In my blog How does your garden grow. I mentioned that one of our projects is the planting of fruit bushes. We have started small and will see how everything develops.

We have chosen to start a fruit garden for a number of reasons, the main one being we love a challenge!

I walk, or cycle to the market stalls selling fruit en vegetables every day and there is an abundance of seasonal produce for sale. Now there is an abundance of plums, nectarines, tomatoes, cucumber, courgettes and aubergines and of course melons. Apricots are also another fruit that when in season like now they are readily available. I must admit my repertoire of recipes using apricots is pretty limited.

The tomatoes are coming into season and they are big, red and juicy with oodles of flavour, served simply with some salty cheese and a splattering of olive oil, the famous Shopska Salad, is the best starter to any meal as every restaurant in Macedonia will vouch for, read about this traditional salad hier > Eating out in Macedonia.

More summer fruits are not available, when I was here in May there were strawberries for sale but you had to be very quick as they were piled onto the stalls in the morning and by the afternoon the wasps where in ecstasy! We are used to walking into the supermarket and being greeted by kilo’s of blueberries and avocado’s. I did find one avocado in a supermarket the other day but have yet to find blueberries or any kind of berries anywhere.

When I visited in January the stalls were full of oranges and apples, (which are now not available, or certainly not edible). There is a lot to be said about seasonal produce and I realise how entitled we are by just looking up a recipe, thinking I fancy making that and knowing that you will be able to go to the supermarket and source all the ingredients you need. Here I see what is on offer and then I decide what I am going to cook and sometimes you have to look past the aesthetics as the produce, on closer inspection is not always what we are used to.

Now, I am not someone who would choose appearance over flavour and being an avid allotment owner and grower of my own vegetables I hail all shapes and sizes and have no qualms whatsoever that my produce would never, and I mean never in a million years meet EU standards, but the taste is without doubt above and beyond better most produce bought in a regular supermarket.

However, where I do have a problem is the fact that I sometimes get home and find that the produce is inedible, for example, I bought a large piece of root ginger and found it to be totally rotten, I have also now got some plums which refuse to ripen and are so sour it hurts my teeth. Mind you, they will taste wonderful when I make a plum clafoutis with them 🙂

My biggest problem with the fresh produce here is the use of pesticides. There are few regulations about the use of pesticides and the regulations that are in place are not enforced, it just means that all produce is washed very thoroughly and everything possible is peeled, and believe me the taste is pretty good!

Peppers are a big favourite here, and Johan loves them, the spicier the better, although the stall holders always warn me that the pepper is “začineta” (spicy) and offer me an alternative.

Maybe growing peppers could be another project, I have no doubt that they would grow perfectly in this climate.

At the end of summer you can see all the peppers being dried in the sun, ready for the winter months.

I digress, back to our fruit garden.

Our challenge is to cultivate the gooseberry, blueberry and blackberry bushes that we have recently planted.

As they say variety is the spice of life so we decided that it would be fun but also healthy to produce some own crops. We have thought about trees but then realised that we would probably have such big crops and the fruit would end up rotting on the grounds which we really do not want, so we decided fruit bushes are the answer.

Blackberry bushes are very versatile, we have one at home on our allotment which is probably 20 years old and produces wonderful blackberries every year. It takes a lot of care, pruning and training along the trellis to prevent it growing like wildfire but it is well worth it.

We have planted 4 blackberry bushes, the Chester Thornless which is very productive and grows well in hot, dry climates. 4 seems like quite a lot of blackberry but we are waiting to see if they will establish and grow.

The gooseberry bush is really hardy, although dramatic to pick the gooseberries due to the nasty sharp thorns on the bushes! But there is only so many gooseberries you can eat, but we will see. We have planted 3 Orgrozd Invicta gooseberry bushes.

You can see in the photo that the leaves of the gooseberry bush look scorched and dry, in the right hand photo you can see the sprinkler system (the little red dot) which I explained in my blog How does your garden grow. . Unfortunately we have had to turn the sprinkler system off the last couple of days as we have been having sewerage repairs done in the garden. One day, when I have recovered from the trauma of a blocked sewerage I might write a blog about it! Anyway, the workmen didn’t appreciate being sprayed by the sprinkler system every afternoon at 14.00 hrs so we turned it off. Fortunately we got it going again today so the plants are getting their well deserved drink.

As you can see it is absolutely essential and fine when we are here to water the plants but Johan, although he is here a lot is not here 365 days a year to water everything.

Then comes the blueberry bushes; this is quite exciting. Obviously blueberries are a hype with the healthy food brigade and have been labelled as a ‘ super food’ due to their high antioxidants, a quick google search comes up with a lot of research into the positive effects of blueberries:

Proven health benefits of Blueberries: protect against heart disease; cancer, maintains bone strength, mental health and a healthful blood pressure.

These Blueberries, and we have 4 plants, are the variety Nero Aronia, the berries should be tasty and fresh. What is also nice about this variety is the foliage turns deep red in the autumn making it really attractive. I have had no luck with growing Blueberries in the Netherlands so am very curious as to the results here.

Watch this space!