We’ve not had as much of that in the last few weeks as we probably should, but surprisingly, the garden’s starting to give us something back. At last. Yes, the tomatoes are still a long way off being ready, but tonight, Nik harvested a fair-sized crop of all sorts of vegetables, more than filling the enamel bucket.

We’ve already eaten our way through a lettuce (the first two went to seed), made blackcurrant and raspberry liqueur, had plentiful bowlfuls of strawberries, and enjoyed more than a few handfuls of broad beans in our risottos.

Today’s tidy up garnered beans of all kinds (Dwarf French, Runners, Italian Red, and Regular French), and Charlotte, Kestrel and Red Rooster potatoes. We also used our first homegrown onion this week. The carrots and parsnips have been more disappointing, though, with only two carrot shoots showing from three varieties planted, and while the chillies are doing something, it’ll be a while until we start using those, too.

Even the herbs have failed. We’re perplexed as to what’s not quite gone right this year so far, but who knows, maybe the autumn will yield better results. By then, we might possibly have had more of the fabled summer sunshine, a much more important ingredient than maybe we first thought.

Herbs are versatile in the fact that not only do they provide tasty seasoning to many cooked dishes and form the basis of herbal remedies, but they are usually incredibly easy to grow. We had a go a couple of years ago, growing basil, coriander and chives on a windowsill. We still have some chopped chives and dried basil leaves in the freezer, but thought we’d have another go, so this time it’s oregano, parsley and thyme.

Why these three? They came in set of chintzy miniature herb ‘urns’, and as they are different from 2007’s crop, we thought we’d start with the largely Italian trio. We are growing them again in a sunny windowsill (essential for indoor germination) in the kitchen, and then will probably plant them out into smaller pots by the back door.

Sowing is pretty much identical for all three. Pop some soil into the pot, drop the seeds in, cover with more soil, water in, and then leave, sprinkling with the wet stuff when dry. All the best guides tell you to sow in the spring, and then harvest in the summer, but that’s all of little bearing when you’re growing herbs indoors; my basil and chives kept cropping more and more each time they were cut, and were finally called time on in the autumn, when the basil flowered.

If these latest indoor horticultural endeavours are successful, then we’ve also got cress, mint, and windowsill chillies (to name but a few) to go in pots, too, to not only season our food and give us natural-tasting tea, but, when hanging from the pan rack in the kitchen, to also bring the outdoors indoors.

We actually noticed the first two on Monday, but nearly all of the plants are now showing signs of having taken, and if they continue at the this rate, it won’t be long before we can transplant them into proper pots and put them in the greenhouse.

Elsewhere, our horticultural fingers have been doing things, too. Nik had a very busy couple of hours in the garden at the weekend, planting ten broad beans, two rows of white onion sets, and a row of early cropping carrots, which we’ll replace with later ones, once these have been harvested in the early summer.  We’ve also started three varieties of potatoes chitting.

As winter seems to (hopefully temporarily) take another cold grip on this week, we wonder if we’ve jumped the gun a bit. But, homemade plastic half-bottle cloches should, we hope, keep them warm and dry. It feels good to be planting once more, and means that with a bit of luck, spring is well and truly just around the corner.

It’s March, and so with spring supposedly just around the corner, we planted the first of the 2009 crop this afternoon. We’re going for the full gamut of vegetables once more (the new for ’09 garlic is already in and shooting and all the other seeds we’ve chosen have arrived), and though planting proper begins in April the Black Russian tomatoes went in today.

Yes, that’s right, a different variety to our usual and successful Golden Sunrise and Moneymakers, the Black Russians are deep reddy-brown in colour, and should be a little more unusual. As last year, we used the paper potter to make degradable newspaper containers in which to plant the seeds, and dug out the mini propagator that will provide warmth and cover while we start them off indoors.

Once we’d popped the seeds into the paper pots, we covered with 1cm of soil, watered just enough to moisten them, and lined them up in the propagator on the patio door ledge in the dining room. We’re starting them off indoors due to the 18-20 degrees C temperature the seedlings need to get started, and once they’re off, they should germinate within 7 to 10 days. Then, when large enough to handle, they can be transplanted into proper pots and kept in the greenhouse.

Just to recap, I’ve been growing the basil and chives since mid-April, and in mid-June, I harvested them for the first time, putting the whole basil leaves and chopped chives in the freezer, to use in future recipes. There was coriander then, too, but this didn’t last very long after the first cutting, and it died fairly soon afterwards.

Spring was definitely the best time to grow them, and the sunny second-floor kitchen window sill the best place to cultivate them. So, last night, I cut the remaining basil leaves from the browning stems off the four plants left, and once again chopped the chives and whizzed the stems with a hand-held blender, so that they can be added to the earlier frozen harvest.

