I can´t believe that I´ve been picking veggies and not bragging about it!
Today we finally picked our first red tomatoes…hurrah! We were late planting, but now that they´ve kicked in, there will be no stopping us for quite a few months now. Am planning salads, sauces, sun dried tomatoes and goodness knows what else. My plum tomatoes (or roma) are getting huge, but still frustratingly refuse to turn red.
We planted 18 runner bean plants this year (as opposed to the totally ridiculous 60 last year) and have been picking them almost daily for about 3 weeks now. We´ve still got a way to go with them, but thanks to my nifty runner bean slicer, we´re enjoying beans and freezing them too for later.
The aubergines are ripening and I´ve started to pick them quite small. Later I´ll leave them to get a little larger, but I couldn´t hold back.
Our long thin green peppers which are great for gazpacho are now being picked every couple of days. They´re also wonderful deep fried (stuffed or not) in olive oil and just sprinkled with salt. Our bell peppers are growing well, but need some more time to get bigger and then red.
The dwarf beans we planted a couple of weeks ago are all in flower, so it won´t be long now until they´re producing little bobby beans for us. I´m quite excited as I´ve planted two varieties, one green and one yellow. I´m sure they´ll taste pretty much the same but they´ll look extra pretty!
Our Spanish radishes, which are long as opposed to round, are doing great. We pick a couple each day and they have a good bite to them. We´ll probably plant a few more as they come up from seed so quickly.
And our little Spanish cucumbers are doing well. We grew them from seeds from a cucumber we saved last year. The cucumber had come from plants that our neighbour Diego gave us from seeds of his own – so these are several generations old. It´s good to have a little bit of history in the garden!
Our chard flourishes, I keep giving bunches of it away, but will do something this week with it for us. And our celery is slowly but surely getting bigger.
We have other things going on in the vegetable patch, and I´ll take some pics as the become ready. I do have to mention our little vines. Big Man is very rightly proud of our muscat grapes which are now trained over the kitchen window. They look amazing, we had to remove some as we had so many bunches but they would never have all ripened. Am looking forward to grapes in September and drying some for Christmas too.
I love summer…but I´m off to water the garden soon as it´s very hot here during the day and the plants are thirsty. ¡Hasta luego!
Chica Andaluza 
Everything looks so healthy. The vine looks really pretty against the kitchen window and so much fruit! Thanks for sharing. Happy watering!
Florence x
It´s all doing well, hope yours is too? Big Man is sooo proud of his grapes!
Not being able to have one of my own, I truly enjoy reading about others’ flourishing gardens and virtually watching them grow! I love how your vine is growing over your kitchen window! Looking forward to seeing all the resulting recipes from your bounty!
I know I´m so lucky to have this and enjoy “sharing” it….am so pleased that you´re enjoying reading about it too! Lots of summery recipes coming up. I love this time of year!
Wow, look at those aubergines! The tomatoes look great too and just for you I said ta-ma-toe. OK, not really, got the American accent going strong. You know I haven’t heard a Brit out of water (came up with that bad pun just for you) story in awhile! Anyway, your garden looks great!
Love your accent! How do you say poe-tay-toe then?! And there´s plenty more to come on the story front too. Must dig out the one about the rude words!
It all looks wonderful – peppers, tomatoes, aubergines, the essentials of a Mediterranean summer! And the grapes….I envy you those as our vine is very young and hasn’t many grapes on it yet. We always find that the Roma tomatoes ripen later than other varieties, and then they all ripen at the same time so we have to have mammoth bottling sessions!
Actually, I´ve just ben poking around your blog as I have some mussels to cook and I know you love them and use all your lovely vegetables too. Thanks for the tip about the tomatoes,. will stop stressing about them being so green! Our vine is two years old now…but I think we got lucky that the three we put in “took” immediately.
Wow!!! You are so lucky to have your own garden girl!!! I envy you!! You have o km produce, You kniw where it is coming from!!! That is a blessing!!! Your garden looks stunning!!!!
