Day 231/366

When growing carrots in the garden, they need more potassium and less nitrogen for better growth.

Too much nitrogen induces forking while adding potassium promotes sweetness and solid growth.

Soil temperatures that are too low (below 5oC) will slow seed germination and temperatures that are too high may mean a wait of anything up to thirty five days for germination.
A soil temperature of around 10oC is best for germination.

Carrots are cool weather vegetables preferring sandy soils.

After our holiday, I think that a detox is in order.
So I made soup for tea tonight.
My carrot plot needed a further thinning out so I pulled the above tiny carrots to make a stock with some chicken carcasses I had in the freezer.
A nourishing stock was made by adding a bunch of fresh herbs from the garden, an onion, Celtic sea salt, filtered water and peppercorns which were all simmered for around two hours.
A light soup was made by straining the stock, adding two parsnips, the shredded chicken meat, the onion (chopped), two cakes of rice noodle,shavings of fresh ginger and  simmering again until the parsnip was cooked.
I served the soup with the addition of a dash of cream, freshly cracked pepper and slices of fresh lime (purchased yesterday from an op-shop in Bangalow).
Here is the result:

The soup was very satisfying and there's enough leftover for lunch tomorrow.