Post Comment Love 16 - 18 November

Hello there and welcome to this week’s #PoCoLo a friendly linky where you can link any post published in the last week. If you were here last week, it was great to see you and if you’re new here this week, then you’re very welcome. Both Morgan and I know you’ll find some great posts to read, and encourage you to pop over to some of the posts linked and take the time to leave a comment or two so that everyone benefits from some extra love.

We spent last weekend in Devon, I know, two weekends away on the trot, such a gad-about! It was great though and we enjoyed an evening at a WWI celebratory dinner in the local pub, and I ticked off the fourth and final RHS garden visit of the year. In fact that’s the post I’ve linked up today to mark the occasion, looking back at some pictures from each of the gardens.

My photo this week is from the vegetable garden at RHS Rosemoor, and you might not believe me but this beauty is a Peacock White Kale. It’s easy to see how it got its name isn’t it?

Blogger Showcase: Kate from Kate on Thin Ice

It’s always nice to feature one of our regular linkers in the Blogger Showcase slot, and Kate is one of them. If you are too then I’m sure you’ve already read a post or two on Kate’s blog. But did you know she started blogging at the suggestion of her mum who reminded Kate that she’d always wanted to write? Or that she blogged anonymously for many years, but now loves to share her personal joys and challenges?

You can find out more about Kate and her blog over at Morgan’s this week, but before you go make sure you’re connected with Kate on her social channels: Twitter - Facebook - Pinterest

An InLinkz Link-up

The Dutch Garden and Orangery at Hestercombe

We visited Hestercombe Gardens in Somerset earlier in the year, much earlier in the year, which explains the grey skies in some of these photos. In fact later on the day of our visit it snowed, and we ended up cutting short our weekend, which we learnt this past weekend was a good call as the Devon village where we were staying was cut off for three days. Or perhaps, we didn’t make the right call after all, depends on your viewpoint I guess…

This shot of the ornate garden was taken on the Dutch Garden side looking through to the Mill Pond, and it’s a hint at the formality and grandeur of the Dutch Garden.

Turning around, you can see the more formal planting, along with those grey snow-laden skies I mentioned before.

As you can see the planting had yet to spring into life, the pots would be full of tulips in the weeks to come, but not for our March visit. It’s at this time of year though that you can more easily see a garden’s structure, and I always think if it looks good without the plants, then it can only look better when they’re in flower.

We’ll have to go back again when there’s more in the garden, as I’m sure it will have a completely different feel. It’s a good garden to visit, so it won’t be any hardship, and you know how much I’m a fan of independent gardens as well as those of the RHS and National Trust.

We knew from the garden map that there was an Edwin Lutyens Orangery near to the Dutch Garden and looking to our right we quickly spotted it looking majestic a few steps away.

As with many of these gardens we visit, even the pathways have added interest and we discovered this to be the case as we walked past the in bud magnolia to see more of the Orangery.

And stepping inside was everything I expected an Orangery to be, and quite an elegant space.

With citrus fruits too, although they had a way to go before picking I’m sure.

The exterior uses Somerset’s yellow hamstone which even on the greyest of day has a great colour. Looking at the Hestercombe site, it’s available to hire for weddings, which seems a great use for the space, now I’m thinking I need to be a wedding guest there, but on a sunny day please!

Pumpkins at RHS Rosemoor

So many pumpkins! As we entered the gardens at RHS Rosemoor in Devon last Friday our first stop was the trestle tables stacked long and high with pumpkins. Some I recognised, some made me laugh, some I’ve grown, some that looked ugly and all colours too, I mean just look:

How many did you recognise?

I’m sure the blue/grey one is a Crown Prince, and there’s definitely some onion or Red Kuri squash which I’ve grown in the past. The fact that these are the two I easily recognised shows which type of pumpkins I like. Both of these have dense sweet flesh, which is quite unlike the watery flesh of the pumpkins that are often carved for Halloween.

More recently I’ve outsourced my pumpkin growing (and potato growing for that matter) to dad often arriving with potatoes to be planted out or a packet of pumpkin seeds as part of a Christmas present. And then later in the year leaving with the fully grown crops, which works very well for me. I’m still hoping for some of these blue/grey pumpkins, although I think I could quite happily skip the longer gourd-like one in the photo below.

Further into the garden, in the greenhouse in the vegetable garden, there were yet more pumpkins. These decorating the shelves and ledges and looking just as fantastic here as they did at the garden’s entrance. We ate in the cafe, sharing a ploughman’s and a cream tea, mainly because we couldn’t decide whether to have lunch or tea and cake, and so did the next best thing and did both.

The cafe uses the produce grown in the garden, and I’ve a feeling that the next few months will involve a fair bit of pumpkin! Luckily it’s a versatile ingredient isn’t it? Although often it’ll become a soup with chilli (they had a few of those on the go too), I do keep meaning to be a little more adventurous and perhaps try some pumpkin scones, or pumpkin jam or curd.

I do have a Norfolk pumpkin (one grown by dad) to use but I’m not sure how just yet. My other favourite pumpkin meal is wedges roasted with chilli and garlic and served with brown rice and some homemade spiced ketchup. It’s a wholesome meal, but one that tastes oh so good too.

Before I go off to browse even more pumpkin recipes, there was one last one that made me smile at Rosemoor, and that’s this one.

It was the only one left clinging to the arched walkway, which had it not been wouldn’t have given a clue that they were grown here, and I’d have been none the wiser. This one though had wedged its way between the gaps, and the only way to shift it would be to cut the flesh.

That’s one wily pumpkin…