That's it for another year.

The allotment is certainly looking bleak now. At this time of year, I always find it amazing when I think of the transformation that will take place next spring and summer.

Any work on the allotment is put firmly on the back burner. If it was just a case of wrapping up warmly on a cold but dry and bright day it would be a different story. At the moment it is cold, miserable and wet, so the only thing that tempts us to venture to the plot is to harvest a few winter vegetables. This is just what we did last week

We needed to harvest some sprouts and parsnips for Christmas dinner to which we would add some braised red cabbage from the freezer. We only had two surviving sprout plants and so we decided to dig these up and store them in a bucket. The sprouts will be picked from the plant at home as we need them.

We also dug another batch of leeks which I prepared and popped in the freezer. As I have explained in previous posts, some of the leeks have been attached by allium leaf miner and so I am preparing and freezing batches of leeks rather than leaving the preparation until I am cooking only to find out that most of the leek is unusable.

As most of the brassicas, in the bed where the sprouts were growing have been harvested, we removed the enviromesh. Garden experts will tell you that wood pigeons only are a problem when plants are young and tender. Don't you believe it. The wood pigeons move in as soon as any covers are off and will readily feast on any available greens.

We managed a visit to Nostell. The scene here is very different now. The trees are leafless and everywhere is wet and soggy.

Despite the cold and damp Nostell was very busy with lots braving the conditions, especially dog walkers, in order to enjoy some exercise.

The meadows are no go areas at the moment. The area above develops a small lake every winter. This will hang around until the weather dries up in spring or summer. Ruby headed for the enclosed area where we play chase the ball with her. She looked at us expectantly but we had to disappoint her as the ground had been badly churned up and was basically a muddy mess. 

The birds on the lake don't seem to mind the cold. The lake is home to lots of ducks but for some reason we never saw any ducklings.

The young swans have now left the lake leaving their parents to enjoy the peace and quiet. The youngsters will join larger gatherings where they will live for a time until they find a mate and some territory of their own. Setting off into the wider world is a risky time for young inexperienced swans. Telegraph wire, pylons and countless other obstacles are new to them and they haven't acquired the knowledge to help them avoid collisions. I hope our four survive.

Adult swans mate for life and so will probably raise another brood on the lake next year.

As well as enjoying a medley of our vegetables on Christmas day they also featured in other meals last week.

Parsnips, carrots, onion and peas from the freezer went into a vegetable risotto. I always put more vegetables and less rice in my versions.

I also made a squash and parsnip cassoulet. Into this went some of our frozen pink banana squash, parsnips onions and garlic.

I used some of our frozen roasted tomatoes and onion in a batch of tomato soup which was loosely based on this recipe. Instead of adding carrot and celery, I added some red pepper.

My second soup of the week was celery soup. Unfortunately, we can't grow celery so that was bought in but some of our potatoes and onion were used. It was based on this recipe.

Now that Christmas is behind us and daylight hours very slowly extend, it's time to look forward to a new year and growing season so the seed orders will be sent off and we can start to plan next year's growing season.

I wish you a happy, healthy and productive new year.

Copyright: Original post from Our Plot at Green Lane Allotments http://glallotments.blogspot.co.uk/ author S Garrett