Cucumber Sandwich

Very good

A couple of weeks ago, whilst lounging low in my seat on an early morning train into work, I read with interest an interview in the Metro that featured Plebs star and comedian Tom Rosenthal. Keeping your head down on the 5:41 into London Fenchurch Street is aways a good idea because a lot of my follow commuters use the journey to extend their somnolent bliss just that little bit longer. As such, many (mainly male) passengers have a tendency to flatulate loudly during their slumber and quite frankly, the carriage usually stinks to high heaven. On a clear day, you can sometimes see a yellow cloud hovering around the level of the baggage shelves, amid a chorus of French horns. Anyway, during the Q&A Tom made mention of his experiences in Bulgaria and the fact that the Bulgarians have really nailed cucumbers, which got me thinking about cucumbers in general. As a matter of fact, the article made me sit straight back up to pay attention. At which point, I burnt the hairs in my nostrils.

Normally I don't really give much consideration towards these cumbersome green batons. In salads and as accompaniments, they work fine. Especially with Peking duck and plum sauce in pancakes, serving as crunchy counterpoint to the rich fatty meat and fruity tangy relish. Pile it all up in front of me and I could probably get through a whole bird by myself. Spooning, spreading, picking, delicately rolling, scoffing and then licking fingers thoroughly clean before moving onto the next one. "How was your duck sir?" "It was gorgeous, thank you." "And the cucumber?" "Erm......."

And yes, OK, I do like a pickled cucumber. Or a gherkin rather. In burgers, with a hunk of cheese, on some juicy pulled pork or plonked slap bang in the middle of crumpled bag of fish and chips. Asking for a 'wally' is always a true test of a decent chippie. Sadly, a lot of the glances that get shot my way from younger eyes over the counter suggest that I am the wally for mentioning it these days. But do I have any other strong feelings for cucumbers? Well not really.

However, like I said, Tom's appraisal did pique my interest with the suggestion that cucumbers can actually taste good, particularly since I have been growing them at home this year. Or at least one of them. And I have been watching this one singular cucumber with curiosity and affection for some time now. Leaving cheap knob gags to one side for a minute, I must admit that it has been fascinating watching this fruit swell and engorge over the summer months. The geek in me should have got the tape measure out to record daily progress but I was worried about what my neighbours might think. They probably think I am strange enough as it is. So I simply resolved to heap as much love on it as possible with frequent watering, careful positioning in the sun and regular chats.

The day for plucking the prized snozzcumber from its stem came some time last week. At a slight loss at what to do with it, I went on Twitter as usual for ideas and a barrage came back. "Smash it!" "Gin it!" "Sorbet it!" were just some of the more unusual recommendations. "Shove it up your backside!" was one of the more childish, immature ones.....Luc. In the end, I went out on a limb (because you know, I AM experimental and everything) and made a salad with cucumber, goats cheese, mint and lemon zest. It looked very pretty but I am afraid the heady citrus of the lemon bludgeoned out any flavour that the cucumber may or not have had. So with the few remaining slices I had left, I decided to make a cucumber sandwich, as proposed by A Rather Unusual Chinaman and self-proclaimed 'sanger-wanger' Helen, of Food Stories.

You might blech and recoil at the thought of flinging watery discs betwixt two slices of bread, recalling misshapen lumps wrapped in clingfilm for school lunches. But I'd say that tomatoes were always to blame for that and should be held accountable for the stains at the bottom of your rucksack. Whereas cucumbers have always married up well with baked white dough and I had sort of forgotten all about 'cuke' sandwiches. It's a simple combination of bread, butter, cucumber, salt and whallop, off you go really. The texture of crisp cucumber against soft bread really does feel lovely to eat, perhaps even better than crisps (although not quite). It's no wonder that they are an institution in this country for afternoon tea and er, for afternoon tea!

What of the flavour of my homegrown cucumber though? Well yes, it was fresh, clean and grassy. But did it pack the sort of punch that makes a man want to stand up and endure a sulphurous fug, knowing that at the end of his journey he could clamber into a supermarket and buy a dozen beautiful, delicious cucumbers that would soon take the pain away?

No, not really. I think I might be missing a trick though. I think I might need to go to Bulgaria.

Weiner

Pickling?

