End of autumn comes too soon

Before the frost and snow hit I managed to gather in the pumpkins and butternut squashes – a barrowful!

The butternut were planted a bit late this year, hence their green rather than yellow colouring, but in fact they ripened up ok once left to dry and harden off. I’ve just used the last of the pumpkins having already made some soup with some of the others earlier.

Another end of  autumn harvest was the last of our apples, and the sweet chestnuts from our tree which is now in it’s teens. Some of the chestnuts are getting to a decent size now and Colin made some fantastic soup with half of those we harvested. There are still lots of small ones though, but we haven’t actually given the tree any fertiliser so maybe that’s still to be expected.

I would like to get some hazel planted too so we can harvest the nuts and wood – we need some hedging to try and filter the wind when it’s stormy. But that’s for the future and meanwhile it’s more apples and chestnuts :

Tarte tatin anyone?