When fresh veg isn't fresh

It’s 10 days since we started our holiday now and the homegrown veg is beginning to run out. It has lasted amazingly well, and better than the “fresh” veg we bought in the supermarket to supplement it. We have enjoyed fried courgette with shallot, mushroom and garlic almost every day and there is one courgette left in the fridge, along with 2 cloves of garlic and a few more shallots. We cooked and ate the beetroot almost straight away so that has all gone now. There is even the heart of our lettuce left looking green and perky. When I picked the peas and mangetout I picked everything I could find including some which had gone papery to encourage a continued crop but these older peas started to go mouldy a few days ago. Clearly I should have discarded these straight away but even so we finished up the peas yesterday and the last mangetout today.

Obviously with homegrown veg almost finished I had to buy some more fresh veg today whilst in the supermarket. Some broccoli and carrots, fresh salad leaves and some more mangetout. It wasn’t until I got the shopping back to the cottage that I spotted that the mangetout were from Zambia. Zambia!! Good grief! Why are we importing mangetout from Zambie in July for goodness sake?! Great big, dark green, perfectly flat things there were and (when I unwrapped them from their cellophane) floppy too. Not like the homegrown ones – bright green, small, bumpy in places but crisp. I de-stringed them before cooking them but then choked on another layer of string with my first mouthful. They were too big when they were picked and too long off the plant before they reached the supermarket. Fresh veg… don’t make me laugh!