Harvest Monday Addendum

At the last minute I decided to harvest Audrey II (see Sunday's post) as well. She was a cute little cabbage head (mon petit chou!), but no more - now she's chopped into little bits into a coleslaw. My improvised coleslaw was pretty rockin', if I do say so myself. My first cabbage was pretty rockin' too! Now if only I had written down the recipe...

(Let's see... the acid was red wine vinegar.. sweet was agave.. base veganaise and veg sour cream.. added pepper, salt, fresh parsley, dried oregano, and a little garlic [just because I had minced extra when I made herb butter].. I think that was it? Oh, and of course carrots that I shredded in my ancient food processor. Now that was an adventure.)

Harvest Monday

Happy Harvest Monday!

This Monday's harvest was almost exactly the same in variety and volume to last week. Cukes, carrots, and lettuce were the main players here, with the addition of a bunch of delicious-looking collard greens, a couple of cherry tomatoes, and...drum roll... garlic!

This was my first attempt at garlic.

I extensively researched the growing process: 

"If you plant a clove of garlic, it'll regrow a whole bulb!"

"Seriously??"

"Yep."

"Sweet!"

No real need to cure them since the bulbs are sort of small and I go through garlic like crazy. I think this fall I'll plant some more to pull next season. Who knows what could happen with a little forethought?

Beans. 

Underwhelming.

Harvested a couple of delicious cherries so far. 

I am going to need some serious willpower not to eat them all right off of the plants.

The potted plants are ripening; no signs of red on the bedded tomatoes yet.

Loving the herb harvests. 

Fresh parsley, basil (holy basil!), thyme, and dill seeds. 

Peppers, squash, and leaf spot??

Jalapeños! So excited to make poppers...as long as it's nothing like last year.

The first of the Summer Crooknecks.

 

Audrey II?

Septoria(?) Leaf Spot, I believe. It's only on my potted tomatoes - the ones in the bed are looking fierce as ever. I fearfully thought late blight at first but [phew] it doesn't match the description or photos. Any tried and true ways to get rid of it?

Harvest Monday

Happy Harvest Monday! I'm starting to take in a few more veggies and herbs each week, which is just fantastic. The garden is sort of in transition still - some of my spring vegetables are just maturing or still producing, and the first of the summer ones have begun.

Holy cukes! I'm growing a Salad Bush variety, and though I only harvested two today there are many more on the way. I like them in salads, of course, and very much in water also, but I think the next stop may be the wonderful Cashew-Cucumber Dip that Nick made last year. Yum.

The carrots are coming along, finally. I still have quite a few left in my carrot squares to bulk up and lengthen. A few of these were shredded into our scramble this morning.

Also have a very, very small handful of green beans. The bush beans are currently at war with my squash... and you can guess who's winning. Next year I'll plant pole varieties so they can climb up the corn and out of the way, and the squash around the bottom to vine about. The indigenous people of the Americas were right on. This is only next year's plan if the corn is successful this year, which is yet to be determined. Looking lovely so far. Knee high by the fourth of July, indeed. Also only next year's plan if I don't decide to go vertical, which is a real possibility.

 And....drum roll...more lettuce! I must have mutant heat-resistant strains of Little Gem or something. It's getting a little ridiculous that the heads haven't bolted in the constant heat. Unnatural. I'll take it!

Also picked some dill pods for seed and fresh thyme for the scramble this morning.

I decided to make a kitchen message board section marked "This Week's Harvest" and update as necessary. I think that will alert my family that there is freshness in the fridge ready to be eaten. They are very kind (and silly, in my opinion) to generally leave the produce to me, but I'm working out of town too much to be the sole consumer of this year's take.

Mini update on some unharvest-ables

This morning I woke up at a very comfortable 8am and headed straight outside for a quick cleanup/harvest/photo op. Very glad to have woken up at a decent hour, since the heat became oppressive very quickly. 

Lots of green tomatoes! My slicing tomatoes this year are Better Boy Hybrid.

And these are something-Girl Cherries. Check out that almost-redness.

 

Dill seed pods are just forming on this plant. The variety I planted seems best-suited for seed.

Baby butternuts.

Harvest Monday

Point of pride: my very first homegrown cucumber! I was really wondering if I would be able to tell the difference since cukes are so mildly flavored, but the freshness was definitely taste-able. Or it's all in my head. That works too. I was worried because the plant was seeming to vine like crazy but never pollinate, but I guess the good ones just like to hide under the foliage. There are a few more little cukes on the way so far.

Carrots are the first for this season. It is a real struggle for me to avoid pulling them too early. I've made some positive steps here. 

The greenery, though not the first harvest, is all from new-for-2010 plants - collards, oregano (for drying), thyme, and parsley. The collards are going into a tempeh scramble, and thyme and parsley will find some fresh uses very soon.

Does anyone else have trouble telling the difference between broccoli leaves and collard greens? They look so ridiculously similar.

Harvest Monday-I-Was-Camping

I had a single goal when I went outside early this morning: fetch scallions to top my bagel. This turned into scallions to top our bagels, which turned into enough scallions to make a whole tub of scallion cream cheese. (tofutti). The rest of the them will find their way into dinner, I'm sure.

A somehow-glorious head of Little Gem. Surprisingly nothing has bolted yet.