To be honest, they’ve surprised us at how long they’ve lasted, and how much produce we’ve had off them. But, nothing lasts forever, and they were looking very unwell, with furry lime green moss starting to creep up over the top of the peat pots, which are still visible, even though the pots they are in and filled with compost.

If the herbs were looking unwell, the tomato plants were definitely very, very sick, if not already dying. I came home on Sunday night to find drooping and shrivelling leaves pointing to the floor, the one fruit that was left on the browning branches on the floor (though finally yellow), and leaning arms of branches that had snapped and broken.

Growing tomatoes indoors was always going to be an experiment. And one that next year, I probably won’t repeat. Moved into the warm and sunny spare bedroom in early summer, they spurted greatly at first, but the fruit has been terribly slow in coming. All in all, including the fruit which I found on the carpet yesterday, I’ve had a total of three. Yes, three tomatoes in at least four months. Not good granted, but it has been good fun.

It must be the right time for the tomatoes to be done, though, as we took down the other plants at the house at the weekend, and although they were still very healthy compared to the sorry ad yellow droop-stricken stems I have at the flat, they weren’t in the best of spirits either, and had stopped producing the copious amounts of juicy, sweet fruit that we had enjoyed right up until last week.

So, what to grow next? At the moment, I’ll admit that I’m undecided as to what to grow and when to sow. As we’ve not used that much of the frozen stock of herbs, they should last us all winter until next spring. I might try my hand at window sill chilli peppers, cress, garlic chives (we may even try proper garlic at the house), mint, oregano, and rocket, as the seeds are in the packets in the pantry ready to go.

Of course, now the sun may have started to hibernate, and has exchanged his hat for a rain hood and taken his warmth with him, it may be too cold to grow anything. Maybe I’ll have a break, and continue with the winter efforts in the plot at the house. That’s the thing about growing; it’s a constant and ever-changing cycle – just like nature itself.

Admittedly, the basil must be nearing its end, as the stalks have gone brown where the leaves have been removed, while most of the leaves are a much lighter green in colour. They still smell strongly and taste very much like basil, though.

The chives started to grow again as soon as we chopped them down to only an inch high in the summer, and are no as tall as they were before, if a little limper. Ripe for harvesting again, they will be added to the previous freezer stock.

There’s no coriander to harvest this time, though; all of those leaves were used for the summer batch of carrot and coriander soup. The pepper tree was a casualty, though; added to the growing rosta when we planted more at the house; it was obviously never destined to be happy indoors, and has now been sent to the big compost heap in the sky.

Six months on, the basil is still growing

It’s much better news for the tomatoes, though. The two plants I have in my spare room are the same age as the herbs, and I took them on after they had germinated and started their horticultural journeys back in the late spring.

Now nearly seven feet high, and trussed up like climbing triffids to my pendant light, I finally took off the two yellow fruits which had been hanging of the vines for the last few months this morning. Resolutely refusing to do anything other than stay green, they suddenly changed colour this week and let me know what varieties of tomato plant I had.

What’s more encouraging is that the flower heads around them on the same branches are sprouting more fruits – very tiny, but all much quicker than before.

I’ll start feeding them now, and see if I can encourage yet more growth. Tomatoes like a warm and humid climate in which to grow, so I think I’ve done quite well growing them indoors to even get two. Are there lots more to come? Only time will tell.

After 5 weeks of waiting, and seeming to be much further behind than the crops at the house, the tomato plants that are growing in my sunny and warm study are now bearing the tiniest flowers. Unopened of course, but flowers none the less, or at least that’s what I think they are. All of which means, the fruit can’t be far off from appearing either.

I also now have a quite impressive row of delicate white blooms on the top of one of the basil plants, which will mean that it will go to seed unless I pich them. Trimmed 3 weeks ago when we made the soup, the leaves of the four plants that I have left are slowly turning yellow (especially in the lower reaches). If the flowers are pinched and they don’t pick up, then I think their work must be done. (Apparently the leaves must be pinched, too, for a healthier, bushier plant). So, tonight I trimmed all of the canopies which were still mid-green and popped them in the freezer, to use at another time.

Basil flowers

It seems a shame to think that I may not get any more useful foliage off them, but they have provided me with two plastic boxes of leaves which will be used for cooking. Growing them all from seed makes the whole process a little more meaningful, though, and gives me the slightest of self-sufficient feelings.

While the basil stems are very much alive (and still smelling strongly of basil, despite the yellowing leaves), the same can’t be said of the coriander plants. Moved outside when the tomato stems arrived – and to keep the new pepper tree and strawberry plants company – they now look very sorry for themselves. I’d been warned that coriander is one of the most difficult herbs to keep alive, and so they’ve proved. Limp, dry, and brown, it’s definitely time for them to be cleared and maybe some new seeds sown.

