Village Veggies

Whole Wheat Bread

2011-01-20T07:07:00.000-08:00

Well, it has been a month since I last wrote, it is amazing how time can just slip by! So I come back to you with a recipe that I have slowly been perfecting for the last several months. I had been trying to make a good whole wheat sandwich bread for a while. Most of the time it was either incredibly dense, not very sliceable or just plain bad. I finally took some advise from some homesteading friend of mine that said I have to start to embrace the white bread flour. Now, I know that bread has been made without the white stuff, and I know that I have enjoyed such bread, but recreating it hasn't happened. So I have slowly embraced the white stuff and have actually had some amazing bread. Luckily, I have converted the recipe to use honey or maple syrup (since that is a local commodity) instead of just sugar. Enjoy!

Honey/Maple Whole Wheat Bread
Makes one sandwich sized loaf.

1 tbsp yeast
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup water
3 tbsp EVOO (I think you probably could use melted butter if you can get it local)
1/4 cup honey (Shelburne Honey Co.) or maple syrup (Hager's Family Farm)
2 1/4 cup whole wheat flour*
3/4 cup bread flour

* I have substituted 1/2 the WW Flour with our local WW Flour and found that the consistency doesn't hold up well to slicing, gets all crumby, but I'm still working this part out.

1) Warm milk and water slightly over stove or in the microwave. (We recently discovered just how much energy the microwave actually takes versus our electric stove: 30 seconds of the microwave = 6 hours of a solar panel in full sunlight; and therefore have decided to not use our microwave anymore. As it turns out, heating things on the stove is just as easy and even quicker.)
2) In a medium bowl combine milk, water and yeast. Let sit for a couple minutes until yeast starts to bubble (testing the yeast).
3) Add salt, oil, and honey to yeast mixture and combine well.

4) Add all flour to yeast mixture and start mixing with a wooden spoon. Do this until dough is too think for wooden spoon. Leave the mixture in the bowl, and use hands to knead in bowl for 2-4 minutes, until a good consistency of dough forms. Dough shouldn't stick to hands anymore and it forms a ball well. (I have found that it is easier to knead in the bowl and not make a mess of the wooden counter.)

5) Place dough in a warm draft free place for 1-2 hours. The oven with the light on works best for us.
6) After dough has risen slightly for 1-2 hours, take out and punch down. Let rest for a couple minutes while you grease an 8x4" loaf pan. Be sure to grease EVERY part of the pan including the top lip because loaf will hopefully rise over it.*
7) Knead dough once more in bowl for another 1-2 minutes. Roll dough into a log that will fit the pan and place in greased pan. Place pan back in the warm draft free place (oven) and let rise for another 1-2 hours or until loaf is desired size.
8) Once dough is desired size, and while loaf is still in the oven, turn oven on to 400 degrees. Set timer for 30 minutes and bake. After 30 minutes dough should be nicely browned and make a hollow sound when tapped. I have taken the bread out too early a couple times though, so let it get thoroughly browned!
9) Place on cooling rack and let cool 10 minutes, and then remove from pan and let cool completely.

Perfect sandwich bread or bread for french toast. We haven't bought a loaf of bread for a long time thanks to this recipe! It might seem like a lot of steps, but it is very simple especially if you are going to home for the day. And, once you have this bread as toast with butter on it, you will realize how worth it the effort really was!

*And officially tonight I looked like an energy efficient GENIUS! This morning I started the wheat bread dough, and put it in the oven with the light on, and pretty much forgot about it. We went out to lunch, and ran some errands and I realized the bread dough was in the oven when I got home @ 2. Yikes! But as it turned out, it was perfect! I kneaded the bread dough a second time and put it in the bread pan and back in the oven (light on only). Then, using the same bowl I kneaded the bread dough in (no washing necessary), I made our pizza dough for dinner. I put that in the oven to rise with the wheat bread. Then around 5pm I took out the pizza stone and pizza dough from the oven, turned the oven on to 400 degrees and set the timer for 30 minutes (whole wheat bread in there all ready to bake). Marc and I prepared our pizza and put that in the oven as well. Half way through baking the pizza our wheat bread was cooked perfectly and there was NO waste of energy!!! Seriously, I felt like a genius! The oven was cooking our bread as it heated up to make our dinner, no water wasted in washing the bowl between doughs, pure awesomeness. Now I need to try and do that every time I make bread and I truly will be an energy efficient cook! I will include my pizza dough recipe in another post soon, so don't fret, energy efficient brilliance is in your future!

