Last updated 12:43, Friday, 14 November 2008

The first time in a long time that I came across a wonky vegetable it had pride of place in a sensationally impressive church. And it wasn’t even harvest festival.

A courgette it was – zucchini if you prefer – much bigger than your average veg and nobbly in a saucy kind of way that might have been considered by some (with a juvenile sense of the humour) to be inappropriately disrespectful... in the Lord’s house.

But since the hand of Nature, God – or whomever you like to think has final say on the shapes of veggie nobbles – propriety seemed immaterial. Already sorted, so to speak. Allowed and approved by the Highest Authority. Higher even than a Eurocrat. But we giggled anyway.

My pal Aly and I had wandered into Lanercost Priory for a little look round. A lot of people wander in. That’s allowed too – but we weren’t aware of that at the time. This was nearly three years ago, when I was very new to Cumbria and Aly was one of my first visitors.

Gingerly approaching the magnificent church, we were surprised to be met, not by a chain, padlock and notice that God wasn’t receiving visitors today – which we had been more used to – but by a sign warning us that parking was at our own risk, on account of inquisitive cows with a taste for wing mirrors. But entering an open door to discover a display of proudly oversized courgettes with nobbles was more than surprising – it was something else altogether.

To tell the truth – and one should when discussing matters churchy – I giggled and Alyson shushed. She was particularly respectful that day. She doesn’t normally do a lot of shushing.

“You don’t have to whisper in a church, you know!” I wanted her to know I knew about these things.

“You don’t have to snigger at vegetables either,” she said. A touch hurtful but I suppose she was right.

Even given her claim of the moral high ground, she had to admit it was a decidedly naughty courgette, breaking as it did all rules set in place by European Commissioners, who’d decreed vegetables must conform to uniform shapes and sizes – no nobbles, appendages, unauthorised curves.

How on earth those people went on who’d reported miracles to the press, after finding the beatified face of Rio Ferdinand or the saintly image of Kylie Minogue in their Maris Piper potatoes, is anybody’s guess. By nefarious means, they must have gone undercover to avoid due punishment, I suppose.

A list of 26 specific vegetables had been banned from embellishment by Europe. Courgettes were on the list, drawn up by a collection of self-important loons with too much time on their hands, awarding themselves authority above and beyond Nature’s own.

I bought it. The courgette, that is. A kindly lady told me where to leave the money (very trusting, they are at Lanercost) and I purchased the nobbly zucchini, two jars of chutney and some thick cut marmalade.

Nobbles have been decriminalised now – or are about to be. Just this week curves and blemishes likely to send a supermodel into hiding were declared newly acceptable by the EU... which will be a relief to Mother Nature who must have lost an awful lot of sleep over the shunning of her beautifully disfigured carrots and cucumbers.

As the announced tolerance of imperfection was reported, with accompanying hilarity, Lanercost’s curious courgette returned to mind – not least because tomorrow I’ll be joining the good Priory folks in their Martinmas celebrations, opening their annual fair and likely looking out for nobbly vegetables.

This time I’ll be able to marvel at them with impunity. Exempt from all possibility of wrongdoing, I an look forward to finding anything from humanised turnips to cauliflower ears.

Encouraging, that. It’s somehow reassuring to know that, no matter how long a time she takes, Nature will have her way in the end. Mother does know best, after all.

Lancercost Priory was founded by Robert de Vaux, Lord of Gilsland, in 1166 and with his extremely generous endowment, Augustinian canons were able to build their monastery on a grand scale.

It has seen and survived a great deal of turbulence, trauma, Scottish raids, Royal bouts of man flu, and varying degrees of upheaval through its long, rich history. So, Eurocratic disapproval of its congregation’s courgettes was never really going to worry the watching spirits of its God-fearing founders.

But I do have a sneaking suspicion that the converse of the theory might not hold true. As Lanercost’s Martinmas Fair sets out its stalls – with or without wonky produce – I believe those faithful canons, perhaps even the noble lord himself, might be snuggling a little more comfortably into their graves, now they know what goes around still comes around and comes right in the end – especially within the walls of their sacred place.