Truncheon

Pretty but overpowering

Runner Bean, Apple and Shallot Salad

Runner beans

In terms of growing fruit and veg, this year has been a very tough one down at Norfolk Road. The enveloping greyness and perpetual drizzle that we have encountered for most of the summer has really taken its toll, not just on our plot but across the allotment as a whole. Yields are down, weeds are up (vine weed in particular) and the onslaught from pests and disease has been merciless. The hatred I have developed for slugs and snails is now bordering on the psychotic. Not content with leaving tiny turquoise pellets of death, scattered upon the ground, I have taken to wielding my shovel, like Sláine of 2000AD fame, muscles warping and spasming as I go into berserker mode, at the merest sight of these damn molluscs. The gleeful crunch and splatter is hardly humane but have you seen what these parasites have been doing my cabbages?

The damp and warm conditions have also given rise to the deadly occurrence of Phytophthora infestans or blight as it is more commonly known. A couple of weeks ago, when I popped down to check on the courgettes, I noticed a sign on the main trading hut that, in short, went along the lines of:

 ‘URGENT – WE HAVE BLIGHT. DESTROY ALL INFECTED CROPS.  I REPEAT, DESTROY ALL INFECTED CROPS! Yours sincerely, Barry.’

So I ran around to our plot and there before me lay a desolate wasteland of withered shoots, seemingly besmirched beyond repair. However, after dusting off my knees and wiping my eyes, I had a chat with some of the veterans. They told me that as long as we took quick action to cut and clear the offending shoots, taking them well away from the site to the local dump, then hopefully, fingers crossed, that would be enough to stop the fungus from entering and ruining our beloved spuds. So at present we are keeping a very close eye on them. Even so, in issuing words of advice, the old guys uttered them with a slow, disbelieving air, shell-shocked, staring a thousand yards off into the distance. They were obviously hit by blight too. Oh yes, baneful 2012 will go down in folklore at Norfolk Road, with sad recollections over pints in the pub, ending in “You weren’t there man, you weren’t frigging there.”

It hasn’t been total doom and gloom though, as some crops are doing quite well. Varieties of chard and spinach continue to shoot through with spirit, cavolo nero and kale remain robust and after the recent burst of sunshine, our sweet corn is looking very good indeed. And we’ve got tons and tons of runner beans. You might deadpan a cheer and unenthusiastically wave a flag at the mention of these legumes but I am becoming quite partial to them, especially when they are young and fairly small. I recently made a batch of runner bean chutney, using a recipe by the great Fnar himself, ValentineWarnerand found myself pleasantly chomping away on raw tidbits as I was chopping away. After commenting on Twitter on how surprisingly sweet they were, a young lady named Pooble Moo (not her real name, I am sure) replied, saying that runners were her one of her favourite vegetables and that she often ate them raw in salads. She expounded with further suggestions and I tried one last night. So seeing as I haven’t done a recipe post in a while, I thought I would pass this on, as it is rather good and very simple. A sort of crunchy, fresh, green coleslaw, to accompany roast chicken or to eat on its own.

One note though, if you try this with larger runner beans, a quick blanch in boiling water for 30 seconds and refreshing in ice cold water wouldn’t go amiss. And having one of those nifty bean slicers would make lighter work. I did start off by slicing neat, even juliennes of crisp bean but then I became very impatient and began chopping with furious abandon.

No finesse, that’s me.

Runner bean, Apple and Shallot Salad – serves 4

500g of young runner beans, sliced thinly (try and discard the actual pink beans within, not too fiddly really after rinsing under a tap in a colander)

2 Granny Smith apples, cored and sliced thinly

1 banana shallot, sliced thinly

Handful of toasted hazelnuts, roughly chopped

1tbsp of chopped parsley

50ml of extra virgin olive oil (I used Nudo)

Healthy glug of white wine vinegar

Salt and pepper

Method

Combine the sliced runner bean, apple and shallot in bowl; add the hazelnuts and parsley combine a bit more.

Mix together the olive oil, vinegar, salt and pepper to make a light vinaigrette and combine with all the other ingredients. It’s all about combining really.

Serve with roast chicken.

Told you it was simple.