Happy Merry Holiday

2010-12-25T16:53:00.000-08:00

Holiday Greetings, and hopefully everyone had a wonderful holiday season. It was a quiet Christmas for us here. But this gave me the excuse to try and cook a Holiday Roast for Marc and I. I have never really made much beyond skillet/wok meal. So this was a big feat. And I truly have my brother-in-law to thank for my success. He coached me on how to make this amazing meal. I am lucky enough to have to have a teacher from Johnson and Whales l and I truly appreciate all knowledge. The best part was that our dinner tasted AMAZING! Here's a little recap:

It started off as a mere piece of meat with garlic and onions, then began it's slow roast.

Mixed Green Salad with Goat Cheese and Homemade Balsamic dressing wet our palettes.

The sides of Garlic Mashed Potatoes, and Rosemary Carrots and Parsnips.

The the main course of a Holiday Roast with Sherry Mushroom Sauce.

It was magical! I can't explain how amazing this all tasted and how enjoyable it was to cook for Marc and myself on our quiet Christmas. Next time I will finish with a dessert of chocolate covered strawberries and a single malt. The only thing I would change :)

Have a safe and wonderful Holiday!

Winter Solstice

2010-12-21T16:01:00.000-08:00

Tonight marks the longest night of the year, with longer days of sunlight to follow. This is something that we hardly think about nowadays, but the natural world is highly effected by this turn of events. I know that for myself this fall, I have definitely felt the effect of the shortening days and the cold chill of the winter setting in. Normally snowboarding is a good distraction from this time of year, but this year, I couldn't help but feel the darkness with the lack of a garden and sunlight.

Pepsi soaking up the last rays of the day, hoping they return tomorrow.

So tonight we celebrate the long night with the return of the sun and longer daylight in the morning. The turn to lengthening days and the hope that things will bloom again. Reflections of the past year, hopes for the new year, candles to light the long night and Solstice Bread to celebrate the night.

Happy Winter Solstice!

A Christmas Surprise

2010-12-16T17:11:00.000-08:00

We got a special anonymous package today in the mail. A miniature Christmas tree to give our bland apartment some Christmas cheer. A beautiful little cypress tree that smells amazing and came with little decorations! After some investigating I figured out who it was from... Thanks Mom and Dad for the great holiday surprise!

All Wrapped Up

2010-12-15T14:12:00.000-08:00

AMAZING NEWS! The BATTERY CHARGER has been located! Shortly after posting that I had lost this vital piece of equipment, Marc went out to check the RV one last time and found it! It has been in there since we got home from our road trip back in October! I am pretty psyched, and now I can get back to posting. What's new around here:

Snow and a frozen garden.

Christmas shopping and baking. I attempted to do more of a "handmade" Christmas.

However, for all the little kids in the family, I ended up buying some things. I tried to make sure I was either supporting a good cause when buying the gift, or it was made of recycled materials. This worked for almost all of the kids, but I will admit, some things were bought just because... Here are some links to great kids gifts from great companies (better late then never).

Stubby Pencil Studios

World Wildlife Fund

Sprig Toys

Plant a Billion Trees

My goal for next year: not go overboard with the wrapping. I bought a huge roll of wrapping paper that will definitely last us the next 5 years....should have thought that one through. Recycled materials from here on out!

And lastly, what's growing around here...Wheat Grass. A potent green that helps us through these dreary, cold days!

....it's nice to be back on the blogisphere!

Mission: Find My Camera Charger

2010-12-13T05:38:00.000-08:00

Hello All, I am writing to say that, sadly, I have lost our camera charger...hence the lack of posts. I am personally a fan of pictures rather then writing, so it's been s secret boycott of blogging. I have tried using Marc's iPhone, but usually it's not around when I need it. So I have come to buying one, and actually went to Staples to get one the other day. Ironically, they were sold out! The quest continues. So hopefully soon I will be able to recharge the camera and get to blogging again, and I apologize for the lack of posts.

What's been happening here since the loss of the battery:
-Snow
-Lots of sewing projects.
-Put the garden to bed for the winter.
-Crafty holiday wrapping projects.
-Marc has brewed more beer.
-Some NEW amazing dinners with our winter veggies.

