plot did a really good series, I assume he's still doing them, of tomato testing. So he grew a lot of different varieties, and he was doing a really thorough sort of review on each of the varieties. And some of them do really sound exciting. So he's growing something that I've grown before as well. And obviously those I know of, but then there are some varieties I've never grown before. And then, yeah, he made them sound very, very good. So I definitely would want to try something new for next year, especially once I know that I'm dropping a couple of them. But I just come back to the real practicality side of it. I just want to make sure that there's constantly something there that we genuinely do like to eat, and I can genuinely make them work for our family. And so, yeah, I'm not testing and trying as many anymore. I'm just sticking to a couple of the ones that it's like, yeah, we're happy to eat those ones. Now, let's prick out the cabbages now. So in last week's video, I mentioned that without the sweet peas, all the different colors that I have growing at the moment in the kitchen garden, the place would look quite bleak because I had plenty of failures. There was plenty of plants that failed or weren't growing that well. And I promise that, A, I look up the names of it, because at the very beginning of the season, I had planted some seeds of different varieties, and they never germinated. And I think something that germinated was very poor. It was just growing so poorly. So I got a couple of new packets, and they have been an absolute success. So the one that I have growing on the trellis, on the two trellis, on the slatted wall, is Our Heroes from Unwinds. So it's a beautiful white and pink mix, and it has more of this pink veining going on. And the scent is beautiful. But the stems are much shorter. So is it due to where I'm growing it? Because it's sort of like in a wind tunnel. But I took three flowers and that's them. And I'll just show you now in comparison, because the other one that I have dotted everywhere is actually all from that same seed packet. And that variety is called Confetti. And I managed to take seven, one, three, six, seven, eight, six, seven, eight. Yeah. So I managed to find eight different colors, and they are absolute stunners. So I'll put them closer to there now again. So there's such a beautiful array of colors. At the very beginning, when they started to come out, I was like, oh yeah, they're all over the place. Do you know the colors there? There was like no uniformity. It was just down to the pure look, how I had placed them, that it was sort of repeating itself visually in the garden. But I absolutely adore them now, by this stage. And again, the scent is just so nice. But I also mentioned that the flowers in this one, well, the stem actually is really long on those. So they have a really good long stem. But the flowers in the Confetti are larger. Maybe take the red one. I believe because of this one, our heroes is due to be a heritage variety. So that's where you would get. Then it's understandable that the flower heads are smaller. So that's the Confetti, and that's our heroes. Are absolutely stunning. And this one, there was two that were slightly different, or like the colors of them, so delicate and pretty. So I highly recommend these ones. And the seeds are from Unwinds. So the Confetti and our heroes. But even now, the sweet peas are actually filling up this greenhouse with their scent. It is just heavenly. It's so nice to be in this environment. I'm loving it. I'm really, really loving it. It's such a break from that constant wind outside. But I was hoping to show you the pumpkin patch, because there's a little bit of an anomaly going on there. And I do need to cut back the actual shoots in there as well, so that the plants will put more effort into the fruit that's there already, just to ripen them more. But obviously, because it's drizzling still, and it's so windy, I'm not going to go there. And I won't go and harvest any courgettes today, even though I was hoping to, because the last time I gathered a couple of the bigger courgettes, and I tried to make what's called the courgette or zucchini candy. So essentially, it was that I peeled and cubed up the zucchini or courgette. And then I boiled it in pineapple juice, just to make it a little bit more translucent. And then it went into dehydrator, and dried it up. That actually turned out successful. Very similar to overall look and texture, if you'd be ever buying these tiniest little pieces of mango or fruit that's been dried up. And you can add them to mueslis, let's say, or granola. That is exactly what that was. Except that some of the pieces, even though visually they looked quite big to me once they were raw, by the time they were dried up, they were like thin, thin slices. They were like, I don't know, like a peel of an onion or something. They were so thin. But a huge hit, huge hit with my boys, and especially with my son. So thinking, look, they're eating courgettes, they're eating zucchini, and there's no extra sugar added. It was just purely the pineapple juice. And for the first couple of days, the taste was really good, really refreshing. After that, it started to lose a bit of that kind of a distinctive sort of pineapple flavouring. But I'm thinking if I would even add maybe a couple of like orange peel or something into that water, the pineapple water or pineapple juice while it's cooking it, maybe it will add more of these kind of citrusy flavours to it as well. So that's definitely something I will try to repeat. And I was thinking maybe even to try to do like fruit leather with it, which is just mashing it up much more finer, and then spreading it evenly across the, let's say, the pulp of it across the sheet of the dehydrator. I'm not sure how it's going to work out cooking it, but yeah, that's definitely something to try out. So as far as the candy goes, that was successful for our family. So the really exciting news is that our garden and our little channel is going to be featured on another quite a substantial channel on stateside. So Danielle from North Lawn Flower Farm and Gardens has really, really kindly asked me to be part of her guest garden tours, and she's been doing them for a while, where she would have gardeners with their gardens just doing a like a garden tour and she'll feature them. So I think that video is going to be out around maybe the same time as this video is going to be out, maybe a day or so before. But she is essentially based in Pennsylvania, and she is a cot flower gardener, and she's huge on the ornamental side of it. So as us here, we're sort of split between ornamentals and kitchen garden. She is purely ornamentals, and she is such a good gardener. She has so much knowledge and tricks and tips. So anybody seriously interested in flowers and ornamental plants, go and check her channel out. And any of the other channels that I mentioned earlier, they'll be all in the description box below. I'll link all of them in there. So this was my little update from the kitchen garden today. There's still plenty of sowings to be done. I definitely want to sow some salads and mustard greens and radishes directly. But there's still a little bit more time for it, especially if you'd be growing undercover like I am here in the greenhouse. Once the plants are strong enough by the time tomatoes fully come out, so let's say four weeks before you want to plant them in. So usually around mid-September that's really when you want to have everything sown. Your daylight is going to be reduced, the heat is definitely going to be reduced, but at least there's still a little bit of time left. So I'm not going to push myself for it. I still have all these to prick out, and I didn't get to do it. I just got the cabbages done. But hey-ho, look, at least I've moved back in, and I'm really, really happy about that. And I do like these kind of days where I could just potter quietly. I don't have to worry about that big physical job like I was doing last week. And if you haven't seen it, I'll link that one up here, I think it's going to be, just have a look how the compost heap got done. And I think, yes, a third compost bay is going to be on the agenda, because otherwise I will not have any place to put these. It's a nice collection system. But thanks a million for joining me today, and we'll see you next time.