Page 34 - Simply Vegetables Spring 2021

Kieran O’Keefe
back garden. His onions were planted in December and the celery was planted in February in the greenhouse, this was before COVID-19. His potatoes were planted in April and the peas planted the middle of May.
Ken presented a top-quality collection consisting of Kelsae onions, Evening Star celery, Show perfection peas and Nadine potatoes. The onions were grown in 20 litre pots in his polytunnel. The onions were around 4lb in weight.
Third place went to Kieran O’ Keefe, Co. Waterford. Kieran produced a top-quality collection of vegetables. His carrots and Parsnips were of the highest standard. It really was a shame that he could not publicly display such showstoppers in 2020. Highly commended went to John Joe Mollen, Co. Offaly.
Margaret Prendergast
JJ Mollen
Results Non-Members
Margaret Prendergast from Co. Mayo was the winner of our non-members section. Margaret’s garden is a beautiful maintained, traditional kitchen garden in which she grows organic vegetables, fruit and herbs all year around. Margaret’s garden was sown
at intervals in 2020. She had bought some seed prior to the Covid 19 lockdown but had to wait for the garden centre to open again before she managed to get some more.
Margaret sowed seven varieties of potatoes on 15th April and sowed her onion sets in October 2019. The white material on the ground is crushed eggshell to keep the slugs out. She does not use any chemicals in the garden.
The four vegetables Margaret choose to present were potatoes, onions, lettuce and peas. The peas are the Onward variety. The Lettuce is Lolla Rossa.
JJ Mollen
There are two types of onions. The red onions are the variety Electric while the white are Senshyu Yellow. There are six varieties of potato. On the left, from bottom up are British Queen, King Edward and Blue Danube. On the right from bottom up are Golden Wonder, Kerr’s Pink and Rooster.
We welcome Margaret to the National Vegetable Society as one of our new members.
“Thank you and your fellow Society committee members for facilitating this competition. The presentation of the results is so well put together. I am delighted
to have won the non-members section. However, the best bit for me is the fact that it gave a focus for this incredibly different and difficult year.”
Margaret Prendergast
34 Simply Vegetables
Margaret Prendergast
Margaret Prendergast