Sofias Country Gardens

Some projects are such that I spend an extraordinary amount of time thinking about them before they happen. Depending on project, the amount of time can vary from weeks to years, before I finally take the plunge and do it. This is why I started this blog as a kind of diary, keeping a record of my gardening adventures and the development of my gardens. One such space that I have been mulling over is the triangle between the driveway to my house and the path to the sauna, backe

To me pruning fruit trees is an art form, and one that I'm not very good at. I enjoy it a lot, but rather as with painting in oil colour I believe that some are intuitively better at it than others. Which is why I spent a lovely day mid March at Rosendals Garden in Stockholm enjoying a one day workshop in pruning fruit trees. The basics are simple enough if the starting point is asking why we prune the tree. When fruit trees are young it is mostly to build a good structure,

This autumn my godfathers spent a month in the country with me, and as we love to spend time cooking one of our projects was to pickle beetroots for winter. It is actually very simple and here I will take you through it step by step. This is what you need: 1 liter water 4 dl vinegar 1 - 1,5 dl sugar 2 bay leafs 15 allspice grains 8 - 10 cloves 2 cm horseradish cut into slices 1/4 teaspoon pickling salt I chose small beetroots of different colours from my garden because when t

Broccoli is one of my favourite vegetables and one that we eat many times a week with the family. I must have a hundred recipes with broccoli stored away, but mostly I love it simply boiled fresh with a knob of butter or in the oven with garlic and fennel. I haven't grown it in the garden before this year, as I always thought it to be a tremendously difficult plant. Turns out it isn't although we had a shaky start. My seedling plants were spindly and weak, and when I planted

Bigger is better, right? At least when it comes to gardens. Personally, I feel that when it comes to the kitchen garden more is definitely more. No minimalism here thank you! Each year I have had a struggle deciding what vegetables I need to have, and which ones I can live without, simply because it has been so small. Now, I get it. Small as a concept is relative to expectations. Although my vegetable garden was small, we never managed to eat everything on offer as I produced

In early spring there are not nearly enough flowers flowering at Humlegård to keep the bees well fed as they come out from winter hibernation. This is not because I haven't thought about it, but because the garden at Humlegård is new and therefore lacking in the abundance of an old garden. At Stensund where I have been gardening for years and years, there are millions of spring bulbs that emerge as soon as the snow melts, ranging from winter aconite (Eranthis hyemalis) to sno

One of the great joys of being in the country is observing the wildlife, and I have a never ending fascination with how interlaced the whole ecosystem is. I find that encouraging biodiversity in my gardens reduces the need for pesticides and invasive control systems, as it mostly evens itself out. I am for example often asked how come I don't have a snail problem, which I by all accounts should have with the amount of lovely tasty plants and vegetables there are. I believe it

Summer to me is all about the kitchen garden. I have to admit I am a bit obsessed with my small vegetable paradise, and each year I spend a great deal of time preparing the soil, planning my planting scheme and selecting seeds. The picture above is from last year, and below from this year at the same time of month. As you can see I have rotated the vegetables from one place to another according to my plant rotation chart. I spend quite some time weeding in order to give my pl

April is the most hopeful month of the year. The light has returned, and boosted by the transition to summer time the evenings become longer and lighter. As the snow is rapidly melting, I dig out my gardening books and spend many delightful hours planning this years planting in the kitchen garden. It will still be some time until I can start growing vegetables in earnest, but it is the perfect time to visit online seed catalogues and order this years seeds. My current favouri