Don't forget to combine those ingredients

Runner bean, apple and shallot salad with roast chicken and unblighted Charlotte spuds

Save Time With Potatoes, Don't Dig, Dib

In passing conversation, whenever I mention that I have an allotment, responses nearly always come back in the form of a cosy smile with a soft tilting of the head and a drawn out mewing of "Awwwwwww, really?" It's quite a strange phenomenon actually. Strange because usually after uttering the phrase, the face of the person in question will often melt into this bizarre, beatific repose and dewy-eyed, they will then go on, mumbling incoherently, something along the lines of "Oh, I would love to have a plot on an allotment." And then, they go absolutely dumb on me. Mute, stupefied, carried off to this wistfully bucolic parallel universe, where the sun always shines, where carrots dance, cabbages hug and whole swathes of vegetables sway in unison, singing in glorious chorus as they imagine themselves skipping through the patch with a watering can. This is the point when I usually take the opportunity to deliver a short hard slap, to shake the person out of their stupor and to deliver the harsh, damning verdict that running a plot and growing your own vegetables is "FARKING HARD WORK! NOW WAKE UP YOU FANNY!!"

And it really is hard work, let's not make any illusions. If you work, have a young family, a steady and varied social life, various commitments elsewhere, a nagging and groaning list of things to do at home and in the garden, then finding opportunities to tend to a plot is very difficult indeed. And it's something that we struggle with all the time. Our visits to Norfolk Road are generally punctuated by running footsteps and a clattering of forks and spades, peppered with grunts and whispered swearing. Pops and crackles fill the air as seedlings get ripped from eroding, black plastic trays, wheelbarrows trundle back and forth, weeds fly up in a frenzy and old, gnarly potatoes get stuffed into orange carrier bags. In the background, there is a soundtrack of much splashing and laughter and then screams as a little girl gets admonished for trying to drown her brother in the water butt. No sooner than we've got there, we're back home. The kids get tossed out into the garden to play gladiatorial scooters on the patio and Dad lies flat on the floor in the front room, grabbing a quick moments peace before looking up and groaning inwardly at a crack in the ceiling.

If you are retired, it's a different kettle of fish for then, you have all the time in the world. Well, seemingly so, after all, no-one knows when Joe Black will come tapping on your shoulder and the odds do get shorter after 65. But I do get envious of the older guys on the allotment and their pristine, well managed, abundant plots. And whenever I go down there, I am sure that the grumpy git across from me hums Louie Armstrong's classic on purpose. Equally, I am sure that he is bemused by our smash and grab antics. He wasn't around on Saturday to frown when I arrived to plant our spuds for the year. With my sister's boyfriend I should add, we get on like a house on fire now. Before us lay five boxes of five varieties of tato and we resolved to get it done as quickly as possible. But how? Well here is the thrust of the post, if you own an allotment or grow vegetables at home and are very, very busy people like myself, rather breaking your back, digging drills and the like, simply dib your potatoes into the ground *badoom-tish*.

OK, using the word 'dib', as in employ the use of a dibber, is a bit of a misnomer. You actually need to us a bulb planter but as both are tools that used to make make holes in the ground, I am quite happy to go with dib. So the method is simple, rake your earth over, dib a series of deep holes in a line, at least 13cms deep and approximately 30cms apart and drop your chitting seed spuds in. Cover with soil and when the green shoots start to appear, earth up some more. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

Russ and I planted half the potatoes in about an hour using this technique, roughly 150 all told, which was pretty good going. So our lunch break in the pub down the road was well deserved and we definitely deserved that pint. We might not have deserved the sixth one and we'll probably finish planting the rest this weekend. But let me assure you, allotmenteering is bloody hard work.

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Tatos!

A dibber........sorry bulb planter

Potato nestled nice and deep

This is a waste of time

One Man And His Asparagus

As of late, I have been getting quite excited by a peculiar, protruding, purple head that has appeared at the bottom of my garden, peering out of a raised bed. I've been visiting it daily, more or less. Crouching down with elbows on knees and palms on face, I've spent the last couple of weeks staring at it, monitoring it's progress. It's arrival has been quite early, especially for this time of year but the routine has been quite pleasant really. Taking the time to just sit still and quietly meditate, with the sun gently warming my back. Once or twice, I have even cupped my ear close, to see if I can actually hear it grow. Get me, the hairless hippy. Occasionally, I have even taken a tape measure down there. Not that I've been keeping a written record or anything. No, it's just so that I can make a rough calculation in my head, to roughly work out when it will be good for harvesting, when I can slip a blade in just below the soil to sever the beauty before plunging it quickly into a bath of seething water. For no longer than 30 seconds.

