Harvesting the last summer crops.

Yesterday we harvested all the frost sensitive crops

french beans
climbing beans
courgettes
tomatoes

The temperature is going down to 2/3C the next couple of nights so it seemed like a wise precaution. It means we will be making Green Tomato Chutney from Nigel Slaters recipe with the couple of kilos of unripe tomatoes that were left on the vine.

Always remembering that according to Nigel

  “Green tomato chutney swings both ways …”

Even better the drop in temperature means we have been able to light the wood fired  Rayburn , so the house is warm and cosy and the chutney can be made on the hotplate.

Its strange the timing of this as its exactly a year ago that we had the Rayburn installed.

Autumn almanac

There has been a real autumnal feel in the air this week, with lower temperatures and misty mornings, and frost forecast for later in the week.

Woodsmoke is drifting over from our neighbours who have lit their first fire of the season. At the moment we are relying on our trusty paraffin heaters for warmth but today we sawed up four bags of logs and are reckoning on firing up the Rayburn on Thursday morning. The downside to the Rayburn is that it only takes 25cm logs and all our logs get delivered cut to 50cm so each has to be cut in half. Our arms usually get used to the daily sawing after a few days, but they are aching a bit today after our first sawing session.

First log sawing of the season

 

Another pointer that autumn is here and winters just around the corner is the fact that we have both put all our summer clothes away and brought all the winter clothes out, on with the thermal trousers, fleeces and thermal base layers!