Careful in the Dark

Now that it's getting darker earlier I'm pulling out my little reflector badges and fastening them to my coat pockets. The ones I have are the classic flat plastic ones on a string, a bit like the cat's eye on a bicycle, and they glow as soon as the headlights of a car approach me in the dark. While I lived in brightly lit London I had no need for them but now that I live in a small town and walk everywhere, often along narrow darkened roads, I find them very useful for highlighting my presence to drivers.

Photo: Dagbladet.no

 

I admit that they don't look fashion-forward in any way, so I'm going to order one of these reflective tassels from Firefly to attach to my handbag. And probably a few to give away as Christmas presents. Finally an attractive reflector!

 

 

Photo: Firefly.com

 

 

 

 

 

Late October - And The Garden Is Still Hanging On...

Up until a few weeks ago I would receive SMS photos from my mother of the yellow roses I planted in her garden outside Oslo this summer, but Jack Frost arrived and now Mamma's garden is asleep.

Our Surrey garden, however, is still going strong. Coming originally from a much colder climate I am enchanted with all the flowers this late in the season. Dahlias, of course, are standing firm in the rain but so are my lovely white snapdragons and most of my roses.

Antirrhinum Majus 'White Giant'

 

Dahlia 'Crème de Cassis'

 

Pink Achillea - unknown variety

 

Cactus Dahlia 'Purple Gem'

 

Rosa 'Lady Of The Lake' (by David Austin)

 

It is Not Too Late to Plant Roses

The garden has started to wind down. There are still a surprising number of flowers left but gaps are appearing in the borders and it's a good time to reflect on what I can do to improve the colours for next year. We planted purples two years ago; lavender, salvias, verbena bonariensis, delphinium, fan lobelia - lots and lots of purple. The bees love it, and we love the bees. We added some white roses last year for contrast and it's been a very restful colour scheme. Now we'd like to add a splash of colour here and there to give it a little lift, a bit like adding a zest of lime to a drink. I have chosen apricot roses from David Austin, so nothing too zesty but with enough presence to lift and balance our colour scheme. It is difficult to be modest when perusing the long list of Austin roses... I managed to narrow it down to these three:

Sweet Juliet

 

Abraham Darby

 

Julia's Rose

 

I like unashamedly romantic English roses in the garden, like Sweet Juliet and Abraham Darby. Julia's Rose is a little wild card but I think the toffee-lilac colouring looks intriguing - and it is apparently much loved by florists, so it should look good in bouquets for the house.

 

David Austin is offering 15% off all rose orders until the end of October when using the offer code KHF.

 

Autumn Beauty

To me autumn feels quite 'vemodig', wistful, as I really am a summer person. But the colours of autumn, they are quite something. Everywhere I turn there is a scene or a detail worthy of a photo.

Like this humdrum yellow car, sublimated by the yellow leaves above it.

 

 

Right now it's time to pull out my down coat and woolly hat from storage, as we're off to watch the races in Cambridgeshire. And the fens are cold..!

Bulbing for Spring

It's only September but this is the best time to plan your garden for spring. It can be difficult to spend time, money and effort on flowers that won't show for another 6 months, but now really is the moment to let your creative juices flow and plan a beautiful display of spring-flowering bulbs. Don't worry about all the rules, you can flaunt them if you like. Get the bulbs, keep them cool and dry until late October and then plant them. Experts say that you should dig them up after they have finished flowering and the leaves have died down, but don't let that deter you, if you plant the bulbs a bit deeper than the instructions tell you to you'll be able to plant the rest of your perennials and annuals on top of them. The bulbs will shoot their stems up between the other plants and although they might flower a week later than normal you will be able to leave them in permanently. No digging up bulbs after they have died back, just leave them in. Yes, the bulbs may reduce a bit in quantity and quality over the years, but I'm willing to accept that if it means I don't have to scrabble around digging out spent bulbs in early summer. And who has cool, dry storage space for bulbs in summer anyway? Certainly not me.

Here are the beauties which will form our spring display next year:

Photo: Crocus

Allium Globemaster. We planted these two seasons ago and their huge, huge purple pompoms are an absolute delight. I've counted at least 10 bees feasting on a pompom at a time, so as well as being gorgeous they provide lots of food for our yellow and brown-striped friends. A big plus.

Photo: HGTVGardens

Tulipa 'Queen of Night'. This is beautiful, but beware - if you plant it in the shade it will simply look like a dark blob. It needs to be in a sunny setting in order to shine. I think it looks very pretty set against silvery foliage such as lavender or a low-growing eucalyptus, which really contrast with this silky black plum colour.

Photo: internetgardener.co.uk

To add a touch of lightness I have chosen to add Tulipa 'Apricot Beauty' for next year. There is a chance that this lovely soft colour could end up being much more vibrant since the soil in our garden is very rich, but it looks so beautiful in the photos that I'm willing to take a chance.

Photo: Tuinenstruinen.org

Allium 'Atropurpureum', a souvenir from a day spent at Wisley Flower Show a few weeks ago. The colour reminds me of crushed blackcurrants... I'm quite excited about this as I love dark coloured flowers.

