1st Home Grown Apple Harvest

This is our first year for home grown apples. The bare root trees that we planted 2 years ago produced enough apples for 7 pints of apple butter. I know we are going to savor every last bite. How exciting also, to know that we will probably get twice as many next year. Mmmmm maybe enough for apple pie too.

Pickled Beets

I made some spicy pickled beets from beets I harvested out of my backyard this weekend. They look so pretty (I love anything pink). I’ll be adding them to my green salads this winter.

Tomatoes

Salsa and tomato sauce are always really popular around our house. This year we grew 30 different tomato plants and had tons of tomatoes (still do) to use for canning. We made sauce and salsa with our first big batch and will be harvesting everything left on the vines this next weekend to freeze, can whole or wrap in newspaper to ripen indoors. I picked another small wagon load yesterday. My absolute favorite this year has been the Big Pink White Stripe. It has the most amazing flavor. I'll be growing twice as many next year.

Pickled Okra

My own homegrown okra was an abject failure this year. I got nada but a bunch of well fed bugs. On the way back from picking up our beef, Mark and I stopped at a road side farm stand where I hit the okra mother load. I bought the whole box (6 lbs) and found a great spicy pickled okra recipe. I haven’t opened one up to try yet, but they sure do look pretty in the jars with my home grown dill and red peppers. Let’s hope they taste as nice as they look.

Ripen Peppers Indoors

The bugs keep getting to my ripe peppers before I can. It is really irritating and I decided to do something about it. I read someplace that you can ripen peppers indoors like you can do with green tomatoes. Mark and I went out on Sunday and picked boxes of green peppers on the verge of turning yellow and orange. We brought them in and cleaned the really well, careful to get all of the bug ridden ones separated out. We then dried them and laid them in clean cardboard boxes covered in newspaper. I will be checking on them every other day or so to see if they are getting ripe. I hope this works!

Bread and Butter Pickles

I’ve been in a crazy pickling frenzy lately. I made enough jars of bread and Butter pickles to eat one quart a week for 17 weeks. We never get tired of them :)

Harvesting the Pumpkin Patch

We had hoped to leave our pumpkin patch in place until a little later this month, but nature had different plans. Rain over the last week encouraged us to harvest our pumpkins and winter squash. The photo above is what we collected. A few of the smaller squash were moldy and got thrown in the compost bin. I will be trading some squash for figs and making a lot of pumpkin curry this winter. I absolutely love pumpkin! One of my favorite recipe’s in the world is Squash Lasagna, but instead of Butternut Squash, I like to use Pumpkin. I know it sounds a little strange, but I promise that it tastes fantastic!

This is a Wonderful Recipe from Weight Watchers that I make every winter.
4 cup all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cup fat-free evaporated milk
2 medium garlic clove(s), minced
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/8 tsp table salt, or to taste
1/8 tsp black pepper, or to taste
10 oz dry lasagna noodles, cooked al dente (about 12 noodles)
10 oz cooked winter squash, thawed if frozen
1 cup part-skim mozzarella cheese, shredded
3/4 cup golden seedless raisins
2 Tbsp pine nuts, chopped
Preheat oven to 350°F.

Place flour in a small saucepan and very gradually whisk in milk and garlic. Warm over low heat, stirring constantly, until sauce simmers and is thickened, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in Parmesan cheese, salt and pepper.
Spread 1/4 cup of cheese sauce over bottom of a 9 X 13-inch glass or metal pan and cover with 3 lasagna noodles; top with 1/3 of squash and 1/2 cup of cheese sauce. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup of mozzarella cheese and 1/4 cup of raisins. Cover with 3 more lasagna noodles and spread with 1/3 of remaining squash and 1/2 cup of cheese sauce; sprinkle with 1/4 cup of raisins. Cover with 3 more lasagna noodles and top with remaining squash and raisins; cover with last 3 lasagna noodles, pressing sheets firmly down. Top with remaining cheese sauce; sprinkle with pine nuts and remaining mozzarella cheeseBake until lasagna bubbles around edges and is browned on top, about 30 minutes. Slice into 8 pieces and serve

This is soooo yummy!!!! My mouth is watering just typing it :)

Grape Vines

Grape Vine Fence



Baby Grapes
Planted along the fence line that separates our yard into smaller sections are 10 grapevines with an assortment of different types of grapes (some wine some table). I was thrilled to see some nice little grape clusters formed. The grapevines do a nice job of disguising the wood and wire fence and make a very pretty green wall. We planted the grapes right before our wedding last June. They were a little stressed out last year and did not produce many edible grapes. I work for a big winery and have all of the wine I could ever drink, however I am considering trying to make some homemade wine this year and lots of grape jelly for PB&J's.

Heirloom Tomato Rows

I've added a nice rice straw mulch over the entire garden. I'm hoping it will work to keep the weeds down and some extra moisture in. The photo above is of 2 rows of heirloom tomatoes we have growing on a tomato fence. The plants are secured to a wire fence supported by T-posts. It seems to be working well so far. I waited longer than I should have to support the plants and they were pretty out of control when I finally got around to tying them to the fence.
I've realized that I have been way over watering the poor plants so I am trying to cut back to every 3rd day. The leaves were starting to yellow and get a little curly which is a bad sign. Under the tomato plants I've planted carrots and baby spinach as well as beans and beets.

July 30, 2008 Harvest

Here’s what Mark and I harvested out of our garden tonight: Beets, Chard, Armenian Cucumbrs, Squash, Nectarines, Radishes, Beans, Tomato, Broccoli

I also picked this 6 bouquets of Roses, Dahlias, Lavender, Bells of Ireland, Agapanthus, Liatris, Artemisia, Hydrangea and Butterfly Bush.

