It’s long overdue but the season seems to finally be settling into a more predictable rhythm. From September to December last year, the challenges of getting the greenhouse built and set up, travel, erratic weather, a lingering illness and end of year burnout set me back and put a damper on my garden mojo. But the garden trundles along, with some disappointing fails and a few unexpected bumper harvests – and the eternal redemption of the ‘reset’ button that comes with every new planting cycle.
On that note, a while ago I started following (as much as practical) a moon planting calendar. While I can’t say for certain if it’s had any substantial impact on the germination rates of my seedlings or success of plantings, the division of chores into blocks is a helpful way of taking a less scattershot approach, and breaking tasks up into different focus areas, whether it’s fertilising, pruning, sowing or mowing. If you’re interested in getting your own perpetual calendar, check out this local business.
January is when cherry season is in full swing in the Huon Valley despite the late start to the season. While my own were picked and eaten a few weeks ago, there’s a decent number of cherry orchards around with everyone having their personal preference on the best places to get them. For me it’s the Woodbridge cherries where I’ll grab a few bags of seconds to make cherries in port syrup, spiced cherries (great for cheese and pickle spreads) and freeze a few to use in a traditional French clafoutis throughout the year.
Equally, there’s something of a local frenzy to secure stone fruit from a particular orchard (IYKYK) – and as my apricots failed for what is probably the 6th year in a row (they’re getting replaced by cider apples this winter, I’ve had it!) they’re who I rely on for getting my annual supply of bottled apricots sorted. They keep saying they’re going to close one of these days which may cause a riot.
Finally, I found a local PYO blueberry patch (which seem to be getting more scarce of late) and spent a pleasant sunny morning in late January filling up a few buckets.
Moving along from what I bought from others, my own main harvests for this month have been the peach tree (which went above and beyond, producing somewhere close to 100kg of fruit this year), raspberries, gooseberries, basil and rapidly ripening tomatoes.
Dealing with a produce glut can be a short-term, high-stress, full-time job and while it’s often tempting to just give up, leave it to the wildlife and enjoy a clean kitchen for 15 minutes, it’s always worth the effort to keep ploughing through – kitchen benchtop cleanliness be damned. It’s also helpful to imagine yourself having a summer fruit pie in the middle of winter.
The peaches were transformed into an assortment of bottled fruit – including batches using bayleaf, amaretto, vanilla, and cardamom for unusual flavour accents – and the rest that weren’t eaten fresh were dried, frozen, made into jam or given to friends and family.
Excess basil is perfect for pesto but this year I’ve put a fair amount in the dehydrator (while it’s easy to air dry, using the dehydrator seems to lock in a lot more flavour) and made batches of basil butter that I roll up in baking paper and store in the freezer – delicious on steaks or in pasta.
I’ll be starting to bottle tomatoes in earnest next month, for now I’m storing them in the freezer until I have enough to do my first big batch. I’ve never been one for growing saucing tomatoes in any real quantity and just do a blend of whatever’s ready – from oxhearts to tiny cherry tomatoes and I think it helps boost the acidity which can be a risk factor in tomato preserves. For a crop that requires a consistent 7+ month investment from germination to harvest, I make sure nothing is wasted and I’ll even use the dehydrator to dry out the skins which I then blend up into a fine powder. 2025 was definitely the ideal year to set up a greenhouse as a lot of people are lamenting their poor tomato crops this year.
Finally, my spring-planted crop of potatoes was ready for harvest – most of which go into a dark spot in the pantry to be enjoyed over autumn and winter.
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