Apricots and Almonds.

I would like to thank Mr. Rowley Leigh for his 'Apricot and almond tarte fine': a simple preparation for a tasty summer cake, glossy golden and elegant.

But, the combination of apricots and almonds doesn't work well just in the kitchen. 'Rare grafts', including 'almond on apricot', are reported in ancient Egypt. They certainly added something special to the incredible variety of fruit already available in Islamic gardens in Medieval times, such as apples, quinces, pears, figs, peaches and grapes. Agricultural treaties, written in Sanskrit, translated into Arabic, copied into Persian and read in India, gave all the necessary information to cultivate, harvest and store them. In these ancient books, brave gardeners could find sophisticated techniques to experiment multi-coloured fruits on the same plant,  to obtain redder apples and peaches by adding rose thorns to the plant roots or to have sweeter grapes by irrigating the plants with extract of dates. They decorated citrons and pears with inscribed letters and almond seeds with calligraphy. Gardens were special places.

Fruit trees travelled as fast as words. Under the Mughal Emperor Akbar, apricots were introduced in Kashmir from Kabul, and then imported in India. Things have not changed much.

Mr. Leigh suggests to visit the Hunza Valley in Pakistan, or the Loire Valley in France, to taste velvety apricots at their best. 

P.S.:
The 'Apricot and almond tarte fine' concluded a relaxed summer Sunday lunch with home-made vitello tonnato [sliced veal with tuna sauce] and tomato salad.

Photos:
TravelinaGarden, 2015.


Further reading:
Scent in the Islamic Garden. A Study of Deccani Urdu Literary Sources, Ali Akbar Husain, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000.

The Anatomy of Dessert: with a few Notes on Wine, Edward Bunyard, New York, Modern Library, 2006. Originally published: London, Dulau, 1929.

Links:
Ripe for the picking, Rowley Leigh, FT Magazine June 20/21 2015
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/fc12fb14-146d-11e5-ad6e-00144feabdc0.html 

Spring and Winter Flower Garden, John Fleming.

I walked along the flower beds of the Great Garden at Cliveden, in Buckinghamshire, reading 'Spring and Winter Flower Garden'.

Written in 1864 by John Fleming, Head Gardener to the Duchess of Sutherland at Cliveden, the book explains his 'system of Spring Flower Gardening': a successful succession of bloomings that allowed him to have appealing flower beds before and after the explosion of summer flowers.
Common practices to overcome this problem included the creation of 'separate gardens, covering their surface with different coloured materials; ... filling a portion with evergreens in pots, ...[using] ivy'. These solutions, however, proved not entirely satisfactory to Mr.  Fleming, who, especially near the house, felt the need for something more thrilling. Inspiration came from nature, from the wild flowers that he saw blooming after winter. In the book, he muses:

'Why then should we not in this matter take a lesson from nature? and if flowers at that season bloom in the fields and woods, they can also be made to bloom in the garden. The most beautiful of these wild flowers are gone before we can venture to turn out the summer plants.'

In the following chapters, he sums up his experience providing combinations of flowers and shrubs. Flowers with 'good habits and plenty of bloom', 'sufficiently hardy to keep the beds green in the dead part of the winter months, and come out in spring with that display necessary to make the garden attractive'; flowers 'well adapted for the season in which they are required' so that 'they are got without the expense of houses or fuel and ...without glass'. He focuses on colours for the spring display, while berries and variegated leaves are considered for the winter months. For spring, he suggests: Anemone 'if a good bed of scarlet is wanted', Alyssum saxatile 'a fine yellow', while 'for blue we have the beautiful Myosotis arvensis', and Pansies and Primroses are available in 'an extensive variety of colours.' Annuals are preferred and the use of bulbs is encouraged to arrange rows, chains and ribbons and create sophisticated designs.
He offers some practical examples choosing among the flower beds created at Cliveden in 1862 and 1863. In 1863, for example, the Great Garden, the impressive formal parterre to the south of the house, was arranged with:

n.1 bed blue Myosotis and La Candeur Tulip.
   2       Anemone and yellow Jonquil.
   3       Limnanthes Douglassii and Tournesol Tulip.
   4       Silene pendula, pink, and Rex Rubrorum Tulip.
   5       Silene pendula, white.
   6       blue Myosotis, Queen Victoria Tulip.
   7       mixed Anemone and Narcissus poeticus.
   8       yellow Alyssum saxatile and yellow Rose Tulip.

The beds 'have edging of Evergreen Privet ... 8 inches high and 9 broad', 'next to this .. is the same with grass' and 'the centre of each bed being planted with either Rhododendrons or Azaleas'. Spring flowerings matched those of the surrounding Thorns and Lilacs, while Gladioli and Hollyhocks followed in summer.
Nothing is neglected: 'each round circle is planted with a good row of Crocus, then Cerastium tomentosum; behind this a belt of blue Myosotis and Wallflowers, with a centre of Honesty.' Mr. Fleming explains that he gets a best effect with a limited variety of plants, which is also more convenient for cost savings and labour. 'To fill the beds moderately it requires two thousand plants, and from six to eight hundred Tulips when well filled'. A triumph.

There is much more to read in the book and to see in the garden, a living page of garden history. But, looking at the parterre that, from 2010, is planted again according to Mr. Fleming's designs, I thought about the observation of wild nature and its consequences, about the bedding system of Mr. John Fleming, and, few years later, the natural garden of Mr. William Robinson.

Photos:
TravelinaGarden, Cliveden, UK, May 2015.
Drawings from 'Spring and Winter Flower Garden'.

Further reading:
John Fleming, Spring and Winter Flower Garden, Journal of Horticulture and Cottage Garden Office, London, 1864.
https://archive.org/

Links:
Cliveden, Taplow, Maidenhead, Buckinghamshire
http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/cliveden/