Narmin Mohammadi, fashion PR, traveller and occasional gardner, continues her series on life on her allotment in London:
ALLOTMENT - Review of January 2011January. In the depths of winter. Little sunlight; sunrise around 8am, sunset around 4.30pm. This is a month when I bake a lot; comfort food to distract from what can be a miserable month. But Mother Nature has a way of lifting your mood and turning your mind away from the January Blues.
Believe or not the brussel sprouts were still growing (I was too lazy and cold to pick them fresh to eat for Christmas lunch), and we have a bed full of leeks that have survived the snow and frosts. Perfect with the potatoes I'd kept back after digging them up at the end of the Summer, for some leek and potato soup.
But the most heartwarming of all was seeing the shoots of garlic that are coming through. I planted the cloves before I left for my trip and wasn't sure the ground would be warm enough to encourage growth. But I guess I had nothing to worry about. I can't wait to eventually dig them up in July; I only have one bulb left from last Summer's crop.
As the winter months are all about preparations for the Spring, I've become a little obsessed with making sure our soil is as well nourished as possible for this year's crops. We have not managed to even get a pot of compost from any of the deliveries to the allotments, and our compost heap is literally taking years to produce anything (I don't think its warm enough; so now I'm constantly on the lookout for old bits of carpet to cover the heap and generate some heat) so I've started compost trenches in the beds. I'm collecting foodstuffs from the kitchen and I'm depositing them in the trenches once a week. Its a little smelly but worth it I hope. And I still live in the hope that we'll be able to get our hands on some compost soon, even if it is only enough for one pot.
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