This time was no different.
It was evening, the girls were tired but they too couldn't help but ooh and aahh at the garden with me. I watered some essentials, picked a couple of cucumbers and zucchinis and of course pulled a few weeds before making it inside.
I also happily picked some of the tops off the basil.
Picking the tops helps stop it going to seed and encourages leaf growth.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6QJ1VgEBa-ojtJC9jAcWt5uf6Hsjuv7olEmHDHN-jaZbCmhiu_jonJzcHlQQb94ghgF2u8fUynerBP2qQFQguvxRRC68FYFUPqXH9h4hNxDMzshYSH_kO_HEs5z2C7vqyucN1XVNRiWFF/s320/basil.jpg)
I'm so happy it is basil time again.
Pesto is what I mainly keep my basil for.
Pesto, without the parmesan cheese, in pasta, on a loaf of foccacia bread I am baking, on a sandwich or a pizza or, as the girls prefer it, straight off the spoon.
And I usually have a bit left over to pop in the ice cube tray and freeze - the ice cubes is just my way of creating a free-flow form of pesto.
By the end of Summer I have tons of little ice cubes of pesto in my freezer ready for quick winter meals.
I love that.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDh0nOKoWS8jOizXOn5EBJmZJUHkOi1Nna_PdFWJ2rDN5iT5lgh5K9jGfRi2W_NCVlp4V5so__QCi8vkJbPEuTsqLWubLccq1XfrAobS9QRowUG4E-punbk2yaakp1lwqDEF4Mi2oAM8N2/s320/garlic1.jpg)
The morning after we arrived home, I got up and harvested the garlic. Apart from needing it for the pesto, the tops were seriously browning and I was keen to clear the bed.
I usually plant my garlic from May to early July, not often on the traditional Winter Solstice. I generally harvest early-mid January depending on how it looks and on our holiday plans.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6QJ1VgEBa-ojtJC9jAcWt5uf6Hsjuv7olEmHDHN-jaZbCmhiu_jonJzcHlQQb94ghgF2u8fUynerBP2qQFQguvxRRC68FYFUPqXH9h4hNxDMzshYSH_kO_HEs5z2C7vqyucN1XVNRiWFF/s320/basil.jpg)
I'm so happy it is basil time again.
Pesto is what I mainly keep my basil for.
Pesto, without the parmesan cheese, in pasta, on a loaf of foccacia bread I am baking, on a sandwich or a pizza or, as the girls prefer it, straight off the spoon.
And I usually have a bit left over to pop in the ice cube tray and freeze - the ice cubes is just my way of creating a free-flow form of pesto.
By the end of Summer I have tons of little ice cubes of pesto in my freezer ready for quick winter meals.
I love that.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDh0nOKoWS8jOizXOn5EBJmZJUHkOi1Nna_PdFWJ2rDN5iT5lgh5K9jGfRi2W_NCVlp4V5so__QCi8vkJbPEuTsqLWubLccq1XfrAobS9QRowUG4E-punbk2yaakp1lwqDEF4Mi2oAM8N2/s320/garlic1.jpg)
The morning after we arrived home, I got up and harvested the garlic. Apart from needing it for the pesto, the tops were seriously browning and I was keen to clear the bed.
I usually plant my garlic from May to early July, not often on the traditional Winter Solstice. I generally harvest early-mid January depending on how it looks and on our holiday plans.
This year I planted it into a no-dig garden of newspaper, horse manure, leaves, seaweed, garden weeds and straw. Friends had brought the main ingredients around as gifts for my compost. I hadn't got to making a compost but I needed somewhere to plant the garlic and so I just lay it down on the grass and left it for 6 weeks.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDGZVVBxZEa0GSWdd9awSZOSNdDF69ttXrBfap-tqFfsomXRg_3S9_7naTt8WD4gbyF-ohrmBUlXR8PJH8CN5pT87JFlBp0D8zHRMuKmGO6I4LZ5EO1yExdlGCXrE73VKg3bXnmKz222dM/s320/garlic.jpg)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDGZVVBxZEa0GSWdd9awSZOSNdDF69ttXrBfap-tqFfsomXRg_3S9_7naTt8WD4gbyF-ohrmBUlXR8PJH8CN5pT87JFlBp0D8zHRMuKmGO6I4LZ5EO1yExdlGCXrE73VKg3bXnmKz222dM/s320/garlic.jpg)
With little else other than a bit of wet and a bit of warm ( and the odd touch of worm juice) we have a years worth of good sized garlic hanging in the shed.
We'll put aside some of the larger cloves for seed in the winter.
The rest we will eat.
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