A View From (Just Inside) The Greenhouse; British Values….Innit?

The picture above, although the quality doesn’t really do it justice, is of a tomato plant (never, I hear you say). It bears a small oval(ish) fruit which turns from green to yellow which, to be fair, does take slightly longer to ripen that one would expect of a “normal” salad tomato. Even when fully ripened, it retains a green tinge when cut. Nowt special about that, apart from the obvious, but I’ve recently come to understand that some people view tomatoes that aren’t red (when ripe) with suspicion. This has nothing to do with the shape, or the taste (which is no different, if a little more acidic, than any other tomato) but it’s all about the colour. I don’t understand it myself, but it does explain why certain tomatoes are left in the bowl long after the majority have been scoffed. Nowt so queer as folk, as the old adage goes.

It won’t be a revelation to anyone who visits the butchers occasionally, but the price of beef, especially if you want to know the provenance of what you’re eating, is becoming somewhat prohibitive. We had the family round for a “full bag of mashings” roast dinner (5 adults and a 2 year old). The veg, which I’m proud to say cost nowt but the price of the seed and the sweat of my brow provided the bulk of the meal, which everyone at the table thoroughly enjoyed, but £32 for 3lb 5oz of topside (which was a great piece of meat to be fair) took the gloss off a little bit, although it did provide 8 meals in total. It did get me thinking, given that even the farm shop in the village is a similar price for meat they grow themselves, whether it’s the intention to price ordinary folk out of the fresh (high quality) meat market and onto the reconstituted meal-worm protein one. I’m sure Bill Gates would be happy, no more cows farting, except on farms and “super” ranches, growing beef for his “elite” friends to enjoy.

One more try, next season, with the San Marzano, although not with the current batch of seed which although it produces plenty of fruit it’s been slow to ripen, inconsistent in shape and seriously prone to blossom end rot. I picked this selection and left them to ripen, but a week later only half a dozen or so are ripe enough to use and the skins on the others is now blemishing and becoming grainy. The Yorkshire in me saw me buying lots of seeds, for not much money, from a company called Simply Seeds, I’m going to try Franchi next year, an Italian seed, so hopefully the results will be more as expected.

The peculiarly purple pepper plant (try saying that after half a gallon of Loweswater Gold) was at the point of being consigned to the old compost heap in the sky when I saw that it’d started to put out new flowers. A stay of execution was granted, bearing in mind I harvested less than half a dozen fruits first time around, and I started it back on a gentle feed regime. As you can see, it’s thriving (not summat that can be said for some of the other peppers) and producing some decent sized and nice shaped fruits. It cooks well, too. A negative turns itself into a positive, for a refreshing change.

I may have pickled Jalapenos in the past, but if so I’ve never used a water/salt/vinegar brine before (which a neighbour suggested). The method means they’ll only keep for a month or so in the fridge, once opened, but it’s supposed to retain the crunch. I stuck an Apache in each jar (although I did have some reservations, geddit?), just for good measure. I’ll let you know how they turn out.

The Armenian “yard long” was headed in the same direction as the purple pepper, but it too decided to blossom again, albeit not with quite the fecundity of the aforementioned. These look likely to be the last two which will be edible, although I’m not a fan I have a neighbour who has a taste for them. She says she may pickle them and, given the low water content compared to “traditional” cucumber, it just might work out. Watch this space!

As previously stated, probably on more than one occasion, I grow this particular courgette (Shooting Star) primarily as a thickener for tomato soups (other soups are available). If you look closely (it isn’t compulsory) at the main vein of the large leaf on the right you may be able to just make out a cluster of black “dots”. These are (I fervently hope) the white-fly parasites which will, if the blurb’s correct, eventually find their way into the eggs of the fly and destroy them, presumably by eating them. The fly, en masse, seem to have taken a particular liking to the courgette leaves, I’m hoping it’ll be their demise. If so, a period of schadenfreude will no doubt ensue, if white-fly can experience such emotions.

