Saturday morning’s been and gone, the rest of the Leeks have gone in today along with a variety of Lettuce and Kohlrabi plants [beneficial A].

If you’ve never tried Kohlrabi, it’s a member of the Brassica family which grows into a Turnip shaped ball on the stem of the plant. Personally I’ve had far better results in my garden with the early Vienna white variety over the purple globe variety. Cook as a normal vegetable either steamed or boiled in chunks, dice or slice. Try it raw in your next salad coarsely grated and tossed in a mix of Olive Oil & lemon juice, mmmmmmm.

On another issue I was asked what does a vegetarian use as a filling in Shepherds or Cottage pie. Well given that it was last Winter let’s see if we can remember:

Onion and Garlic fried in Olive Oil until golden, then add Dried Paprika and Ginger.

For the protein source use a pre cooked savoury Lentil recipe which you can find on the Recipe base, We simmer Brown lentils in a miso stock with whatever herbs take our fancy or alternatively if we fancy Vegetarian “junk food” we use pre-soaked TVP mince or preferably TVP chunks. Yes I know it’s a manufactured Soy product but a Veggie’s gotta have a junk fix too, it is beneficial.

Add whatever diced vegetables are in season or your favourites, we use Carrot, Pumpkin, Peas and Parsnip. Any of the following herbs fresh or dried, Oregano,Thyme,Rosemary or whatever you like really. Simmer it all in a frying pan [skillet] in a Miso stock enriched with either a dark Soy sauce or red wine. Cook until tender and thicken with Arrowroot of necessary. Turn it out into a casserole or pie dish and top with the Parsnip mash I mentioned earlier in the week.

On a none food related issue I was asked earlier this week for my thoughts on the fact that reprints of ER4YT are still published with the original errors and none of the changes to food values in them. Now I don’t know what are the rights and wrongs of this issue in the publishing world about when a reprint becomes a second or third edition. I suspect that a reprint is just that ,errors and all and that a later published edition would possibly have the corrections made. Maybe somebody reading this who works in the publishing business could clarify this for me. The reprints of the book in Australia certainly contain all the original typo’s and food data errors. Jenny maybe this is an issue you could put to the books publisher in Australia. I will ask Dr D for you though.

In the words of a well known Australian TV gardener “That’s you’re bloomin’ lot”