Grumblegarden: Progress

Ugh I’ve been a bit busy busy busy recently and working at home is torture because all I want to do is faff about with the seedlings and pick at the bigger tomato plants and make sure everyone is getting enough sun. I’ve also realised or identified a very dangerous Grumblegarden predator and that is the lesser spotted flatmate – whether it’s fag butts in their pots or knocking the plots or as I found out this weekend their lack of watering the plants after I’ve asked them! Ho hum. Anyway I got my first tomato last week which was very exciting!

I also got my first ladybird which is awesome as she can keep the pesky green / whitefly away from my chilli plant.I’m going to call her Billie after Billie Holiday who was really called Lady Day.

And recently I’ve been befriending the people in all my local delis and getting them to give me all their old tin cans which I’ve been painting and then this weekend I’ll transfer some of my tomato seedlings into them.

GrumbleGarden: Flowering not Flourishing

So I skipped home this weekend and proudly boasted to my mum how my lettuce leaves and rocket were flowering. I thought that this meant or perhaps proved how much of a badass gardener I was. Turns out I was wrong wrong wrong! Mother dear told me about something called bolting and it means that the flower is trying to steal all the goodness from the actual plant.

Anyway – long story short I immediately ripped the flowers from their stems as soon as I got home – the balcony may have fewer flowers but long may the grumblegarden prosper.

GrumbleGarden: Picture Update

So I went away back to my parents this weekend – good times, chatting with my mum under trees that she’d planted essentially when I was born. Kind of reminded me of Marx’s theory of alienation which I love and also one of the reasons I think I dabble in the art of growing things on my balcone [bal-cone].

Luckily I have these massive windows in my flat so when the sun is out it’s a bit like living in a greenhouse which pisses my flatmates off but I love it.

So when I went home I pestered my mum for saplings so I could become a grand master bonsai dude and as it turns out she had a couple of baby trees for me – this is my baby beech.

This is a ind of bad photo of my flowering Japanese cherry tree that my mum also donated me – the plan is to let both trees get a bit settled before I start hacking at them.

These are the two tomato plants – one is doing super well but the other is being crowded by the lavender – need to start shifting things around but troubled by what to put next to the lavender.

And here’s a little photo of the garden getting some sun with a lot of seedlings in prime sun position.

GrumbleGarden: Saturday Photos

Today was a scorcher! Didn’t see one cloud all day. I spent most of today taking photos of things on the balcony.

It was so hot I took a few of my tomato seedlings out to get some proper sun – here’s one of the little ones with my big tomato plant behind it.

My tumbling toms in the basket are getting their first flowers which I think means tomatoes are soon to follow!

Some of my little lettuce leaves are getting big enough to eat – I actually muched on some of the rocket today – nom nom nom.

And then the sun went down – awesome day.

GrumbleGarden: Has a posse

Yeah I know this is probably only 1 step away from garden gnomes but whatever.This one actually reminds me of Coachella.

GrumbleGarden: Introducing the band

So a month or so ago something finally snapped and I cleaned up my festering balcony. For the past couple of years it’s been home to all sorts of rubbish like paint pots, some broken chairs, a lot of fag butts and some other old crap. I cleared everything out and then took a trip up Columbia Rd and got myself some plants. It started off with a couple of mini fir tree things and some window boxes with some cheap flowers (can’t remember the names). I did treat myself to an Acer and I had a couple of desert looking plant things donated by Grumblegirlfriend when she moved flat.

I instantly became hooked and it’s grown into a tiny wilderness in a matter of weeks. The window boxes now are home to a small rosemary bush, some tomato plants (not grown from seed), some rocket and mixed salad leaves and a couple of lavender plants. I’ve got 2 more tumbling tomato plants (red / yellow) in a hanging basket. I built some shelf things out of old paint pots and a bit of wood and they’re home to a big chive plant (donated my Grumblemum) a Sambucca plant (bday present from Grumblesister) and some little flower things. Also there’s my massive Olive tree which was a 3oth bday present from Grumblefriends.

Also in the little wall mounted thing behind the Acer is a chilli plant, some corn on the cob and some other herb thing that I can’t remember the name of.

Then on the windowsill in the kitchen there’s my nursery where I’m trying to grow my seeds – I’ve got basil, dill, corriander and oregano on one dish. 2 types of tomato in another. Lambs lettuce, mixed salad leaves and rocket in another AND a tray of Alfalfa sprouts which I love.

Ohhh and not to forget my favorite (shhh don’t tell the others as they might cry) is my new Larix (larch) bonsai that Grumblegirlfriend got me for my 30th – I love it so much and I’ve been reading loads about how to make your own bonsai recently so watch this space.

Anyway I haven’t blogged about anything for ages but now I’ve found something I’m passionate about again and also it’s nice to have some likeminded people out there such as Callum from The London Vegetable Garden, who is much more organised than  me, but perhaps equally excited about the prospect of growing your own food and stuff.

