Karnival Si Jantung Hati

If you have time today do join in this HeartKids Charity Carnival held at Dewan Annexe, UITM Shah Alam. Lots of great stuff to get there, spend and donate for good cause. I will be helping out Supermom Nadia at the gardening booth so hope to see you there.

Sneak Previews of stuff donated for the gardening booth by kind souls:

 Supermom Brenda Ang ~ cute cactus and herb seedling plants.

Supermom Herny Yusnizar ~ 20 packs of Vermicompost (RM3)

Supermom Hebatullah Kamilah ~ 20 varieties of seeds (10 pack each) :

1. Red Bangladesh Amaranth
2. Local Semi Red Rounded Leaf Amaranth
3. Late Flower White Stalk Choy Sum
4. Local Green Rounded Leaf Amaranth
5. Oily Green Long Bean
6. American Coriander
7. Aromatic Basil
8. Golden Yellow Round Leaf Amaranth
9. F1 Hybrid Five Star Lady's Finger
10. F1 Hybrid Pearl Gold Sweet Corn
11. F1 Hybrid Extreme Yield Red Chilli
12. F1 Hybrid Golden Thousand Super Sweet Corn
13. F1 Hybrid New Green Eagle Chilli
14. F1 Hybrid Market Wonder Cucumber
15. Red Flower French Bean
16. Fu Chew Brinjal
17. F1 Hybrid GF Special Feet Brinjal
18. GE Grade A Water Convulvulus (kangkung)
19. F1 Hybrid Star-8 Cucumber
20. Type B Curly Leaf Chinese Kale

 Gardening booth in progress yesterday setting up.

Supermom Nadia and her mother Salehaton hard at work.

Some of the plants that will be available:

Suriram spinach, Rambutan fruit seedlings, Mango fruit seedlings, Water hyacinth, Walking Iris seedlings, Snake plants, White anthirium plants, Spider plants.

Some fresh fruits and vegetables are also available:

Lemons, Green Papaya, old coconut for coconut milk, rambutan, NamNam, Passionfruits, Chillies, Pandan leaves, Curry leaves.

Hope to see you there!

More items not listed yet!

Thank you very much for the donation received from all.

Ceri Terengganu

 I would like to introduce a fruit plant that I have discovered on our backyard while cleaning up some space for planting food and came into my view. Oh what is that glossy smooth dark red skin fruit looks like a cherry fruit but growing in clusters like grape? So I asked on experts local medicinal plant in facebook group and many gurus said that it might be a plant called 'Ceri Terengganu'. Well ceri in our national language is an English borrowed word so 'Cherry' and Terengganu is one of Malaysia state. It is more seen in the Terengganu state or Johor state as well. Hence the plant is commonly known as 'Ceri Terengganu'. It does have other name known as 'Perupuk' or 'Kelelek' and the scientific name is Lepisanthes alata which belongs to tha Spindaceae family. This distribution of this plant is South-East Asia and it seem the plant does not have an English name yet. New leave shoots are interestingly in purplish colour. The plant fruits are edible but this plant is more used as ornamental plant for landscape by the council or providing some sheltered from the sun. The ripe fruit is said to be sweet (I have not tried it, I might pick some and let the turkey and geese have a taste of it first) with a little bit of  green raw fruit taste-like (I actually don't know how to describe the word 'kelat', may be other gardeners can help a bit). To enjoy the fruit sweetness and lessen the rawishhh taste, it is advice to rub the fruits  between your hand first. Make it a bit mushy. The fruits can also be roasted. The Ceri Terengganu ripe fruits attract bird and bats and they help dispersed the fruit seeds. The Ceri Terengganu tree fruits all year round, it does not have a specific flower or fruiting season.

 Our Ceri Terengganu tree is growing under our very tall tamarind plant at the moment so it is receiving filtered sunlight due to the tamarind plant big canopy. Not much known about this plant and only little scientific research has been done to understand the medicinal or nutritional value of its fruit. Traditionally it is said boiled water with this root plant can reduce itchiness or fever. The dark red colour of the skin fruit is said to contain anthocyanin that also aids as anti-oxidant. The fruit might also be used as natural colouring. 

 If you visit Malaysia, hope you can enjoy our local cherry plant :).

Mungkin mana tahu next MAHA kita dapat rasai jus ceri Terengganu pula (klik sini untuk info).
Sokong produk tempatan kita.

Mmmm...nak rajinkan diri ke petik buahnya buat jus.

Sesiapa yang berminat untuk mengetahui lebih mengenai pokok nadir kita ini sila lawati laman ini (klik sini).

I think I have to make an inventory what plants we have in my parents garden. So clueless at the moment. So that we siblings and our children will know what treasures our parents has grown for us and now we are the ones who really enjoy their fruit of labour.

Selamat Datang (Cordyline Fruticosa)

 If you visit Malaysia you will be welcome by the word 'Selamat Datang' in the national language of Malaysia. If you are visiting our home this plant flower will greet you 'Selamat Datang' first as it is growing next to our front gate greeting our visitors. I thought this plant has only showy reddish and green leaves, surprised me it did when I opened the gate and saw the plant pretty flowers near the front gate this week. The weather in the Klang Valley at the moment is rain every afternoon. We don't have to water the plants at all since we came back.

I am not sure what this plant name is, any tropical plant expert know the name of this plant? I thought it was a croton type plant but when I was googling the croton plant flowers it looks totally different. So perhaps not.

Standing tall in front of our house front gate.

One very tall blooming plant, almost reaching the cable wires.

 This flower stems shows the different stages of how the bloom look like from bud to spent flowers going to seed perhaps (From left to right). I wonder how this plant seeds look like if they are not sterile flowers.

Touchstone Gold Beetroot

 I bought Touchstone Gold beetroot seeds last year spring but planted the seeds this year autumn and harvested the roots early spring ago. This is just an observation note of this beetroot variety for future reference as I still have several varieties of beetroot seeds waiting to be sowed stashed in my seed box. The name does make me think that it is a yellow golden root beetroot that we anticipated to harvest. The globe storage root skins is lighter shade of red, though with yellow-green leave stalks.

It is easy to differentiate the Touchstone gold beetroot seedling plants compared to other more common red beetroot that are available in the market. Although it might get mistaken as yellow coloured leave stems Swiss Chard.

Always forever forgetting to thin the seedlings (laziness is more honest), thinnings have already started to form roots but if you have plenty of space to grow edibles, you can still transplant them somewhere in the garden. Beetroot can be merciful in transplanting and not as fragile/tricky as carrot or parsnip seedlings.

  I found that Touchstone Gold beetroot does not grow much during Adelaide winter but does pick up growth again when the weather becomes warmer in spring. Does not flower quickly like rainbow chard if over-wintered.

 This is the reason why the name is attached with the 'gold' word, as can be seen the root flesh is golden yellow and some rings can be seen in the beetroot. This beetroot does not bleed like the red ones. The taste is mild and you might prefer this one if you don't have a sweet tooth.