I will write again when we have a camera to post some pictures. Enjoy your Holiday Season!

Giving Thanks

2010-11-25T06:52:00.000-08:00

Well, Thanksgiving is upon us, and Marc and I hadn't had much time to even consider the holiday until Tuesday. It occurred to me that not only was Thanksgiving in 2 days, but that also means that Christmas is right around the corner...YIKES! I will admit, I am not a huge holiday person, but I do get excited to give people gifts. So yesterday I did some canning projects, some of which I cannot mention because of the high probability of them becoming Christmas gifts. But one thing I made was some Cranberry Sauce with Blueberries for the upcoming feasts (8 pints to be exact). This recipe was super easy, and although it isn't jellied like the canned stuff, I believe if you refrigerate it prior to using it will be thick enough to enjoy with the various holiday fixings.

Cranberry Sauce with Blueberries

6 cups whole cranberries, washed and picked over
1 cup blueberries
1 cup fresh orange juice
1 cup water
2 cups honey/maple syrup (whichever you have)

1) In a large sauce pan combine all ingredients. Bring to a boil.
2) Reduce heat and simmer 15 minutes. You should hear the cranberries popping.
3) Sterilize jars and prepare boiling water bath.
4) Ladle cranberry sauce into sterile jars, cap and boil water bath for 15 minutes (pints).

Pretty easy!

In other news, our dog has taken a liking to yoga...or it could just be our yoga mat. But this is something that I am thankful for this holiday...she always makes me smile!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Blonde Oatmeal Cookie Bombs

2010-11-07T12:44:00.000-08:00

Today I decided to chip away at our bulk oats and made some awesome cookies for Marc to enjoy while I am away. This recipe was super easy and the cookies delicious. I really like how different they look compared to the run-of-the-mill chocolate chip oatmeal cookies too. I will be making these again soon. The name however, could use some work. If you have any ideas, please share!

Blonde Oatmeal Cookie Bombs

Makes approximately 3 dozen.

1 cup extra virgin olive oil

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup honey

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp sea salt

3 cups rolled oats

1 cup chopped walnuts

1 cup white chocolate chips

1/2 cup shredded coconut

1) Preheat oven to 325 degrees and grease cookie sheets.

2) Combine first 5 ingredients and with an eggbeater, blend until creamy.

3) Add the flour, baking soda and salt and stir just until combined.

4) Add the remaining ingredients and blend. Scoop onto cookie sheets 2 inches apart. Cook approximately 10-12 minutes or until the edges just start to brown.

5) Let cool on cookie sheets 5 minutes, then remove and let cool completely on a wire rack.

Local Ingredients Used: honey, whole wheat flour, eggs

Eco-Conscious Backpacking Food

2010-11-07T12:12:00.000-08:00

Well, I am off once again for another trip with the Outdoor Leadership Program. This is their fall White Mountains trip and the first official "backpacking" trip of their year. We will be carrying everything on our backs for the week in the beautiful national forest in NH. I love this trip!

This year I have tried to make less of an impact on the earth by making most of my own food. This means that I have been dehydrating things like a mad woman and hopefully they will be delicious and satisfying! A couple great benefits of making my own chow is that I am throwing away much less plastic packaging and using way fewer Ziploc (my mortal enemy) and much of the produce I have dried has come right from our front yard! That means the only carbon impact on the planet is the small amount of energy used for the dehydrator. Whoo Hoo! Now hopefully everything will be edible. And on a side note, I impulsively bought a bulk bag of rolled oats at our Co-op. Bulk bag being 50 lbs...might be the first time I regret buying bulk. But our first attempt at granola was awesome and since we use oats a lot I am hoping it won't go to waste. I will keep you posted.

Here's what I have made for the trip...

Breakfast: Oatmeal with homemade granola (putting that 50 lb bag to good use), earl grey tea.
Lunch: Instant soup (bulk), pepperoni, cheese and ciabatta bread.
Snacks: Dehydrated Cajun Sweet Potatoes, Beef Jerky from Hager's local cows, Salt and Vinegar Pumpkin Seeds, Homemade Chocolate Peanut Butter Power Bar and homemade Coconut Brownie Power Bar, honey roasted peanuts, vitamin chews.
Dinners: Tortellini with Village Veggies Tomato Sauce, Eggplant and ground beef (Hager's Cows of course).
Annies Whole Wheat Mac & Cheese with Spinach and Italian Sausage (Hager's own sausage).
Red Beans and Rice with Hager's Kielbasa and Chorizo sausage (kind of like a Jambalaya).
Asian Noodles with Teriyaki Tofu and Eggplant.
After Dinner Treats: Peirce Brothers Hot Cocoa (Greenfield MA company) with mint tea or decaf chai tea. Dark chocolate squares.

