March update - garlic planted, beds readied, seeds planted

Spent a few hours planting up a few seeds - ran out of both window sill space and containers. Planted some tomatoes, basil, coriander, spring onion and a new variety of basil which I haven't tried before that is supposed to be hardy for Ireland - Sacred Basil Ocimum Sanctum from http://store.irishseedsavers.ie/

Also planted some bedding plants including French Marigolds, asylum and some other plants for different parts of the garden like Morning Glory and Nasturtium.

Enjoying the lovely spring flowers - crocus and mini daffodils. 

We have our light installed by our house name plate now which meant it was finally ready for planting - I had been holding off as even with the best of meaning, they would all have been trampled with the light installation. Planted some violas and 

My strawberry bed after clearing out. Not looking the healthiest after all the frost the last few nights. 

My strawberry nursery - planted my strawberry runners here ready for moving out and passing onto friends in the next month or so before the bed is needed. 

Got my three varieties of garlic planted - though I did have to re-plant a few after the neighbours cat decided to dig up a few!! Think the chicken manure I spread on the bed attracted the cat! 

 These two beds have been cleared down and the manure spread on them in Oct/Nov has mostly broken down in them. Almost ready for planting!

My first glimpse of purple sprouting brocoli! Can't wait to taste as its one I have never had before! 

New paving stones - just put them out in temporary positions at the weekend. Have to figure out what we will do around them for the future with the beds. It does get so mucky when trying to collect the veg during the lovely Irish summer! 

Just a few views around the garden. Looking quiet well - only second year for the rock garden and even now has a nice bit of colour in it.

View back up the garden from the raised beds. 

A lot of digging over still left to be done. 

Strimmed the wild flower section - going to rotivate it again this weekend - it had too much grass planted with the flowers and was taking over. 

So much work to do - so little time ... 

For something different - check out straw bale gardening! 

Coriander

Coriander is a wonderful herb mainly used in Asian and Indian dishes ( that I am aware of). There are also a lot of old herbal remedies that use the Coriander herb. For more info have a look at the link below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coriander

To keep a ready supply of Coriander, it is best to make succession sowings every few weeks. For instance at the moment, I have some seeds just planted and in the hot press to germinate. I also have seeds that have germinated about two weeks.

And some ready for use. I plan to keep this up over the summer to have a ready supply of Coriander.

Coriander Chilli Chicken Noodle 
One of the simplest ways we sometimes use coriander is for a quick late night snack or quick bite to eat - takes all of 5 mins. For this we use chicken flavoured noodles (i.e. Maggi noodles), up to you if you prefer other varieties - chop half a chilli and add to the boiling water with the noodles and the chicken flavoured sachet. While thats cooking - cut and chop a couple of sprigs of Coriander - strain noodles and chilli, add Coriander and you suddenly have a lovely tasting quick snack with a taste of the Orient for only a few cents. Not necessarily the healthiest snack, but definitely a very flavoursome one.

Seeds
The seed from the Coriander plant can also be used in recipes and stored easily for the winter months or can be stored as your seeds for next year. It is best to plan to save seed from early summer sowings, to allow plenty of time for the seed to mature and dry on the plant. Harvest as soon as the seed is brown and dry, as it does tend to drop from the seed heads. Rub the heads together in your hands over a bucket to free the seed.


Nutritional values:
http://www.nutrition-and-you.com/cilantro.html
If these are true - its a pretty amazing plant!!

Yum Yum - cous cous recipe

My lovely fresh coriander didn't last long. Hadn't been shopping so had to do a search of the store cupboard to see what was available. As I had only cooked Couscous once before I was amazed at how well this all turned out. Unfortunately, the finished product was gobbled up before I had a chance to take a photo - will try and upload one when I repeat this dish.

Servings: 2 people 
Preparation time: 5mins
Cooking time: 5mins

Full chilli ( small red - depends on how much heat you like)
an inch of grated ginger
2 shallots
2 small garlic cloves

Peas
Couscous
Chopped coriander
Squeeze of fresh lime juice

First 4 fried off together - then cook peas - couscous for last minute
Empty lot into a bowl - add chopped coriander and squeeze of lime over the top fluffing the whole lot together with a fork

You can easily add whatever meat you like on the side.We had some pork steak that I marinated with a mix of 1ts of soy sauce, 1tbs of balsamic vinegar, about 3 tbs of ketchup, 2tbs of brown sugar - all mixed together and over trimmed 1/2inch cuts of pork steak. That was then put in the oven for about 30mins on 180C. Melt in the mouth! Yum Yum!!

This was a really quick meal to put together, definitely on of my better experiments from the store cupboard!

Although a coriander was hurt in the making of this dish, I have more coming along from seed as I had planted a few sowings of it a few weeks apart. I have also done this with the basil - but the basil is nowhere near eating stage ( think it would like a lot more sunshine than we have gotten in Ireland so far this year!).

I would love to hear what other people thought of this recipe when they try it! Or any feedback for improvements!