So yes, I have been savouring it for some time and yesterday, when no-one was around, I took the plunge. After all that protraction, really I should have eaten it unadulterated, plain, honest, raw and pure. But I decided an egg was called for, a soft boiled Burford Brown, a small nod at luxury. Dipping the head in, now feathered and green, floods the deep yellow yolk up to the surface. The caldera overspills and gooey spider arms run down the shell and cup. I pause and eye the stalk, glistening and effulgent. Then down the hatch it goes. The umami rich, viscous taste of the egg hits first but soon gives way to delicate, fresh, perfect bite of sweetness. And in that moment, I am reminded that this beautiful, elegant, vegetable, when taken straight from ground and eaten straight away, takes some beating.

Later in the evening, a visit to the bathroom is interrupted by a creaking door and a small, enquiring, crinkled nose and the secret comes out.

"Daddy, what is that smell?"

And that's when I am in trouble. Because my wife had her eye on that asparagus too. Thank gawd there's more to come.

The Fiddle and The Faff

During my time as my man and boy, I've heard lots of people extol the virtues of simply spending time in the kitchen preparing fruit and vegetables, happily easing themselves through the day with a spud in one hand and a peeler in the other. And I have to agree. There really is something quite pleasant about whittling away minutes, hours or days at the sink. Stopping occasionally from time to time to contemplatively stare out the window zone out and pause. Very nice. This state of zen is normally interrupted by a prod in the backside by a wayward son with a light saber or a vision of the cat squatting over my beloved zinnias but nevertheless, this state of grace, however long it last is a very pleasant place to be. I do get caught out sometimes, particularly with aubergines. I think it's something to do with the lovely firm purple skin of this very sexy looking fruit. Standing there grinning with heavy eyelids, cupping the base as though it were a buttock, I easily become distracted and lost in time, thinking lascivious thoughts of yielding, soft flesh. 'Oooh, I am gonna flame grill you until you drip all over the hob, you saucy little thing you'. Again, in this incidence, things usually come crashing to earth when Mrs FU slaps my out of my stupor and tells me to get on with the baba ganoush. But for even if it's just a little while, it's beautiful space to inhabit. Just beautiful.

Not all vegetable preparation needs to be meditative or titilating though. Many a squash has been cleaved in half with the zeal of Jason Voorhees which of course helps to release tension, frustration and anger. Sometimes I find it very soothing to personify said vegetable, even going so far as to stick a photograph onto my butternut before sticking my cook's knife in and slashing it down the middle whilst screaming "DIE! DIE! DIE!". I have done this a lot lately which is probably not healthy but hey, it keeps me out of jail. However, some preparation of fruit and vegetables do sadly racket up the blood pressure due to their sheer finicky attitudes to life. I love gooseberries but I hate top and tailing the buggers. And why, I ask myself, do sulphourous brussels sprouts have to be crossed at Christmas time? And just what is the point of globe artichokes? Never has a vegetable have to give up so much for so little. Well that's my experience anyway, detractors have commented on the size of my artichokes in the past. The humble broad bean is similar in some ways in that you have to pod them from their fluffy overcoats and then further remove them out of their little jackets. To me this is the veritable padlock on a pair of knickers which is time consuming and fiddly to unlock. (The key of course is to blanch the beans for just a minute or so and then they will pop out with nick from your thumbnail and a gentle squeeze.)

Still the rewards are great because this sweet green little bean is very tasty indeed and I always look forward to this time of year when they are ready for harvesting from the allotment. We don't grow many and for that I am grateful but once I've got the fiddle and the faff out of the way, I always end up being rather grateful for them. If that makes any sense.

With this year's batch I made Habas y Morcilla or broad beans and black pudding to you and me. In fact, the black pudding came from Bury and not Spain so this dish does have a fervently British slant to it, he says triumpantly and I urge you to try this handsomely moreish recipe which I got from the first Moro cookbook. It really is worth the effort.

Habas y Morcilla - serves 4

3 tablespoons olive oil

200 g morcilla (or Bury black pudding) cut into 1cm slices

2 cloves garlic sliced

Half a teaspoon of fennel seeds

1.5 kg broad beans – to yield approximately 500gms of podded beans

100 ml chicken stock

A good handful of fresh mint roughly chopped

sea salt and black pepper

Method

Warm the oil in a fryin pan over a medium heat and then throw in the black pudding. Leave for a minute or two, making sure that the pudding crisps up but doesn't break down. Put to one side.