It has been great experimenting with the dehydrator. Who knew you could just make extra dinner and dehydrate the leftovers? Pretty great! I have saved a boat load of money by making my own and hopefully I can inspire some of the students to try the same in the future.

Peanut Butter Cup Alternative...Local Is Better!

2010-11-07T12:07:00.000-08:00

Let me be clear: this recipe is not healthier for you, just better for the environment (and maybe a little big healthier). Which in my book is a good excuse to have one of my favorite candies! I came across this recipe a while back on another blog. I thought it would have been more appropriate for Halloween, but lost track of time. I have adapted the recipe to use local ingredients when possible (less petroleum used and more support for the community). These are pretty delicious but rich, so make sure to use the mini muffin tins!

Sorry about the poor pictures. I have lost my battery charger for our camera, thus the iPhone has been used.

Local Peanut Butter Cups
Makes approximately 24 mini-cups
*All links below are to the local company that provides this ingredient.

1 stick butter (1/2 cup) softened
3/4 cup all natural chunky peanut butter (obviously no one grows peanuts around Shelburne...)
3/4 cup whole wheat graham crackers (approximately 10 squares)
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 cup dark chocolate chips (these are SUPER expensive, but worth the splurge for a treat, plus read about the benefits of cacao here)
1/4 cup milk

1) Line a mini-muffin tin with papers
2) In a food processor crush crackers (if you are super crafty you can try to make your own grahams with a recipe I found here. I didn't try this yet, but the addition of local whole wheat flour would be amazing!). Add butter, maple syrup and PB. Process until smooth.
3) Using a cookie batter spooner (not sure what they are really called) scoop batter into muffin tins.
4) In a small sauce pan combine chocolate chips and milk. Stir over medium low heat until completely melted. It's important to keep stirring so it doesn't burn!
5) Spoon chocolate over peanut butter batter and spread to cover. Place muffin tins in the freezer for 2-4 hours until set.
6) Remove from freezer 1/2 hour before eating. Enjoy! Be sure to keep the refridgerated when not being eaten because they become soft and gooey otherwise...not necessarily the worst thing, just not very clean.

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T14:00:00.000-07:00

First of all, thanks for being patient with the ever changing blog designs and colors. I think I have settled, and hopefully everything is readable.

I can't believe it is the end of October already! Our garden isn't dead yet, but officially the tomatoes and eggplants are done. Just picked the rest of the hot and bell peppers a couple days ago too. Now, I need to get in gear to work the soil for next spring...but not now; now I have some baking fever!

There is something about the fall and cooler weather that always puts me in a mood to bake. I truly enjoy finding new creative recipes to use, and then there are always the old stand-bys that I can't do without. We have had some of these creations in the past week, but due to the date, and having some festive Halloween cheer, I have tried a new recipe today: Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies. (Secretly, I made pumpkin puree this week and found mascarpone by the Vermont Creamery company that I was dying to try out...Halloween aside!)

Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies
Brownie Batter

3/4 cup butter melted or EVOO

1/4 cup honey
1 tbsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
3/4 cup Sucanat sugar*
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 tsp cinnamon

Cheesecake Batter
8 oz mascarpone cheese
1 egg
1/3 cup Sucanat sugar*
2 tbsp whole wheat flour
1/2 cup pumpkin puree - directions on how to make your own at the bottom!
1/4 cup vanilla extract
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ginger
pinch of cloves
*regular sugar can be used instead.

