Allotment geekery

1. We're a little unsure about the tomatoes, we've had fewer but they've been bigger.  Last year we grew plum, gardener's delight, black krim, cherry and tom-berry varieties.  This year we've gone with gardener's delight, principe borghese, and plum.  These varieties are much flesher than a lot of last years, the black krims we grew last year looked amazing but were powdery in texture (like over ripe apples) and the cherry and tom-berry ones were lovely but would split and ripen quicker than we could pick and use them.  
2. Massive shopping bags are a must at the moment to carry everything home.  You have no idea how much writing that makes me happy!  It finally feels like we're beginning to know what we're doing, and can make decisions based on our own experiences growing rather than shrugging and hoping we get lucky.
3. Successional planting of beetroot was one of my goals for this year and I've been doing well!  Plus I'm actually preserving it this year (boil the beetroot for two hours (!) in slightly salted water, once boiled the skins will rub off really easily, cool completely, chop up, bag into servings and freeze).
4. Eeep!  The pumpkins are coming along nicely, we didn't plant many this year because we didn't really use them in our cooking much and a couple of them rotted but one or two were a must.
5. We are in full on apple season and we've been out collecting blackberries so bramble jelly and apple and blackberry pie will be a must.
6. Our one pear.  Hmm might have to read up on how to care for pear trees...
7. MozzyMr tending to his courgettes, in previous years he hasn't been that bothered by courgettes but this year he seems to be into their care a lot more.  I think next year there may even been growing experiments to get the biggest yield *eye roll*.
8. If you have any left over bread crusts and a food processor, waz them up with some salt and pepper, a clove or two of garlic and some dried herbs (I usually use oregano or basil).  Cut your courgettes up into 1 cm thick sticks dip them in egg, coat them in the breadcrumb mix and bake at 200 c until golden.  Yummers.
9. My butternut squash panic earlier in the year my have been unfounded.  We have a lot of butternut squashes.  A LOT.