It´s true- no food miles or km. Not even for our chickens or goat – they´re just outside the front door!
Obviously the result of lots of hard work… you should be very proud! What a fantastic range of produce.
To be honest, Big Man does the digging and the harder stuff. I waft around picking off the suckers on the tomatoes and tying them back…but I do all the cooking!! (Which I love, so it doesn´t really classify as hard work). We love our veggie garden, I do appreciate having it.
I love your vegetable garden! I think I am going to plant some runner beans or similar outside so if we have an abundance we can get our neighbours to pick for themselves 🙂
Beans are great as they don´t really take up much space, especially if you have them trained up a cane or fence. They also don´t need too much looking after and I´m sure your neighbours would be very happy! The more you pick, the more they flower and give you more beans – they´re very polite plants!
What a great vegetable garden, and a lovely blog. I am just a little bit envious of your Andalucian life… ¡Hasta pronto!
¡Muchisimas gracias! Hope your Spanish is going well, I saw that you are learning – ¡suerte!
Love your blog and so enjoyed reading some of your posts. Your vegetable garden looks great and sounds wonderful.
take care
Thank you for your kind words and for the visit – glad you have enjoyed what you saw.
Wow, congrats on the veggies! They look amazing – and if it helps, your tomatoes are way ahead of all of us in the UK, I’m still staring at flowers and tiny green nubs… Oh well, they’ll arrive on my plate eventually!
It´s hard to patient though isn´t it?! Good luck with your tomatoes…
I am so jealous. Maybe my next place will have space for a garden. You’ve inspired me.
Maybe some tubs or window boxes in the meatime?!
How lovely to eat the fruit of your labours.
It is indeed – we´re very lucky.
Ah so that’s what a garden looks like when it rains (even occasionally)…. so pretty – I’m jealous!
Well, occassionally – but not for a few months. We have a super efficient watering system that drip, drips, drips (so doesn´t use much of our precious water) when the sun goes down. Thanks for your kind words Rachel!
Your garden looks amazing. A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.!!!! Mine is suffering this week, it’s too darn HOT! We’ve been at 100 deg F all week! Gah! Hot….melting…
Thank you! We have a good watering system for the evenings and it´s a walled garden so at some part of the day, some part of it is in shade…which is a good thing as we have also had the same temperatures here. Hot and melting indeed!
Can you please fill me in on how you’ve reached such a GORGEOUS grape vine? My dad’s was going great, until he had to move it because the sun here was “too strong” which cause it to burn and shrivel. He moved it to a shadier spot, but since then it’s been looking very sad. It’s still a baby plant, so he was able to move it….suggestions?
I shall have to consult Big Man as he is the expert, but we too had to shade ours for the first year. We put four little vines in and two died. I know that after the winter he cuts if back very, very short…it scared me when I saw it! he also sprays it with sulphur dust which I believe is fine for organic gardening. I found this link http://www.gardenguides.com/129935-sulfur-garden-plants.html
I know he also watered one day then left it dry another at the start to force the plants to make strong roots. I´ll speak to Big Man tonight to see if he has any more tips! Good luck to your dad…ours took a year to get established.
And ours looks like a twiggy dead vine now. Maybe we’ll have better luck next time planting a vine. Thanks for all your tips and sorry for taking a month to get back to you! 🙂
I’ll tell dad what you told me, I think dad watered his every day, shaded it, and … yeah, about it, really… Thanks for all the tips! 😀
Shame…but cut them back to where they are green inside, keep them covered and hopefully they´ll come back to life next year. Hope this works!
I’m so jealous of your huerta. I just take pictures of other peoples and get inspired. The romas here aren’t red yet either, patience!! 😀
We love it and we know we´re lucky to have it!
A lovely garden and looks to be very healthy….RaeDi
It´s doing great at the moment, now we are reaping all the rewards…I love it!
your garden looking fresh and lots of healthy vegetables..you’re lucky to have a lush garden