The Best Laid Plans…

If you are being lazy about using your creative intelligence, natural forces will work their hardest to overwhelm and undermine your inadequate design.

Linda Woodrow, The Permaculture Home Garden.

I put my compost bin in a stupid place so now I have to wheelbarrow the compost up a flight of concrete stairs to the new garden beds. A good permaculture design is all about making the various elements in the garden work together harmoniously in order to reduce the hard work.

The best place for the compost bin is where the compost is to be used.

To be fair to myself though, the compost bin placement worked in my original plan. Alas, my beautiful circle garden is not going to happen as the space has been taken over by my children. Which is ok, because it’s ultimately less effort to build a new garden in a slightly different place than it would be to try and keep the children’s games out of an area they naturally are drawn to.

Harvesting

Steamed zucchini;
zucchini on pizza;
zucchini in pasta sauce;
zucchini fritters;
zucchini chocolate cake;
raw zucchini and bean dip…

and now, my new favourite:

Zucchini Loaf

3 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
¼ tsp baking powder
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 ½ cups white sugar
3 eggs, beaten
1 cup cooking oil
1 cup chopped walnuts
2 cups of grated zucchini
1 tsp vanilla essence

Sift dry ingredients, then add sugar, eggs, oil, walnuts, zucchini and vanilla. Mix well. Spoon into two lined loaf tins and bake slowly for 1-1 ½ hours, starting at 150 degrees C and increasing to 170.

This recipe is from Homegrown : how to sow, grow, harvest, pickle and preserve fresh fruit, herbs & vegetables from your garden / by Lynda Hallinan. (A New Gardener special edition). It’s my new favourite garden book and where I also found the recipe for the plum chutney I’ve been guzzling.