August is over, September is upon us, and there’s a bit of a feeling in the garden, and maybe more generally too, that the party’s pretty much over. Things just look a bit tired, with many plants having given their best and others struggling on gamely but clearly not as fresh and vigorous as they were earlier. Well it happens to the best of us.

So it’s not the most exciting time of year in the garden for me, but there are as always compensations. The first and most obvious is the harvest of late summer fruit and veg. I’m having a good year for tomatoes, with all three of my seed-sown batches doing well and tasting delicious. Miel de Mexique, from an organic seed packet I bought in the garden centre here in Brussels, is a lovely juicy sweet cherry tomato which comes from Mexico, as the name implies, and is a good choice for drought tolerance, although I water mine frequently as I grow most of my tomatoes in pots. Next is Davis UC-82 (odd name but great taste) a nice, deep red, reliable plum-shaped tomato, that’s good for passata and tomato soup. Finally I was given some beautiful beef-steak Portuguese tomatoes as seedlings. We are really enjoying these roasted in the oven with onions, garlic, squashes, mushrooms….yum. They were thirsty plants, but well worth the effort of a bit of extra watering. The combo of the different types and sizes worked well, one to try again next year.

Another great hit this year is the sweetcorn: what an amazing thing it has been to see these grow from their single corn seed into little seedlings, which I remember anxiously protecting from the cold by taking them into the shed each night in April when it got very chilly, then developing into towering majestic 5-6 foot tall plants and finally the miracle of a corn (or “ear”) from each of the seven plants in my little patch! They taste so delicate, sweet, with a soft melt-in-the mouth texture. The variety, Golden Bantam, is an heirloom one that became popular in the early 1900’s in the US, at a time when only white corn was considered good enough to eat, but Golden Bantam changed that. The seed company says they are robust plants producing two corns/ears per plant. Well I only got one per plant, but I’m still pretty pleased with them! I think I will grow sweetcorn every year from now on, they are the supermodels of the veg patch.

On the fruit front, we’re well into the apple season now, and here it’s been a mixed bag. We have two trees, a very old Cox variety and a 3 year old “Reine des Reinettes”, a very old French variety which is known as “King of the Pippins” in the UK. The old tree seems to be giving up, and we’ve hardly had anything from it, and those we do have are far too high up to reach, so what is up there is for the birds and the wasps. Our 3 year old Reine des Reinettes, however, is coming on strong, and we’ve enjoyed the slightly sharp but very juicy fruit, with its very pretty red-blushed skin.

On top of that, we’ve got a very big grape harvest coming up. The bunches on the vine, which grows alongside a section of our front path, are looking very healthy this year, and are now turning a gorgeous deep purple colour. Last year I made grape jelly with them, which turned out well, so I think I’ll do the same this year. As I’ve been vegetarian for over a year now, I don’t plan to eat the jelly in “the traditional way” with meat, but there are plenty of other combos: great with goat’s cheese and oatcakes; spread on toast for breakfast, or on a tea cake or Victoria Sponge…it also gives a good, sweet flavour to sauces and stews. Yes I know it’s full of sugar and bad for you, but we are only talking a teaspoon or two at a time here!

There’s another activity that makes me realise all is not quite over yet in the garden, and that is taking cuttings and offsets. There are new plants to be had, and they are right there growing in the garden, all one needs to do is take a cutting, cut some leaves off, add to a vermiculite-compost mix in a small pot and then wait for roots to form. I’ve done this with some rosemary, and might do the same with catmint (such a useful little plant) and a stupendous purple berberis growing in a nearby front garden: I’m sure the owner won’t miss a couple of sprigs of that. For me, berberis has the most breathtaking autumn colour, I have always wanted one, and damn it I will find a spot for it somewhere!

So, even if bits of the garden feel a bit drab, it’s worth reminding ourselves that there is lots to look forward to, just around the corner.

To finish off, here is a snapshot of what’s still looking good for the time of year.