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Oxford – Please Confirm!

It’s been a little while since I last posted an update on the status of the upcoming meeting in Oxford, so I thought I would do a quick post.

Please Confirm Your Attendance by 20 August

The following bloggers have said they may attend.

Those marked with a * have already confirmed, or I’m pretty sure are going to come, and don’t need to reconfirm.

The number next to the blog name is the number of seats I have reserved for you.

Bifurcated Carrots (2)*
MustardPlaster (2)
Spade Work (1)
Daughter of the Soil (1)
The plot thickens (1)*
Joanna’s Food (1)*
Growing Our Own (2)
The smallest smallholding (2)
A Blog Called Fuggles (2)
Veg Plotting (1)
Soilman’s Allotment Blog (1)*
My Tiny Plot (1)
Manor Stables Veg Plot (1)
Fluffius Muppetus (2)*
NomeGrown (1)
A Nice Green Leaf (1)*
Hills and Plains (1)*
Horticultural (1)
Speaker:  Real Seeds (1)*

Total people attending:  25

Total number of seats available: 25

Please check to make sure the information I have here is correct, and let me know if it’s not as soon as possible!  If you need an extra seat, I can probably figure something out.  If you have an extra seat, please let me know!

If I don’t hear from you by 20 August, I will try to contact you directly.  If I can’t get a firm answer from anyone by 1 September, I won’t necessarily cancel your reservation unless someone comes along who says they want to come.  If you are still unsure by 1 September, you are welcome to wait until the last minute to see if there’s still space available.

If there is anyone else who wants to come, let me know.  If I have unconfirmed seats on 1 September, I will happily offer them to you.  At the moment I have no waiting list, and it seems likely at least one or two people listed above won’t attend.

It’s still the intention to find a place for everyone who wants to attend, if at all possible.

Speaker

We have one speaker already arranged.  The Real Seed Catalogue have said they would send someone to meet with and speak to us.

We might consider a second speaker if anyone has concrete ideas.  The best thing would be if you contacted the person you were thinking of first and get an agreement in principle they would be available, then give me contact information and I will confirm it with them.

It needs to be clear to me the person is appropriate for our meeting.

Costs

I am still expecting the costs to be between £10-15.  It depends on how many people show up to share the costs, so I will calculate it on the day.

The cost of entrance to the Oxford Botanic garden is included in the price of the room we have reserved.  Please don’t pay the usual entrance fee, just tell them you are there for the food growing get-together.

Place and Time

20 September 2008, 9:30am – 5:30pm

Oxford Botanic Garden, High Street, Oxford

Please arrive between 9:30am – 10:30am for coffee and tea.  We will begin shortly thereafter.

Closer to the time I will publish a proposed schedule for the day.  Much of the time will just be spent socializing, and perhaps visiting the gardens, but there will be a few planned speakers as well as the picnic and seed swap.

Picnic

Rain or shine we will have a picnic, so bring any food you want to share with others. Since most of us are gardeners, consider bringing something from your garden, but anything you want to bring is fine.

Also bring something to sit on, and anything else you want for the picnic.

Our room can be locked, so personal belongings can be left inside while we go outdoors.

In case of bad weather, we can eat indoors.

Seed Swap

Be sure to bring any seeds or other propagation materials you want to share with others. I will bring some seeds and other things from my garden.

The most interesting of course are seeds you have grown and saved yourself, but don’t be afraid to bring any seeds you think anyone else might be interested in.

You don’t need to bring seeds in order to receive them from others.

We Have a Banner

FoGroBloMe

For more information see Simon’s post.

Phone Number

I will have my mobile phone with me on the day, and you are welcome to call anytime until then if you have any questions:  +31 6 40109417.

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Achocha Fat Baby

Achocha Fat Baby

Okay, it’s cucumber time.  Emma already posted about her achocha ‘mouse melons’, and even devoted an entire podcast episode to it on Alternative Kitchen Garden last year, as well as a squidoo lens.

[update:  I just realized Emma probably posted about something else, ‘Melothria’, a few days ago.  Achocha is something she grew and reported on last year]

A look in the Seed Savers Exchange yearbook shows my friend Frank in Belgium as the sole member offering seeds for it.  I suspect he’s been growing it for years, and probably one of the people who introduced it to Europe.

I feel behind when it comes to posting on this one.

The insides look like this:

Achocha Fat Baby

The black things are the seeds, which you take out before eating and save for replanting.

Raw they taste something like a cucumber, and after being fried a bit like green pepper.

Except for the seeds, you can eat the whole thing.  I’m looking forward to trying this in different foods.  I’m not sure if I like it yet.

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Cucumber Time

The Dutch have an expression, komkommertijd, which translates to Cucumber Time.  According to Wikipedia this is called Silly Season in English.

It’s a very important time for journalists.

Literally it’s the time of year when news is so slow, because everyone is on vacation and out enjoying the sun somewhere, that journalists are so hungry for a story they are even willing to report on cucumber harvests.  It’s the time of year where there is often a rash of fake press releses, trying to catch journalists off guard.  Every once in a while a good joke gets pulled.

I don’t know about traditional journalism, but it’s getting awfully quiet in the garden blogging world right now.  Anyone reading this have any good stories about their cucumbers?

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Japenese Trifele Tomatoes

Japenese Trifele Tomatoes

These are Japanese Trifele Black, Yellow and Red tomatoes.  In spite of the name, these tomatoes come from Russia.  Apparently a scientist involved in the development of these tomatoes was Japanese.  At their largest, the red ones are about 5cm wide and the others 2-3cm.

The black version is available from a number of seed companies now, and have become a popular tomato to grow.  Just out of curiosity, I tracked down the red and yellow versions from a seed saver in Sweden and planted them too.  I also got an orange version from a seed saver in Belarus, but it came too late for planting this year.  Perhaps next year I’ll give it a try.

Green spots and uneven ripening seems to be a common trait of these tomatoes.  At first I thought it was intentional, but now I realize it’s more of a problem than a feature.  This isn’t as much of a problem with the black version.

The flavor of the black version is really excellent.  It has a very complex taste that’s a little on the sweet side, but there’s plenty of acidic taste too.  Rumor has it this is Raymond Blanc’s favorite tomato.  For those reading this from outside of the UK, Raymond Blanc is a French born TV celebrity chef who owns a chain of restaurants in the UK.

At best I would say the yellow one is uninteresting.  The plant is the earliest of the bunch, and probably the most prolific.  The plant is also a nice compact size.

The red one is not nice.  The flesh was very mealy and tasteless.  Perhaps this is due in part to the uneven ripening, so perhaps after I’ve had a chance to let some others get riper I will have a more positive impression.

I’ll certainly grow the black one again!