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease an 8x8 inch pan.
2) In a large bowl combine the first 3 ingredients in the brownie batter. Beat in the 2 eggs until it has a light airy consistency.
3) Add remaining brownie batter ingredients and mix well.
4) In a separate bowl combine all the cheesecake batter ingredients. Blend well.
5) In the greased pan, pour 2/3 of the brownie batter, spread evenly over pan. Next spoon all of the cheesecake batter on top. Finally dollop the remaining brownie batter over cheesecake batter. With a butter knife, swirl the cheesecake and brownie batter by running the knife through the batters.
6) Bake for 40-50 minutes or until center is set. Cool completely on a wire rack and chill before cutting and serving.
Using Local, organic ingredients WHENEVER possible makes a better recipe! Not to mention it saves BARRELS of oil from shipping far off ingredients, doesn't destroy the soil and helps support your local farmers and community.

Pumpkin Puree

1) Choose fresh local sugar pumpkins (these are usually smaller then regular pumpkins). And since you are taking the time, you might as well do a few pumpkins to stock up.
2) Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
3) Cut off tops and remove seeds and stringy guts. Don't forget to make roasted pumpkin seeds later.
4) Cut the entire pumpkin in half, and finish removing any other seeds etc. Place on a cookie sheet gut-side-up and place in oven. Cook for 45 minutes or until flesh is soft.
5) Remove from oven and allow to cool completely.
6) Once cooled process through a food mill. If you don't have a food mill, peel off pumpkin skin and run through a food processor. Store in air tight containers in the freezer.
Two pumpkins made 2 pints of pumpkin puree for me.

More recipes coming like apple cheesecake bars, homemade granola, and maybe even some cookies! Happy Halloween!

We're Back!

2010-10-27T06:48:00.000-07:00

Hello again after a short hiatus! Marc, Pepsi and I are back from our cross country road trip. What started out as an idea, turned into an adventure! We got to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon on Waste Veggie Oil and then back again with a ton of amazing things in between! Our goal was to have a vacation, but to have as little footprint on the earth as possible. The biggest deal was using Veggie Oil as our fuel instead of a petroleum products. Waste Veggie Oil (WVO), the stuff that makes your french fries, is considered a hazardous waste...why, I have no idea. We use it to fuel our truck; the ultimate in recycling, and it is considered a carbon neutral fuel because the corn grown to make the oil offsets the carbon from driving. Pretty cool. We also composted, brought bulk grains and ate all our Village Veggies along the way which meant not going to the grocery stores for highly processed foods. I am sure we could have done it better, but it was a small step in the right direction, and definitely a great vacation. We saw the Grand Canyon, the Rocky Mountain National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park, the Vermilion Cliffs, tons of state parks throughout the middle of the country and a TON of wildlife. Couldn't have been better.

This is our set-up in the Rocky Mountain National Park.

That big tank in the back of the truck is full of Veggie Oil and Marc is trying to get rid of the grease smell with some bleach water so we don't attract bears.

Dinner in Utah just outside of Bryce Canyon.

Hiking in Bryce Canyon National Park looking at the Hoodoos.

Once at a camp site we used our bikes to get around, here's mine with a bundle of wood (Marc thought this was funny).

The Grand Canyon, from the North Rim.

Picnic dinner at sunset in the Grand Canyon.

Pepsi making herself comfortable.

Well I have a TON of pictures so I won't post them all, these were just a glimpse of the awesomeness! Can't wait to do it again! And since we've been back home it is officially fall! So we started cooking up some goodness once again. And surprisingly my garden is not dead yet, so we are lucky to still have some eggplants and tomatoes.

I was very proud of myself for the dinner we had the other night. Thanks to this post from Fields and Fire, I made my first roasted chicken (with roasted garden veggies). It was super easy and tasted AMAZING!

Veggies for the skillet: Kale, Brussel Sprouts, Butternut Squash, Parsnips, Potatoes, Carrots, Onions and Garlic. Chop these garden fresh veggies and put them in the bottom of the skillet. Place your chicken on top with some salt and roast. Seriously, it was that easy.

And this was the end result!

We also got some sugar pumpkins and baked them for pumpkin puree and roasted pumpkin seeds. It is nice to be home again. I will be posting more soon about some fall baking and getting ready for my backpacking trip coming up.

Apple Squares

2010-09-28T09:55:00.000-07:00

We have been getting things together for our trip the the Grand Canyon, and I realized I had a ton of apples that I needed to use up soon, so I made a double batch of these and they are AMAZING! A perfect way to use apples and make a road-trip snack! Enjoy!

