Vasili's Garden Episodes
Cultural gardening
Every week I have the fortune of travelling through many different gardens throughout Victoria, viewing some of the most amazing gardens while learning great gardening practices and experiencing the passion of gardeners who happily share their views and produce and even a glass or two of the good stuff!
Home made wine of course.
Just like Silvia and Tsing out in South Morang, this year’s winners of the ‘Best Front Garden’ category in the City of Whittlesea for their amazing stone work and plantation.
But it doesn’t stop there, if you were to take a walk around the back of the property to have a peek you would fall over in amazement with the continuation of the elaborate stone walls they built creating the different garden levels.
Each garden is connected by cobble stone pathways with extruding pebbles to massage the feet as you walk over and of course the intricate planting scheme to compliment each garden section too.
The gardens just seem to get better and better every week, just when I thought that I had seen the best there is, up pops up another garden like Tsing and Silvia’s and it’s not only about ornamental planting.
Being of European descent I love my tomatoes and cucumbers but it’s nice to travel outside the boundaries and explore varieties that I would never dream of growing, everywhere I looked there were plants that I never see growing in the back yards of Melbourne. Maybe many of you do grow varieties like Tsing and Silvia which to me seem as unusual because I don’t grow them but if you do, don’t hold back, share these with the rest of us ‘cause we want to learn and experience too!
One of many unusual plants growing in their garden was what seemed to look like a cucumber gone wrong but in actual fact a very popular variety called Bitter Melon and yes it is bitter, and the more it ripens the more bitter it gets.
It looks and grows like a cucumber but unlike the cucumber which is generally smooth on the exterior, the Bitter Melon has extreme ripples, bumps and lumps all over the outer surface with a hollow centre.
Its seeds a large and flat which sweeten more and more as the fruit ripens turning red and can be eaten raw when ripe.
Bitter Melon come in a variety of shape and sizes, the Chinese being oblong shaped with tapered ends and about 20 to 30cm long where as the Indian variety is longer and more narrow, colours range from green to white when semi ripe, turning to bright orange when completely ripe.
In Indonesia, bitter melon is prepared in various dishes, as stir fry, cooked in coconut milk or
steamed, and in Pakistan it’s mainly cooked with lots of onions.
Like most other bitter tasting food, bitter melon stimulates digestion and is regarded by Asians as very useful for treating Malaria, it has also been scientifically tested that 100 milligrams per kilo dose per day can help lower elevated blood sugar levels, so it must be great for diabetes.
If you love gardening and I’m sure many of you do, start exploring different varieties like Bitter Melon, it’s easy to grow and great to eat, opening a whole new world to gardening experience.
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