March 2008 Archives

A food garden at the Whitehouse?

By
Colin
on March 30, 2008 9:12 PM | | Comments (0)
Our friends over at Kitchen Gardeners International have come up with a good idea. They want to see a food garden at the Whitehouse. It seems there has been one there before and now would be a good time to dig up some of the lawns and grow something useful.

This has got me thinking, why not have food gardens at Buckingham Palace, 10 Downing Street and other official residencies in the UK. Why not go further still and make this an international movement by having food gardens at all places where heads of state live? It would be a wonderful way to demonstrate that everybody should try to grow at least some of their own food.

I welcome comments on this so please let me know what you think.

Plastic bags and saving the world

By
Colin
on March 30, 2008 9:19 AM | | Comments (0)
I was in an M&S food hall recently and while queuing for the checkout noticed a slogan on the till readout - "Buy a bag for life and save the planet." So, all we need to do now is to stop using plastic carrier bags and everything will be fine and the planet will be saved.  I just didn't realise it was so simple.

Good vegetable site

By
Colin
on March 28, 2008 8:57 AM | | Comments (0)
This is a good site for info and recipes http://www.thinkvegetables.co.uk/  There is a very good nutrition link which shows where to get specific vitamins and minerals.

Climate change, food and biofuel

By
Colin
on March 27, 2008 7:58 AM | | Comments (1)
Growing biofuels will impact on food. It has already caused an increase in the price of wheat which has meant higher prices for bread and animal feed which in turn increases prices for other foods. Biofuels are just a distraction and part of the denial of climate change. We must lean to grow more food locally and get away from the expensive centralised distribution systems used by supermarkets.

A couple of recent article in The Guardian highlight the problems with the mistaken idea that we can grow fuel instead of using oil
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2 ... ls.energy1
and
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2 ... els.energy

 Grow FOOD not fuel!

Soil remineralisation

By
Colin
on March 27, 2008 7:45 AM | | Comments (0)

For the last 5 years I have been remineralising the soil in the fruit and veg garden. What this means is that rock dust was added when the garden was created and we have been reaping the benefits ever since.

I have no real 'scientific facts' to prove it works but much anecdotal evidence says that plants are healthier and the food produced is more 'nutrient dense'. Take the onions we grew last year. Throughout the UKUK supply had been quickly exhausted. The weather was no different here yet we had the biggest and best crop ever. We are still using them and will last well into April.

This year I plan some trials to try to prove that remineralisation does indeed work.

This is from the soil remineralisation pages on the web site

"This year there will be a new trial of rock dust and sea minerals. The aim of the trial is to see if there are any differences in the nutrient density of crops grown in remineralised soil compared to those grown in plain soil.

I am preparing 3, 4ft (1.2M) square beds:
Bed 1 Soil
Bed 2 Soil + rock dust
Bed 3 Soil + sea minerals

Each bed will grow 4/5 separate crops, planted at the same time and treated in exactly the same way. The crops are: onions, carrots, lettuce/cabbage and dwarf French beans.

At harvest time each crop will be sampled for BRIX levels and records kept. I hope to be able to repeat the trial over next 4-5 years the very wet summer caused havoc and many crops either partially or completely failed. Onions suffered badly and there were news items that the meagre .

Delia!

By
Colin
on March 27, 2008 7:38 AM | | Comments (0)
Some of you might already know my feelings on Delia and her cheat at cooking TV programme/book. What bothers me is that someone who is supposedly interested in food should suggest that we can can cheat. Who is cheating who? If you use convenience food/ingredients the only person you are cheating is yourself. You are also paying food processors for grating cheese and making mash potato etc etc so cheating yourself out of a lot of money! Not only do such ingredients cost more they are often of dubious origin and nutritional value.

The other oft quoted argument is that it saves time. Evidently people do not have the time to cook when they get in from work. To me that says they do not have the time to take care of themselves. It is high time we recognised that good food is crucial to good health, you are truly what you eat.

In a country that has an enormous obesity problem, and one where people are addicted to convenience food, the idea that we can cheat is just dangerous nonsense. 

The blog is back!

By
Colin
on March 26, 2008 9:36 PM | | Comments (0)
The Organic UK blog is back after a couple of years break.

Although mostly about organic gardening the blog will cover other related subjects like food, climate change and associated issues. Your comments are welcome but anonymous comments will not get through.

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