Tag Archives: Ulluco

January vegetables from cellar and window sills

Last harvest of 2017 and the most colourful!

I harvested Ulluco and Oca tubers which I grow on indoors from the first frost to the end of the year!This is probably the last time I grow Ulluco for a while due to the UK advice to destroy all Ulluco currently being grown due to the danger of non-native viruses hopping over to other more important crops!

Happy New Edimental Year

Wishing all my friends, family and all the amazing folk I’ve met live and online this year a very happy green year in which things WILL begin to change for the better for our wonderful planet earth!
However, things are not changing for the better for ulluco (Ullucus tuberosus) in the bottom row in this animation as this is the last year I’m growing this wonderfully colourful root crop which I’ve been growing now since 2007 (see the comments below for the reason for this!)
The top two rows are oca (Oxalis tuberosus). Both are from the Andes and were harvested yesterday indoors (grown in large pots brought inside before the first frostsin October).
Animation by my daughter Avellana Hazel 

Ulluco

Andes in Malvik 2008

In 2008 I still had a greenhouse. After it was destroyed in the 26th December 2011 I decided not to rebuild it and to only grow hardy vegetables. However, in 2008, I grew a number of less hardy vegetables including several from the Andes mountains. One of these was Achocha (Cyclanthera pedata), although yields of fruits wasn’t very big  (I grew it for several years from 2002-2012) and I would have probably been better off eating the shoots and leaves which are also edible and pretty good! Interestingly, my Nepalese guests (see  http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=6118) told me it was commonly grown in Nepal and they not only used the small green fruits, but the top shoots and the black seeds. The latter are roasted, ground and mixed with salt, chili and perhaps lemon. The powder is also used as a flavouring in chutney!

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Picture: Achocha “Fat Baby” fruits 

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Pictures :  Various Andean vegetables in my garden on 12th July  Quinoa, Yellow Finn, Ulluco#1, Shetland Blue Eye; Achocha Fat Baby, Amaranth, Russepotet, Oca, Blå Congo, Ulluco#2, Mashua

Kosmorama/ Credo diversity dinner #1

Last night (8th March 2017) was the first of two events I had been asked to take part in celebrating the diversity of vegetables that our area has on offer (or could have on offer) even in winter! The Trondheim Kosmorama international film festival are showing two films related to food. Last night, the film “NOMA: My perfect storm” was shown and around 40 people also bought tickets to a fantastic 10-15 course, 4 hour meal (I lost count) at Trondheim’s NOMA: Credo!
I supplied a number of vegetables for the dinner and these are shown here, several being served for the first time in Norway :)
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All the veggies including Primula elatior (oxlip / hagenøkleblom flowers)
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Blanched dandelions (løvetann)
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Oca, ulluco, Hablitzia shoots (stjernemelde) and Chicago onio
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Blanched horseradish (top left) with blanched wild dandelion, Aleksandra garlic bulbil sprouts, Chicago onion (Allium cernuum), different types of Oca (Oxalis tuberosa) and Ulluco (Ullucus tuberosus – green tubers)
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Sweet cicely / spansk kjørvel seed sprouts at the top with blanched horseradish shoots at bottom and blanched wild dandelion on the right

End of the year Andes in Malvik tuber harvest

As the psychedelic (colour not effect) Andean tubers Oca (Oxalis tuberosa), Ulluco (Ullucus tuberosus) and Achira (Canna edulis) benefit from a longer season than I can give them outside, I grow them in buckets which I bring inside and harvest around Xmas time for a colourful christmas dinner…so here’s an album of this year’s harvest!

I was very surprised by one of the best ulluco harvests here, despite the leaves being mostly frozen off before moving the pots inside and not regrowing…I don’t understand…

 

3 Basellaceae for Xmas dinner

For Xmas dinner 2007, I made nut roast with roast vegetables including two members of the Basellaceae family (known as the Madeira vine family).  It contains the following genus:  Anredera, Basella, Ullucus and plantlist.org also assigns Tournonia hookeriana (previously Basella) to the same family.

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Roast green Ulluco with Madeira vine (at the back) and potatoes and Basella greens!

I also cooked some Basella alba (malabar or ceylon spinach) greens to serve with the dinner.

Is this the only time all 3 main members of the Basellaceae have been served together? ;)

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