… the leftovers. Apart from the first meal, there’s enough meat to make lots of individual pies. Then there’s stock from the bones to make lurid green watercress soup or spicy winter leek and potato soup.

Here’s Rodriguez, the Rhode Island red rooster, and his wives. Mabel (the one black hen), as ever aloof, still sleeps up in a tree rather than with everyone else in the chook house. These won’t be roast dinners any time soon.

The very popular fresh food garden half-day organic vegetable gardening courses will run this year on Saturday 3 and 31 October 2009.

There’s not room in everyone’s life or garden for a rooster. They are noisy at very unsociable hours. But if you want the patter of tiny chickie feet, keeping a rooster is one option. If you would like to give a very handsome pure-bred Rhode Island red rooster a good home, please email me. This is a photo of their dad, Henry.

We like to snuggle under a duvet as the nights draw in. So does the soil. Covering it up stops it being washed away by the rain and blown away by the wind.

Covering the soil helps keep it aerated and gives a better environment for the microorganisms and worms to live in. Read more

You’ll get more done by doing things at the wrong time, than you get done by not doing things at all.

I’m refering to gardening but the same could be applied to saving for retirement or changing jobs. There are lots of rules about when you should do what. Sometimes doing things later or earlier means they turn out better, or at least, not much worse. The main thing seems to be to try it and see, rather than not to bother at all.

If you are planting things at the ‘wrong’ time, they’ll appreciate some protection. Here are a few ideas I use to keep off the worst of the weather and the pests. Don’t forget to water if your protection keeps out the rain.

Read more

I was very glad I’d stashed a bag of our own herbs, salad and spinach leaves for a weekend away. It meant I could start my Saturday with herbed scrambled eggs and spinach without leaving the comfort of our delightful cottage. There was enough salad for lunch that day too – most of the way up Mount Holdsworth at Powell Hut.

This is a picture of one of my winter salad favourites ‘mibuna’ – an easy to grow Asian green that does well in cooler weather. Joy Larkcom’s book Oriental Vegetables: The Complete Guide for the Gardening Cook has many other ideas too.

Consumer magazine recently tested 15 ready-to-eat salads from supermarkets. Only 3 of the 15 mixes rated as good. Most of the rest were “fair”; three were “below average”. I’m as susceptible to the charms of the easy option as the next person but Consumer recommends washing ‘ready to eat’ salad, even though manufacturers usually wash salad leaves in a ‘chlorine rinse’. I soak garden greens in salted water for ten minutes to remove any bugs and then spin in a salad spinner to dry them.

Given that I can buy a packet of seeds (enough to grow about 1,000 lettuces) for the same price as a bag of salad (which I still have to wash anyhow), I’ll stick to dashing out for a few leaves for my lunch or taking some with me when I travel. Even if you haven’t got a garden you can grow a back step salad.

The Rhode Island red hens have gone to meet a young Rhode Island red rooster in Pauahatanui.

I’ve just been reading a fascinating account of how every culture develops its own folk myths, handed down from one generation to the next in Jonathan Haidt’s The Happiness Hypothesis.

It seems I’ve been developing my own gardening myths, such as ‘you can’t make hot compost in small quantities’. When I applied a little more scrutiny and science, I’ve proved I can make excellent hot compost (over 60 degrees C for the last six days) in two ordinary (230 and 300 litre) black plastic compost bins. I used weeds, lawn clippings, kitchen waste and shredded paper from my office. I’ve turned it today, combining the contents of both bins into the larger one and adding some more water. It should heat up again over the next week.

If you want to find out more about making compost, one of the keys to success in any edible garden, come on the fresh food garden course on Friday 27th February 2009 from 1pm to 5.45pm or the tiny fresh food garden course which will run over two evenings on Tuesday 10th and Tuesday 17th February 2009 from 6pm to 8.30pm.

If you can’t make it to the course, there are some very tasty vegetable gardening books around at the moment.

Some warm summer days mean that it may be time to harvest your garlic if the tops have died down. If they haven’t you can always lift a bulb or two gently with a fork while you wait. I plant garlic close together which means the bulbs aren’t huge, but no less delicious for all that.

The back step salad has needed some extra defences against hungry blackbirds. Ten out of the eleven radish seeds I sowed a week ago are up, no sign of the spinach yet.

Everyone, including me, came away from our most recent fresh food garden course full of enthusiasm and energy to get growing more of our own food.

If you need more motivation with your own vegetable garden, come on the fresh food garden course on Saturday 31st January 2009 from 10am to 3.30pm. There’s also a fresh food garden course on Friday 27th February 2009 from 1pm to 5.45pm. What more of an excuse do you need to take a Friday afternoon off work and make an early start to the weekend? Get a group of friends together to come and enjoy some time relaxing in the country while learning something new.

The tiny fresh food garden course will run over two evenings on Tuesday 10th and Tuesday 17th February 2009 from 6pm to 8.30pm in response to requests for help with growing things to eat in pots, on decks and balconies or in a small back yard.

Please email me if you’d like to treat a special friend to a course. I’ll send a voucher for you to give them.

If you’re being buried under a zucchini mountain, I’d recommend trying some zucchini fritters or zucchini and feta pies.

I used an old polystyrene fruit box and planted eight lettuce seedlings in home made compost. A day after I planted them the blackbirds had nearly scratched them all out in their enthusiasm to find some of the many worms. Four short bamboo canes with some mesh stretched across has solved the problem.

I also sowed some spinach and radish seeds in two 8.5 litre flower pots. Five pots ($10), five packets of seeds ($15) and a 40 litre bag of potting mix ($10) could give you rocket, spinach, lettuce, spring onions and radishes on your back step.

I chose this spot because it’s close to the house and gets morning sun but won’t fry the seedlings in the afternoon. If it gets too shady later in the year, I can move the pots somewhere else. It’s also close to a tap so I can fill up my watering can.

If you found this useful, then sign up for the fresh food garden course on Saturday 17th or Saturday 31st January 2009.

If you’ve resolved to get your own vegetable garden going in 2009, I’ve got just the thing for you. Certainly a good book will help, but coming on a fresh food garden course will give you enthusiasm, encouragement and support as well as knowledge.There’s still time to get things started before summer is over.

Find out about the two biggest mistakes vegetable gardeners make from my interview on National Radio. You’ll also hear from two participants of previous fresh food garden courses.