And I thought they was picking up this week, due to new stems (or ones that I’d missed when I trimmed it the first time around) reaching for the sun on my balcony porch.

It’s still all go for the chives, though. Cut and frozen the same week as the basil and coriander, the plants have since regrown, and are almost as tall and lush as they were before. Maybe they are an easier variety to keep, if you can find enough uses for them in the kitchen.

Finally, the lavender seems to be getting larger at a slow but steady rate, and the strawberry plants, while healthy enough, just aren’t doing anything. As at the house, they seem to want to concentrate their efforts on replicating themselves, rather than producing any fruit. So, after we got rid of the Chelmsford plants last weekend, maybe these will have to go, too.

Today was a day at home, as the infrequent downpours made us stay indoors. But, it was as fulfilling as exploring the outdoors, as we did something which I had never done before.

We spent an afternoon in the kitchen, and made batches of fresh soup.

Two varieties were on the menu: leek and potato, and carrot and coriander (the latter using the home-grown herbs, of course).

It was much easier than I had expected, and after rounding up the necessary ingredients, we cooked them off and whizzed them with the hand-held blender. Potatoes formed part of the base for both types, and proved easy to pulp, and along with the leeks, carrots, and onions, were mushy in no time.

Lovely colours: Nik does the blending

Once they were cool, we scooped the mixtures into bags, which were then clipped in readiness for their new home in the freezer. We tried some before they went into their frozen hibernation, and both sorts did taste much better than anything I’d bought from a supermarket, as the recipes are preservative free.

Bagged and blended batches of soup

I’m looking forward to eating the rest. Once defrosted in the microwave, a little milk needs to be added into the pan, to add a touch of creaminess.

One day, I’ll post up the recipes.

Part of the soup-making process was the harvesting of the herbs, before they go to seed. The coriander was chopped and then blended, before being added to the carrot soup mix. Any which was over was placed into an ice cube tray, before being covered with water and placed in the freezer.

Home-grown cut coriander

I’ve learnt that the basil can be frozen, too, so as much of this was harvested as I could put into a clip and close container, before being popped into the frozen shelves. It’s best to freeze the leaves separately, but I need a few more boxes so that I can trim the rest of the four plants which are back in their rightful place on the kitchen windowsill, after their holiday on the shelf outside.

Home-grown harvested basil

Finally, the chives were trimmed, blended, and put in a plastic beaker, and again went into cold storage. With the peat pots making them resembling beetroot plants, it will be interesting to see if they (and the rest of the chopped crops) regrow.

Home-grown chopped chives

It turns out I almost had enough plants to almost start a cottage industry, which after last week’s rural and scenic break, sounds like a wonderful way to make a living.

We finally planted out the vegetable patch today, at the house. It’s surprising how full it is already, with our broccoli, pepper and sprout plants. Languishing in the greenhouse and on the patio since they were tiny seeds, I should imagine that they will breathe a little easier now, not being confined to pots, and having proper drainage.

To compliment this season’s vegetable selection and to make the table a veritable feast of self-sufficiency, we also popped in some carrot and leek seeds, as well as some lettuce, to provide a good companion to the fast-ripening tomatoes.

Not being a keen gardener in years gone by, it was three thoroughly enjoyable, and well spent hours. It wasn’t only enjoyable, but also very fulfilling, too, as we’d grown the plants ourselves, from virtually nothing a few weeks ago.

The basil has undoubtedly been the biggest success. Now at least 12 inches tall, the plants still try to escape through the kitchen window, straining to get to the sun. The chives are equally as tall, with their wispy and withery fingers still reaching for the sky. A few of the lower leaves have died, most likely due to lack of water or overcrowding, but otherwise, they are very green and seem to be enjoying life on the window sill.

Even the coriander has perked up, although I should have planted more. There is enough to make a handful of meals, but then the pots will be empty. They will need harvesting soon though, as the edges of the leaves are turning a deep red or brown. I’ve been told that coriander is one of the hardest herbs to keep, so I’ve done quite well. Once it’s been cut, it will be interesting to see if it regrows.

Harvest time will come soon, for the basil and chives, too, and I’ve been looking at ways to store all the crops I have. I’m not going to be able to use all of the cut plants at once, so I need to find ways of keeping them fresh to cook with in the future. They can be dried, which involves hanging the cut stems in pierced paper bags in a dark place for quite a few weeks, while others can be placed in ice cube trays or other trays placed in the freezer, once water has been poured onto them, to encase them in ice.

We’re going away next week, so I’ve got to find another keen grower to water and look after them for me, which could be easier said than done. I hope they’ll be okay – I’ll be keeping my green fingers crossed.