Page 36 - Simply Vegetables Autumn 2021

It’s sow simple...
BY EMILY PLUMB FNVS
Some of the new varieties we’ve tried in 2021...
We thought we would take a look at some of the new varieties that we’ve tried for 2021 in this article, as a look back at some of the things we’ve learnt and some of the new varieties we definitely hope to grow again next year!
Courgettes
As everybody has probably guessed by now, courgettes are one of my favourite things to eat! And so it wouldn’t have been right not to try a couple of new varieties for 2021. The ones I wanted to mention here are Piccolo and Black Forest.
Two very different varieties,
one is round and the other a more traditional shape respectively, but both seemed to enjoy being grown in their containers well enough, so they’re winners for us as space is of the essence in our garden. Our main learning from this year with our container courgettes is that perhaps we need to give them longer stakes, as they were up the top of them by mid-August which
unfortunately meant that they had to be lopped down a bit earlier than perhaps they needed to be. That being said, all was not lost, we had sowed a later sowing so we could replace them and keep us in good supply of courgettes for as long as possible (weather permitting!)
Piccolo
Black Forest
36 Simply Vegetables
Cucumbers
We went a bit mad on the new varieties of cucumbers this year, trying Salt and Pepper and Striped Armenian in addition to our usually favourites. Needless to say, it was quite a task to train them round
all sides of what is only a 6’ x 8’ greenhouse. We had them going up, down, criss-crossing one another and all sorts to try and give them the longest run we could. And once we’d exhausted that, we let a side shoot grow quite low down on the plant and went all over again!
The cucumbers were successful enough, but both varieties weren’t your standard cucumbers. The Salt and Pepper produce an oversized pale-yellow gherkin-type of
fruit, and the Striped Armenian can only be described as a furry skinny marrow-looking cucumber! Apparently, the Striped Armenian are not a true cucumber, and instead related to melons. And I think that could be right as when you pinch out a side shoot, there
is a definite “melon-y” smell in the greenhouse.
The Salt and Pepper was a good cropping variety, setting fruits every couple of leaf axles. The Striped Armenian on the other hand kept us in suspense for absolutely ages. The plant seemed perfectly healthy,
Striped Armenian growing