A Fruitful Fortnight

This last few weeks I have mainly been preserving. My parents have had bumper crops of plums and apples this year (4 plum trees, 2 apple trees). So they asked me to come and pick some of the fruit before it all fell to the floor in a rotting mess. The weekend before last I went back to Oxford with Charlotte and Jon and we set to work relieving the trees of their fruit.
Here's the view from under one of the plum trees:

These are Victoria plums. Delicious. 

Here was the bounty after thirty minutes or so of picking: 

Out of this, the apples and also some rhubarb from the allotment, I have made:

6 jars of Spiced Port and Plum Jam

4 jars of Plum and Lime Jam

4 jars of Plum, Anise and Vanilla Jam

2 jars of Rhubarb and Vanilla Jam

4 small jars of Apple and Chilli Jelly 

4 jars of Plum Chutney

4 jars of Apple and Raisin Chutney

A very productive way to spend the summer holidays, even if it has left me, and my house, smelling slightly of vinegar. I'll post a photo when I can figure out how to get pictures off Andrew's camera. 

Special thanks are due to my beloved father whose love of apricot jam made all this possible. And to my beloved mother for cleaning and saving all the jars.  Sadly Pops appears to have gone off apricot jam in the last few months, so I'm going to have to find a new source of jam jars...

Now to find a recipe for courgette jam...

August Update

Here are a few photos of what's growing.

Tomatoes: The tomatoes in June, not long after we got them. 

 Here are the tomatoes now. Haven't they grown?! You can't see any tomatoes growing on this photo, although there are a few in there. You can see a nice yellow flower though, that will hopefully soon be a tomato too. These plants smell amazing.

Courgettes: You can see quite a few lovely yellow courgettes growing here. We have four courgette plants. We've been dining very well on courgettes this summer. 

Marigolds: Aren't they pretty?

Runner Beans: With marigolds in front and fennel behind. This time last year we'd been feasting on runners for weeks, but they've yet to grow any beans this year. I think we planted them much later this year, and it's also been colder. And I haven't been watering them as much. Hopefully there'll be some beans in the Autumn. 

So, that's about it. We've also got a load of onions, lots of delicious potatoes, two very tiny aubergines and a random brassica which Andrew planted but I can't remember what it is. Only one survived. We'll find out what it is when it starts growing properly. We did also have some seedlings growing at home, pumpkins and squash and other Autumnal fare, but the b***** squirrels that live in our garden dug them all up. Will have to make more use of the greenhouse next year.