Where growing, making & good living come together

Growing salad leaves – frugal, organic & green

Posted by on Friday 25 June 2010 in eating, growing | 0 comments

I just sowed my fourth pot of loose salad leaves of the season.

We finished the last of the just-about-to-bolt Winter Gems lettuce this week and have got a tray of Lollo Rosso seedlings in our porch/greenhouse but loose leaves has been filling the gap between those beautifully – and in three or four weeks, this new pot will be offering up its tasty leaves too.

Until we started growing our own, my partner John and I weren’t big salad eater, but mostly from disorganisation than anything. We didn’t have meal plans and we’d regularly find lettuce going soggy/brown in our fridge – we’d buy it for one meal, then eat some more at a second but then we’d have meals that didn’t work with salad or eat out, and soon the lettuce would be past it. We realised that didn’t make sense from a frugal or food waste point of view so tended to not have it at all at home, to save the waste.

Now though, from early spring to about the first frosts, we can eat fresh salad leaves whenever we want them – and without waste. A little gem lettuce is just the right size for a meal for us, or for a sandwich, we can just pick a handful of loose/”pick and come again” leaves.

Read More

First post! Welcome to The Really Good Life

Posted by on Thursday 24 June 2010 in admin | 1 comment

Hi, welcome to The Really Good Life. I’m Louisa and I live really well – but frugally.

I already write about reusing and recycling on my blog “How Can I Recycle This?“, and about composting on my site “Can I Compost This?“, as well as blogging and running other sites but I wanted a new place to talk specifically about growing, making, foraging, cooking – and living a frugal life in general.

The name of this blog was originally going to be something highfaluting and fancy but thinking about it the other day, I realised it boils down to this: I’m living a Really Good Life. Like Tom & Barbara, I live in a city (specifically squished between two industrial cities), I grow my own veg, our chickens will arrive shortly and we live cheaply & sustainable – but with tasty food & pretty things, inside of nasty homemade wine and scratchy woollen underwear.

This blog is about the journey I’m making – because it is a journey – my thoughts, my questions (that hopefully other people will be able to answer!) and where I’ve got some info to pass on, my recommendations & my mistakes – and I hope you enjoy it.

Read More