In the same pan fry the garlic and fennel for a minute until the garlic begins to colour and the throw in the broan beans, pour on the stock and simmer for 3 to 5 minutes until the beans become tender. Throw the black pudding back in the pan to warm through and right at the last minute toss in the mint. Serve up with griddled bread. Delicious.

From this....

to this...

and this.....

then this.....

and then finally this....

......phew!

Norfolk Road Allotment Open Day

Oh to be retired and to spend the rest of your days scratching around a small plot of land, digging a bit here, planting a bit there. Weeding, sitting, pondering, chatting, building, reading, watering, sleeping. Aways doing a bit but essentially taking life easy, just simply going with the ebb and flow of the seasons. Sounds blissful doesn't it? And that's how most of the chaps down my allotment have got it sewn up. No wonder I feel bitter towards them sometimes. Not only do I have to contend with their banter, wry smiles and raised eyebrows, they mock me with their gloriously immaculate plots which are testimony to a decidedly pedestrian approach to allotmenteering. Why can't I have it that way? Why does it always seem like such hard work? Why can't I sit in a shed all day with the radio on and a copy of The Sun for company?*

My visits down to the allotment always seem to be frenetic you see. It starts with spending five minutes or so negotiating the padlock at the gate, sweating and spitting blood because the thing is so damn stiff (I swear one day I am going to break the damn key). I'll then dash down the path, give a quick salutation to my neighbour who is always there rain or shine and whose name I am still unsure of (Dave? Alan? Bill?) and then I'll jump onto our plot and proceed to wrestle with the hosepipe. Tangles get untangled, kinks get straightened out and off I rush to the water tap. Invariably, I'll trip over a lump of wood that's been stuck in the ground to remind me that once upon a time I planted something there, many moons ago. Brushing myself down, I'll plug in and turn on the tap and run back to the hose to give everything as thorough a drenching as possible in the quickest time possible. With crops such as sweetcorn and cabbages, this is no bad thing as the plants are quite hardy and can take a battering from a high pressure jet. Yet when you swing the gun around and aim it at the gooseberry bushes, nothing prepares you for that dull thud in your stomach as your precious goosegogs go blasting off into the air, knowing that they had at least another month to go. After spending a brief moment, crouched on the floor with my head in my hands, I'll just sigh, pick up the gun and carry on regardless because I'm on a tight schedule. And besides, there's always next year. Once that is done, I may have time to scoot around and try to haul up some weeds, usually firmly entrenched due to said liberal watering technique. It's no small wonder to see the old boys watering plants individually from a can I can tell you that. I might manage an extra 20 minutes or so, ripping and tearing up chickweed and nettles (often getting stung in the process) but a glance at the watch usually sends me scuttling back up the path. I'll wave goodbye to Dave/Alan/Bill who has barely moved from the spot and off I'll go to get ready for work or to go to the shops or run off on some other errand. When I get to the top, back to the gate, I'll often turn around and shake my fist at those still left, utterly green that they have the whole day ahead of them to potter around and do nothing.

And that's what it all stems down to really, I am jealous of the ol' buggers. In the past and on the very few occasions that I have written about the allotment, I have alluded that the silver haired brigade down there are a miserable, sarcastic bunch. But after going to our open day last Saturday and having had a good old chat with some of them, I came away feeling slightly guilty of my contempt. Sure some of them are a bunch of Meldrews but by and large, underneath those sun bleached overalls and weather beaten furrowed brows, beats a warm heart and a friendly smile. Over a polystyrene cup of tea, it was quite refreshing to actually speak to some of the faces that in years previous would only offer a curt nod. The big topic was the late frost in mid-May that destroyed so many of the potato crops. Tim in future was going to start growing his spuds in those great big sand bags that builders merchants use in an effort to protect his and Danny had conceded that he hadn't planted his potatoes deep enough. I plumped up and said that with great pride that our tatos had seemed to escape the 'great burn', probably because we had dug deep trenches and mounded the earth fairly high. "Yeah" Danny winked and said, "and to think that we were taking the piss out of you at the time. You do like a spud though don't you, you've sunk enough in your plot to feed an army". In return, I had to concede that this was also true but that was my Dad for you who shares the plot with me. He loves his spuds and does the lion's share of work, so what the hell he deserves them.

