Curried oca parcels

Autumn is approaching, and you know what that means: It’s time to watch (or maybe rewatch for the 10th time) Gilmore Girls, the classic cozy TV show set in charming Stars Hollow. Rory and Lorelai’s lives offer more than just quirky hometown characters, book recommendations, and nostalgic fashion inspiration—you’re forgetting about all of the beautiful settings the show has to offer. 

When you've finally decided to sell your home, the process of doing so can be challenging and confusing. Whether it's going through numerous open houses or waiting around for the right offer (or any offer) to come in, speed up the process by following some of these real estate expert tips to sell your home faster.

For my Masters dissertation last year I did some research into gardeners who choose to grow unusual edible crops. I settled on two species to investigate, achocha and oca. In the past I’ve written about how to grow achocha – it’s a nice, easy plant and in a temperate climate you should have no problems getting a significant yield. You may have more of a problem dealing with the glut….

Oca is a very tasty and useful vegetable tuber. It grows well for me in North Wales. It’s good ground cover and polycrops well with taller partners such as tomatoes. Fresh picked and raw, many varieties have a lemony (oxalic acid) taste which goes after exposure to the sun. The cooked taste is sweet. The texture ranges from that of a slightly less crunchy water chestnut to a soft puree which depends on the variety and how much you’ve cooked them.

I didn’t get outside much over Christmas, as the weather wasn’t really conducive to gardening and we were happy having some quiet time indoors. But as harvesting the oca and ulluco was long overdue, I went out to do it yesterday afternoon. The photo above shows what the bed looked like at the end of August. The oca were clearly happier than the the ulluco by this time; they were always more numerous in terms of actual plants, so they had 2/3 bed.

There’s a distinctly autumnal feel to the garden now (and high winds over the weekend have made the dahlias all bendy), but it’s still very warm.

I wasn’t going to grow oca (Oxalis tuberosa) last year, but I wanted to support The Guild of Oca Breeders (GOB) in their efforts to breed new varieties more suited to the UK climate, and so I ended up with one of their supporter packs (which are sold out for this year, although you can still sign up to be an experimental grower) of 12 different varieties.

Katsu curry sauce is often poured over breaded chicken on a bed of rice. We made this yesterday and really liked it (we cheated a bit and served it with ready made breaded chicken, so we didn’t have to faff around with breadcrumbs), but is a versatile sauce you can serve with just about anything.

Header image: The finicky fruit took some time to adapt to California’s climate. Print Collector via Getty Images

Header image: Geoff Caddick/EPA

A great indoor and patio plant, the elephant ears look not only great but also invite warm tropical vibes to the place where it is grown. Here are some of the best Types of Alocasias you can grow!

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