Grabbed some fresh eggs too:

Not a bad shopping trip to the backyard

Back Garden Tour

On the east side of our green house we have planted Corn, Squash, Melons, Okra, Cilantro, Basil, Lettuce, Radishes and more....

South of the green house we have Beans, Peppers, Eggplants, Beets, Chard, Black Basil, Tomatoes, Onions, Strawberries and Rhubarb
Everything is doing really well. There are volunteer Tomato's, Melon, Eggplant, Cilantro and Bells of Ireland coming up all over the garden. I've been digging them up and moving them around as best I can.
This weekend I started some Lettuce, Peas, Kale, Beets, Turnips, Radishes, Carrots, Chicory, Broccoli, Cabbage and Cauliflower in 6 packs and 4 inch pots. They should be ready to put in the ground in a few weeks. The weather has been strange. It is still smoky from the wild fires and has remained overcast long into the day. It has not been hot enough to ripen may tomatoes (I've only had 2 ripe ones). I did not plant any early varieties, instead I chose all crazy colorful heirlooms. I'm regretting not having planted a couple of early girls. I bought a tomato from the Farmers Market Saturday morning. It was the most beautiful Pineapple Tomato that I have ever seen. It weighed a full pound and was $4. worth every penny.

The Pumpkin Patch

Here's a shot of our little pumpkin patch. It is located to the west of our green house next to the chicken coop. Mark had to raise up the sprinkler on to a pole because everything grew tall very quickly. There are about 10 different kinds of winter squash and pumpkins planted here.

All of my favorites like Golden and Blue Hubbard, Cinderella Pumpkins, Butternut, Sweet Dumpling , Potimarron , Musquee de Provence, Galeux d'Eysines , Red Kuri, Jarrahdale and more (Mark refuses to eat squash of any kind). I have already spotted some giant Golden Hubbard squash growing in the corner. According to the seed packet they only get to be 12 lbs, but I estimate that they will be at least 20-30 lbs when ripe. They are enormouse already.

I'll be eating home grown squash all winter. I can hardly wait!!!

Zucchini Time

We harvested our first zucchini of the season this weekend. Mark spotted it. He grilled it on the BBQ and it was quite tasty. I harvested a few more on Sunday and traded them for some peas with my sister over the back fence. On Sunday I went down to the 40/8 Flea Market at the Vets Building. I found this really cool book on Preserving for $1. There is a recipe for Zucchini and Ginger Jam which sounds absolutely delicious. I’m going to give it a try next weekend.
We still don't have any ripe tomatoes but the plants are loaded down with green ones so I am hopeful we will get a few more hot days and I'll be seeing them turn colors soon.

Garden Update

This photo is of the eastern most side of our garden looking thru the tomato fence. We've got beans, squash, okra, melons, tomatillos, basil, cilantro, lettuce, radishes and corn growing in these three beds.

This photo is of one of three tomato rows. We have 27 different heirloom tomato plants growing this year. not counting the volunteer mystery tomatoes that are popping up everywhere.

This is the middle garden, in front of our green house. There are probably around 40-50 eggplants (all different varieties) and 60-70 peppers plants in this section. There is also more beans, swiss chard & beets, basil and green onion planted here (not pictured). The peppers seem to be growing quite slowly. The eggplants made a miraculous recovery from the damage done by beetles early on. Once I get the straw mulch spread out I will take some more photos to share.

The Herb Garden

Salad Bar

We're growing a salad bar in the garden this year. This patch is just starting to sprout. It's got a huge variety of lettuce, spinach, basil, radishes, and bunching onions all mixed together. It's experimental, but so far it is coming along pretty good. The bugs do seem to be eating their fair share

Growing Challenge Update Oca & Yacon

I am so sad to report that my Oca has completely disappeared. Apparently something living in my yard found it to be quite delicious, because it has vanished. After over a month of waiting for Oca sprouts to come up, I dug down to see what was happening. Not one single tuber was still in the ground. I was at first completely disappointed, but then decided that I would just order some more seed starts and give it another try. I called up the folks at Nichols nursery to order some more and also to quiz them on the likely cause of the disappearance. I gave them the lowdown on what had happened. The woman I spoke with was so sweet. She cheerfully announced that they would be sending me a replacement at no charge. I was shocked. How cool is that? I am now excitedly awaiting the replacements so I can give it another try. This time I think I am going to make some chicken wire cages around the plants to thwart any would be gourmet gophers or moles. On a happy note, the Yacon I am growing seems to be taking off. It has been really easy to grow so far and I am hoping for a nice harvest (and that it tastes good, since I’ve never tried it before).

The 15 yards of compost we ordered has been delivered. It is a mixture of rice hulls and duck manure. I spent hours moving it on Sunday. Mark was hard at work installing 4 new water faucets in the back yard.


This is the back garden plot. I moved 20 wheel barrels full of compost back here. Next step is to finish tilling it in and then form out the beds. It's taking much longer than I anticipated to get the garden in this year. It seems like there is always something other than the garden on the schedule.

Yacon

As part of the Growing Challenge I am trying to grow Yacon for the first time. I ordered the Yacon from Seeds of Change. It was supposed to be shipped to my work, but was shipped to my house and sat in the sun on my porch all afternoon. When I opened the box it didn't look so hot. I've been babying it in my kitchen window for a week and it is starting to get some new growth. Next step is to put it outside in a 1 gallon pot for a few weeks until I am 100% positive that there is no more frosty nights ahead. Then it will go into the ground.

Yard Pics

Cactus paddles drying in the sun (almost ready to plant)-We are going to grow an edible cactus fence

Strawberry Plant that the chickens haven't attacked yet

Spanish Lavender

The "Hoopty Tiller"