We didn't stay down there too long that afternoon as the weather was fierce and having taken the children with us, we wanted to keep the damage limitation under control. To the plots and fruit and vegetables within them of course, not the twins, they are a law unto themselves but I was able to take some random photos which follow. The main point in principle though was that in the four years or so that we've had the plot, this was the first time that I got a real sense of community down at Norfolk Road allotment. I suspect it's been there all along but I've always got my head down in a busy effort to crack on in that one day of the week that I decide to get down there. From now on, I'm going to try the little and often approach like my fellow allotmenteers and chat more often with them too. I might not be retired and modern life is rubbish at times so it might not always be possible but I am going to give it a go. And one day I might just find out what Dave/Alan/Bill's name really is.

Onions drying in the sun

Frames to shield from deadly frost



Fruit cage

Erm pretty silhouetted plants (prize for what it's called)


Directions


A pretty potato flower

The Scarecrow's Girlfriend "Hilda"

Quiet spot #1

Quiet spot #2

Our plot

*It would help if I actually had a shed

Allotments Against Terrorism

I have stated in the strap line of my blog that I am an allotmenteer which to some may conjure up the image that I belong to a strike force of volunteer horticulturalists not too dissimilar to the boy scouts. Need to know when your earlies will be ready, how to stop cabbage white fly or cotton root rot, whether you can throw citrus waste in your compost or how to stop badgers from nibbling your corn crop? Have no fear the Allotmenteers are here, we are here to help!

Actually all it means is that I have an allotment and have rudimentary knowledge of how to grow vegetables and a little bit of fruit, if you ever are looking for proper advice or expertise then ask this man. I was lucky enough to get our one 3 years ago, having made a phone-call and a visit to the site, which is five minutes away from our house, to have a quick chat with a man named Bert. Clever man was Bert, who I found out later was the allotment warden, as he spent some time showing me around the place, explaining the rules and regulations, how much the fees would be and where you could get manure from before stopping off at his prize plot. He stooped down by his strawberry plants, plucked off a couple of big red juicy ones and rinsed them under a nearby tap. "Try one of these, much better than the rubber ones you get at the supermarket" he said and he wasn't wrong, it was amazingly juicy and tasted beautiful. Bert then showed me the plot that was available which was huge and resembled a jungle with a monstrous bramble bush at it's centre."That's the last one left" he said. "Ah that looks like a lot of work" I replied but of course I was already hooked, thinking of it's potential with all the lovely things I could grow, like potatoes and stuff. So I signed up there and then, and then called my Dad (who exclaimed "f**ing hell" when he saw it) and so it began, a summer of profuse sweating, swearing and sore backs.

We are two and a half years down the line now and the principles of that first summertime effort still applies, keeping an allotment is bloody hard work and it is very time consuming. As such the plot hasn't quite come up to it's full potential but I can happily state that the vegetables that we have cultivated have always tasted ten times better than what you could get at the supermarket. I do sometimes wonder if this is psychosomatic but still the aforementioned potatoes dug straight from the ground and plainly boiled are just so much more creamier than their plastic wrapped counterparts which is why we will gladly slog our guts out with a fork and spade. From this season on though we are going to try and do things a bit differently ie. keep on top of things and not break our backs every four weeks. The whole patch has been rotavated, the spuds are in the ground and we have varieties of cabbage, beans, courgettes, tomatoes, sweetcorn, spinach, peas, onions ready to go in. The fruit patch is fairly well established with bushes containing raspberries, gooseberries, redcurrant, white currant, figs and rhubarb (except that's a vegetable isn't it?), plus we're putting in some strawberries. Good times lie ahead on the cooking front and I'll be writing more in this blog about the allotment and the produce we get so ideas and suggestions will be appreciated.

Alas Bert isn't with us anymore but with this new found enthusiasm, I reckon the old boys he left in his place as wardens aren't going to know what's hit them this summer. Or will they? Recent events suggest that they are far more on top of the game than I give them credit for for and probably far more than Bert had ever intended. Perhaps before I go any further that I should explain that as with any well run gardening society, our allotment has a committee to regulate the rules and regulations that are needed to run the running of an allotment. The most recent motion passed by the committee was to change the lock on the front gate and install a sign that the gate needed to be LOCKED AND SHUT AT ALL TIMES. "Oh no, so what we've been getting our veg pinched then?" I thought. But on investigation, it seems that the main reason had been "to prevent terrorists from stealing fertiliser from the main shed, we'd read reports in the paper that Al-Qaeda are raiding allotments to create bombs".

May I just say I think this is fantastic, Captain Mainwaring and his gang are alive and well.