Monday, September 25, 2006

The moon's an organic veggie

In my humble aspiration to eat seasonal, preferably organic veggies, I set a friend of mine to enquire in town at his usual organic market stall whether the guy delivers baskets of veg. I know the service exists in some parts of Montpellier, but as I can't get into town on a Saturday morning just to buy veg, I was rather hoping some keen little entrepreneur would take the effort out of organic shopping and offer a fresh, appealing basket of goodies somewhere near where I live.

Alas, the bio chap sells either from his farm or from his market stall on a Saturday. I am most welcome to go down to Marseillargues where he'll happily sell me a basket of veg, I was told. I'm sure! It's not quite what I had in mind...

Why not investigate bio veggies in the supermarket, I hear you cry. Well, the bio veggies in our local bio supermarket do not fill one with joy and delight generally. They look sad and at the end of their tether. They've probably been there a while and any vitamins they may have had have long since lost their verve.

The ones in Intermarche do not wow me either. Being sold under plastic rather defeats the object of the exercise, there is not much choice and I'm just not convinced that they are an improvement on normal veg. Which is why I want to buy them direct from the farmer - a selection of seasonal veg for a fixed weekly price and he chucks in what's available. That way, it's a constant surprise. This is the south of France; there should be a wide variety of veg on offer for much of the year, and maybe more choice of unusual veg; ones that you don't find in supermarkets, such as parsnips... or swedes even.

So hear me, all ye bio farmers of this here little corner of France. Come and sell me your veg. I will buy them with delight. Just make it a little easy for me. Pleeease!

Am I asking for the moon?

6 comments:

  1. uh uh... sorry, i'm not in france and not much into veggies...

    actually, just passing by to say hi since now they fix the beta comment bug!! :D

    ReplyDelete
  2. What about us using the top of your garden to grow them ourselves......if Jules & Ulysse don't plough thru them...or worse. Well there is the ground plot, the good will, all it needs is a little elbow grease...and a happy gardener!!!!!

    Decent tools, natural horse manure, lots of easy-to-use water, and off we go!

    All round the veg can be shrubs of herbs of every southern type so that it still looks like a garden - romarin, thym, mente, ciboulette, basililc, garriguette etc., with little wooden "paths" between each row of plants of veg so as to take good care, water rightly, and "sarcler...because all good gardeners know 1 good sarclage is worth 20 waterings!!!!

    The only problems with planting veg is overdoing the numbers...which means you get 4 tonnes of haricots verts ripe at the same time....just a little of each, at the right time, one after the other.

    Growing good veg in "pretty" patches is even more difficult than a normal garden - but worth every moment of it.

    Nutty Granny.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tree, good news about fixing beta comments! At last, I say!!!

    NG: you may have a good idea there, but the garden is a bit of waste land full of stones... and a hopeful attempt to plant flowers on my part! Wouldn't it take a TON of work???

    ReplyDelete
  4. No dear, just turning the ground over good and easy, bio manure, tasteful arrangements of flowers, shrubs and veg...and liking gardening. Takes a lot of time, slow gentle time, and ioo0 tons of patience...but no sweat if the ground has been thoroughly prepared beforehand, sanded, manured...and coddled!!!!

    The a little "plan" to make things come at the right time in the right way, the right shape, shrubs & veg and flowers for the house decoration - courges too to decorate as to eat....great fun!

    I miss that all - used to spend half the day doing it on a bigger scale...now I just paint to lety myself create!

    The smaller the plot of land, the more difficult it is to make it lovely and useful - in big grounds you can have wide spaces of nothing but on a small plot every inch counts to make it perfect to be seen from the house, and to be used for cooking and decorating!

    Gardens are somewhat like other "esthetes" habits - have to be as useful and beautiful and easy to take care of. And each garden should suit its owner, and the time the owner has to spend on it. If you have only a little time to spend on it then the plants, veg and shrubs should be ones which only need a little taking care of, a little water, but giving maximum effect....and maximum tast too - in every sense of the word!

    luv and happy spade....and you can count on me if you decide to get going.....October is beginning time for gardens of next spring and summer!!!!

    NG

    ReplyDelete
  5. Nah - just clear the garden and turn the whole lot into a veggie patch. Grow yer own!

    The soil's probably had loads of time to recover if it's been sitting dong nothing for a few years so dig some compost in and plant the potatoes for Winter.

    Wish I had a garden, you lucky devil!! I might invest in on of those grow bags for the balcony actually.

    Mmmm tomatoes...

    ReplyDelete
  6. I used growbags for some tomatoes this year. They did well. We didn't need to buy tomatoes this summer.

    ReplyDelete

Comments are bienvenue.