(apologies for this messy gallery – haven’t been on wordpress for a while – will sort it later)

London Pub Reviews

I just had the most awesome weekend and one of the highlights was finally going to Broadway Bookshop – it’s on Broadway Market which a pleasant but hectic way to spend a Saturday morning. I’ve never been to the bookshop because it looks so small but it’s a bit like a tardis inside. Anyway I ended up buying a book called London Pub Reviews and it’s awesome – written by a guy from New Zealand called Paul Ewen it’s these weird surrealist accounts of his vists to various pubs in London which always end up with him being ejected from the pub. When he visits the Golden Heart he somehow believes that the piano turns into a rocket propelled car, and when he visits Bradley’s in Soho he’s so convinced that the building would be better served as a swimming pool he tries to do the landlord a favour by flooding the toilets! It’s an awesome mix of fact and fiction – the descriptions of the pubs are spot on and the level of insanity seems to fit well with the ambiance of each place. Anyway if you see it you should buy it – the front cover looks like an old pub window – GOLD!!!!

Mangal Ocakbasi

Last night I watched the Barry inauguration at the Agricultural with @JoelBrazil @eatlikeagirl and @themakelouge – it was awesome and I loved Aretha’s hat. Then ran down the hill for a quick drink with Cheese and Biscuits, Food Stories, Hollow Legs, Foodie Guide and Eatlikeagirl – turns out @thirstforwine was hosting a drinks and dinner thing and I wasn’t invited which was cool cos then Grumblegirlfriend took me for dinner at Mangal Ocakbasi aka 2nd best lamb chops in London. Here’s my review from Tipped

Ocakbasi supposedly means open charcoal grill or something and I can confirm that they do indeed have a massive fucking grill with charcoals in it.

The decor is really simple, perhaps a bit ikea but hey its a restaurant and if you’re coming for tips on how to decorate your living room you’re going to be dissapointed. If however you’re coming to eat some meat gilled with charcoal then you have arrived my friend.

This is how it went down – 2 people, 1 order of Patlican Salata (Lightly grilled aubergine, peppers chopped & topped with yoghurt & butter) 1 order of Pirzola (grilled Lamb Chops) Special Karisik (selection of kebabs with quail and salad), 2 cokes and a basket of bread – BOOM!

The Patlican Salata was amazing, tasted a bit like a mexican salsa, quite spicy but not too much. The lamb chops were amazing, not quite as good as Tayyabs but really realy good. The Karisk was some Kofta, some cubed lamb, a lamb rib or steak or something, some chicken and half a quail. All of it was tasty but I was too full by the end of it to eat all the quail. The salad that it came with was massive and actually declicious – loads of gherkins and cabbage and carrots.

To finish with we both had a sweet tea which is kind of like a shot of hot tea that someone has been stewing for a couple of hours but seeing as this is how I like my tea I was in heaven.

All in all the bill came to less than £30 which considering how much we both ate is rediculous.

This is now one of my new favorite places to eat – full stop.

Oh and it’s BYOB so I stopped off at City Beverage for some awesome treats.

Why I haven’t posted for so long

Essentially I’ve been working my ass off at Tipped – It’s my ultimate job ever. I get to be nice to people, come up with awesome event ideas and drink a lot of beer (which actually makes me better at my job!)

However, everyone else manages to blog whilst working their awesome jobs, so why not me? Well there are a couple of blogs out there that make me question everything about blogging.

Hipster Runoff - Hipster Runoff is a parody of pretty much 95% of blogs out there – it strives for authenticity by constantly questioning authenticity – what is bloggable? why do we blog? why do we quest for authenticity? It’s truely awesome!

Riff Market – written by ex Village Voice (semi-disgraced) writer Nick Sylvester it’s pretty much the most inpenetrable awesome blog about music, life and the universe.

Both of these blogs are rediculously obtuse – in a world where people strive for homogeny without realising it these guys are keeping it real – by being so SO wilfully obtuse they make a mockery of the people that that just try to be niche or obtuse. But in doing so they end up being the only light of truth out there in the meme world of internets. Viral? Sticky? These guys OWN the internet and most people don’t know about them.

Anyway, the main reason I haven’t been blogging is that I want to be blogging like these guys but they do it so much better – don’t read this blog, save your time for reading them.

Tipped Chilli Cook-Off

Wow – I think I’m broken – I think I’ve completely overloaded my fun and awesomeness receptors or whatever. This weekend Tipped organised a Chilli Cook-Off and it fucking went off! 8 chilli cooks went head to head in a taste off at the Mucky Pup – the level of competition was insane – every chilli tasted amazing and most of them had very unique and distinct flavours.

Anyway everyone got to vote for their favorite and in the end the lovely Helen Graves of Food Stories emerged victorious.

However this was far from the end of the festivities – I built a couple of pinatas, one of which was a Sarah Palin pinata so we all squashed outside into the garden, necked a bunch of tequila and set about hitting boxes.

The Palin pinata was much more sturdy than we had previously thought so it was necessary for the Chilli Wizard to set fire to her!

We then all headed back inside where the Chilli Wizard DJ’d awesome old hair metal and cock rock and we danced until we fell over.

Thanks to Tiki Chris and Helen for the photos. I took some more photos here.