Hugs for Trugs

I’m relatively new to vegie gardening and Mr Scott has built me a small garden just in case I lose interest and abandon it to the deeds of the bugs and weeds. Mr Scott knows me quite well.

Last year at harvest time I staggered about trying not to stomp on my vegetable plants which had been planted with scant regard to just what size they would finish up. Balancing on one leg I would perform yoga-like moves as I picked beans and tomatoes, filling supermarket plastic bags as I went.

I wasn’t very happy with the plastic bags. The handles cut into my hands as they filled and it just wasn’t very Darling Buds of May to brandish my crop in nasty cast-offs from the supermarket. I knew there had to be a better, more romantic sort of collection vessel for my produce. Without actually knowing its name, I went in search of a trug.

And wouldn’t you know it … we’re lucky enough to have a splendid trug maker in Golden Bay, Nelson. Brett Hutchinson is his name. I’ve never met the man so I can’t honestly vouch for his character but I have to say that a bad person couldn’t possibly make a thing of such beauty.

Brett’s website is here and you’ll struggle hard to come across a more accommodating person to do business with. Don’t expect next-day delivery because his trugs, Devon maunds and flower baskets are all hand-made and good things take time. Plan ahead and order one for yourself, then one for your best friend and then order yourself a second one because they’re pretty useful as a fruit basket for your kitchen bench. And don’t worry about where you are on this planet because this trug maker does mail order worldwide.

I love my trug. I love that it holds the vegies without squashing them and that it sits sturdily on the ground while you’re busy picking. I love its aesthetics and the fact that it will probably outlast me so that when I’m gone the mock-grandchildren can discover it, maybe with a radish or two nestled in the bottom, and say: “Here’s the old bird’s basket. What did she call it? Truggy, truggle, trugger, trug …”

I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

 Brett’s beautiful trugs and maunds.

 

 Just showing off now. Proud of the veges.

 

Yep, that’s parsley, courgette, lettuce, tomatoes (3 varieties), beans (2 varieties) and something else!

 

But wait, there’s more.

[Have you noticed how difficult it is to place a courgette without making it appear phallic?]