Competition day 2016 ek

Sept. 11, 2016, 1:11 a.m.

Wow where do I start!

I have nothing to enter into the show...or do I? We have some black tomatoes growing in the polytunnel that should be ripe for the show, surely no one would do black tomatoes!

The kids have grown sunflowers from seeds, we could enter them? After consulting with my daughter (6.5 years) that's a "No daddy, that is our flowers and we're not cutting them!"

But in the end and some chocolate as a bribe we're entering:

Class 6 - Sunflowers (3 blooms, matching size)

Class 55 - Tomatoes (Small-fruited variety, not exceeding 1.5" diameter, 12)

Class 62 - Potatoes White - 5 (which might have not won, but was a nice dinner)

Class 81 - Home made fruit jelly (1lb approximately)





10 of September 2016, the day of the show and the day we'll see if the black tomatoes is ready for the show. The tomatoes looks amazing as long as you only look at them from one side, the other side is as green as can be!!!!

This was our ticket! The black tomatoes would have won us the prize and we could retire from the prize money and live out our days as the only people that's ever entered black tomatoes to an allotment show. I can see how I tell this black tomatoes story on a beach in Spain! The tomatoes are not ripe!!!! The underside of the tomatoes is as green as the retirement money I was suppose to win!!!

Nevermind! What do we have? The sunflowers, some amazing Nadine potatoes (works better in their soil then a bag), tomatoes from the polytunnel (not 12 of the same variety), a lot of marigolds to make a jelly with and the will and excitement of two small kiddies and a dad that kinda like these things!

We've cut the sunflowers and we've picked what was ripe of the little tomatoes, I've cooked a marigold jelly with the help of the kiddies picking the flowers and pulling the pedals from the flowers (please see below for the marigold jelly recipe)

Off to the show we go!

We've washed and rubbed the potatoes and put them on a little paper plate, we did not won any prizes for the potatoes...but they've made amazing chips for our dinner and we can't wait to plant a lot more potatoes next year.





Our tomatoes looked very pitiful compared to the other guys out there and I am kinda glad the black tomatoes was not ready, we would have lost. The other tomatoes were amazing! I really mean that, if the shops sold tomatoes like that, the world would be a better place.

I was told off as our tomatoes was not a single variety, I said it's ok if we don't win. My daughter has arranged them and that is how I would leave them. We might not win, but my daughter can tell people she's arranged and entered them. We got:





I love it!

The marigold jelly won second prize, it is really nice with blue cheese (wish the judges had some crackers and blue cheese)

The sunflowers that we were not suppose to cut won first prize!!!!!!!





And then out of nowhere we won the Jane Barnes memorial cup! WHAT!

Yes we won for newcomer of the year.

I am on Pippenhall because my kids love going there and catching worms! My kids helped me to chit some potatoes (that were entered into this show), plant some seeds and win the first prize for sunflowers. And today I've had to privilege to take a picture with Jane's Dad with the cup that I can't wait to pass on to the next person.





There was some amazing veg at the show, here is some of my favorites.













Congratulations to everyone taking part and thank you very much to the society to make such a great day such a great success.

Marigold Jelly Recipe

Pick about 3 cups of flower pedals, cover it in boiling water and leave it for at least 2 hours. Strain what looks like a marigold tea.





800ml of water



500g of caster sugar

Juice of one lemon

Bring it all to the boil and reduce until it stop running off a cold spoon or put sum on a cold plate and push your finger trough it, if it creates a path and stay clear it is ready.









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