 

Photo: Fluwel.nl

And finally, as another touch of lightness, and in case Apricot Beauty turns out more like the orange of smoked salmon: Tulipa 'Belle Epoque'. It's a peony-flowering variety and it looks divine. I think I'll have to plant lots of this since I am already looking forward to picking an armful for a vase.

 

A word of warning: it's all too easy to spend a lot of money when you click and buy tulips online. I would suggest choosing the lowest priced option for those bulb varieties that you want a lot of and spending the big money on rarer specimens which you can use as accents or focal points here and there. I've shopped around and found that J.Parker has some of the lowest prices among the well-know internet retailers, followed by Crocus, although there are many others. Avon Bulbs has top-top notch bulbs and some really exciting varieties (take a look at their Scilla Peruviana) - they consistently win prizes at Chelsea Flower Show - but they are quite a bit more expensive. Find out which varieties you want and then see how many you can get from one supplier - what we often forget is that savings on bulbs can often be wasted on postage costs when we buy from more than one supplier.

Supermarkets also sell bulbs and sometimes they are very reasonable but you might have to put up with slightly loud colour combinations as they tend to sell mixed bags of tulips. Morrisons has a very pretty collection of 4 different white narcissi for only £2 (10 bulbs) which I think is worth trying out, and the above-mentioned 'Queen of Night', also at £2 (10 bulbs). Waitrose, which collaborates with Crocus and therefore gets a good quality selection, has a number of tasteful combinations on sale right now at decent prices. The trick with supermarket and garden centre bulbs is to buy them early, as they tend to dry out on the shelf (specialist suppliers keep their bulbs carefully at exactly the right temperature and humidity to ensure that they stay in optimum condition). Better to keep them cool and dark at home while you wait for the time to plant them out, rather than wait for them to go on sale in late November (Something I know all about as I'm a shark when it comes to picking up items at knock-down prices. I've invariably found that at least 30% of sale bulbs don't perform, so it's not actually a saving).

Golden Autumn Mornings

Photo: The Keen Gardener @ Life with a Nordic Soul

Morgenstund har gull i munn... mornings are golden.

 

Every morning when I go into the kitchen I check the thermometer on the kitchen window: Above 8C? Sunshine? Time for a cup of tea on my rickety little bench (my vintage Arts & Crafts silver teapot keeps tea hot for ages on chilly mornings)

 

This is the spot in the garden that catches the morning sun, but sometime soon the rays of the sun won't make it over the top of the trees and it will be left in the shade for the winter.

 

So I'm making the most of it - soaking up vitamin D and birdsong before the world gets going.

Fårikål - Norwegian Mutton Hotpot

Photo: godt.no

 

I spotted this recipe in a Norwegian newspaper this morning and thought I'd share it. 'Fårikal', or 'mutton in cabbage', was a stalwart of autumn and winter Sundays when I was growing up. It's simple to make: mutton, cabbage, potatoes, black pepper and lots of time. It's a warming and hearty dish* so it's just the right thing to eat at this time of year.

 

Fårikål - serves 4

1.5 kg mutton (use stewing meat with bones and a marbling of fat)

1.5 kg white cabbage

4 teaspoons black peppercorns

2 teaspoons salt

500 ml boiling water

 

Cut the cabbage into wedges

Layer the meat and cabbage in a large pot, starting with a layer of the meat fatty side down at the bottom of the pot

Sprinkle the peppercorns into the pot

Pour the boiling water into the pot and bring everything to the boil

Once it starts to boil a foam will form at the surface - skim this off and throw it away

Let the pot simmer at a low heat for 2 hours

 

Once the meat is so tender that you can easily pull it off the bone it's ready. Serve with steamed potatoes.

And plan a rest afterwards - this is hearty food.

 

*according to Traditional Chinese Medicine mutton is strengthening, helps improve circulation and ward off the cold

Late Summer Colour in the Garden

We're back from the languor of the French Riviera and as much as I would have liked to stay a bit longer it is lovely to come back to our own lush green garden. But it's chilly here, only 7C yesterday morning!

One of my first assignments this month is to rejuvenate a herbaceous border for a regular client whose previous gardener seemed to plant euphorbia, euphorbia and more euphorbia... So we're going to add hot colours that can be seen and enjoyed from the drawing room even on rainy and grey autumn days later on. Lots of plants flower into early autumn and beyond, but it's not so easy to get your hands on them this late in the season since garden centres have switched their focus to spring-flowering bulbs. Thankfully I still have some home-grown plants in stock which I have supplemented with plants from some of my favourite online retailers - Crocus and Sarah Raven. I've pulled together dark pinks, apricot, dark reds and plum purples and I'm really looking forward to getting started with the transformation of 'Euphorbia Mound'.

Achillea millefolium 'Pomegranate'

 

Penstemon 'Blackbird'

 

Eremurus 'Romance'

 

Erysimum 'Purple Shades'

 

Aster 'Andenken an Alma Potschke'

 

Geum cocktail 'Cosmopolitan'

 

Penstemon 'Garnet'

 

Dahlia 'Elma Elizabeth'