The chili jam hasn’t set again, but the sweet chili sauce is nice enough! Any road up, on to more comforting things in the form of green tomato and sweet pepper chutney, with added Scotch Bonnet. Finely dice 750 gm of green tomatoes, 300 gm of mixed peppers and 200 gm of onion (I used both red and white) and blitz a further 250 gm of peppers with the chilies (I took the seeds out but left the membrane in). Cook down in 600ml of cider vinegar with 350 gm of soft brown sugar and a dessert spoon of mustard seeds until the desired consistency is achieved (about an hour- 90 minutes), take off the heat and allow to cool slightly.

Once cooled, but still warm, spoon into warm sterilised jars (a jam funnel works well) and leave to mature for 4-6 weeks. The photo doesn’t do it justice as it’s a lovely colour, once the vinegar mellows out (it tastes great already) you should have a nicely unctuous chutney with a decent kick. There isn’t a rule saying you can’t use more chili, or a little more sugar if you like it sweeter, but don’t overdo the vinegar.

For my newer reader, who may not be cognisant with either the white-fly infestation or the damage it did to my (grown from a pip) lemon tree, a quick recap. The sapling was in a bit of a state, with all but a couple of leaves showing signs of severe parasitic action. I had thought that the fly may not take to “shiny” leaved plants, but, as both the lemon and may pepper plants can attest to, this isn’t the case. I applied neem oil liberally to all the leaves, top and bottom and hung several sticky traps above it. Every time I went to the greenhouse I made it my first job to shake the trunk, hoping to drive any remaining pests to the traps. Long story short, here we are. I’ve potted it on and moved it to its winter home, still protected by traps and still getting its morning shake. I’ll fleece it over for the winter and hopefully put it outside for the summer months. Pleased with the job, if I’m honest.

A change of PM and a rearranging of human deck-chairs, masquerading as competent politicians hasn’t brought about any substantially noticeable difference. The slogan is still everything and this bunch don’t half know how to employ them. I’m guessing the media team and the Spads advising them have had a bit of a reshuffle, too. I won’t bore you with the “Growth in every postcode” schmaltz, or the risibly simplistic “Andy-For Us” (I think he meant Andy for Andy) or even the stomach churning “hope in every heart”, because you’ve all heard them far too often. The latest wheeze has been to take the pithy phrase “British values” and use it as a further tool to make us believe that if we don’t buy into the prevailing narrative, then we must be members of the “hard and far-right” (I have Lewis Goodall to thank for this gem).

Never mind that Palestinian activists and their Antifa fellow travellers who get their rocks off attacking “cis” women regularly came masked, without a peep from the government, should you choose to put on a mask and take part in a peaceful protest march, then you’ll not only be a racist and an Islamaphobe, you’ll also now be subverting “British values”. Should you choose to take to social media, or heaven forfend, have the nerve to write to your MP to complain about the clearly “two-tier” biases within the policing and judiciary system, a system where you’re likely to be sentenced not for the severity of any crime you may have been deemed to have committed, but for your political position, then yes, you guessed it, you’ll be subverting “British values”.

Worried about the numbers of undocumented males entering the country illegally, who go on to be housed, fed and watered at your expense and the lies that politicians and a captured media are telling you about how their presence in the country can only ever be a positive, even though the evidence clearly shows this not to be the case? You need to keep said worries to yourself, because, should you dare to voice them you’ll be guilty of, you guessed it again, subverting “British values”.

I could go on, because the examples of how our love of democracy, the rule of law, the pursuit of individual liberty and (this is the one they’ll use the most to try to break you), mutual respect and tolerance are being used, not as an affirmation of what once made our country a great place to live, within a high trust, self reliant society, but to convince us all that if we aren’t willing to accept changes that we know are antithetical to our way of life, then we’re not really British at all, because we don’t share the newer, kinder “British values”.

One supposes that one of these new British values, especially where politicians are concerned, is having the brass neck to accept free gifts from anyone offering them, whether it be concert tickets, bespoke suits, spectacles, luxury accommodation or even huge sums of cash. It must be, because there isn’t a single one of them who isn’t snout deep in the trough and they all seem to see it as their right to do so.
 

© Colin Cross 2026