Apple Squares
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup olive oil
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup sucanat sugar*
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup apples, chopped
1 cup walnuts, chopped
Optional Topping
2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
* If unable to find this natural sugar, you can substitute white sugar instead.

1) Preheat oven to 350 and grease a 9x13 inch pan.
2) In a small bowl combine the first 4 ingredients and set aside.
3) In a large bowl combine brown sugar, sucanat sugar and oil. Add the eggs and vanilla and mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon.
4) Slowly add the flour mixture to the wet mixture and mix until just combined, then stir in the apples and walnuts.
5) If using topping: in the bowl used for the flour, combine the 2 tbsp sugar with the 2 tsp of cinnamon and set aside.
6) Spread mixture evenly over greased pan. Sprinkle topping over entire pan.
7) Bake at 350 degrees for 45-60 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Cool on wire rack and then cut into squares.

I made the bars with the topping, but next time I might try it without for a less sweet breakfast option. But really, you can't go wrong either way. It's like an apple brownie!

Back to the Garden and Out Again

2010-09-23T12:45:00.000-07:00

I am finally back, and finally blogging after my 10 day backcountry trip on the Raquette River. Although it was rainy the entire time on my trip, I guess it was beautiful here, and most of the plants in the garden are still thriving! And all this sun has given the peppers and eggplant a second wind. While I was gone, Marc managed to freeze 4 gallons of tomatoes, roast eggplants, and consume an INSANE amount of summer squash, what a guy!

But, even though the summer is going strong, Marc, Pepsi and I are headed on a road trip to the grand canyon next week. So things have been a little crazy here getting things ready.

Question: How do you go on an eco-friendly road trip to the grand canyon?

Answer: In a Waste Veggie Truck and a used camper loaded with supplies from our garden!

We have over 250 gallons of grease to get our little mobile home out the the North Rim of the Grand Canyon (and hopefully back again). And, in order to make sure we don't produce a ton of waste along the way, we are bringing bulk food supplies to maintain our low-impact life style while on the road. What that means is that in the midst of my unpacking from the Adirondack trip, we are making tofu, beer, bread, hummus etc like crazy people. Our house is a little scary at the moment.
More posts about our trip plans and preps are soon to come.

Beer making and tofu being pressed.

And news from the garden: Japanese turnips are ready and delicious. Tomatoes are still going strong and we have started sun-drying some and freezing the rest. Planted spinach in some of the empty beds which should be ready when we get back in the beginning of November. I actually attacked the compost madness, so we will have a ton of it ready to spread when we get back. Another mad dash to preserve whatever we can because it will be done by the time we get home from AZ.

Sun Dried Tomatoes in oil and tomatoes freezing.

Brussel Sprouts

And another fun thing: Village Veggies is participating in the 350 Challenge, aka 350 pounds of carbon emissions have been offset thanks to our blog (the equivalent of turning off 100 light bulbs for a day or not driving for 2 days). For more info check out the widget in the side bar.

Some much needed comfort food. When things get a little out of hand, a smoothie with some fresh greens makes everything better!

A Much Needed Update

2010-09-06T08:05:00.000-07:00

I have been really slacking in the blogging department lately. And since it's getting to be the end of the summer (well, today is Labor Day) and I actually start my real job this Tuesday; I thought it would be a good time to blog. I leave for a 10 day wilderness canoe trip on Thursday for work, so it's been a little crazy around here getting things harvested and preserved. And, I will admit, I haven't planted any fall greens in the garden, so the garden itself is looking a little haggard. Enough of my excuses, here's what's been going on here lately.

We harvested our first watermelon! And although the outside is suppose to be a dark green color instead of this lighter green, the taste was amazing! It was around the 5 lb size. And we have 5 more that are a little smaller but almost ready. Along with the last cantaloupe that was hiding amongst the leaves.

Breakfast this week has been the best.

We are still harvesting a ton of tomatoes, so this was a pizza that featured some of the heirloom varieties we are growing. Also, some fresh pesto from our basil. I wanted to make sure to make this stuff before I left for my trip (love pesto), so I froze 3 half pints.

In the past couple days we canned more Curried Beets (7 quarts), Hot Garden Salsa (8 pints), and a Spicy Pineapple Salsa (12 half pints) ...and no, we aren't growing our own pineapples. Along with other preserving projects our Harvest Keeper Tally is getting up there! I will be canning some apple butter today.

Marc has been brewing away these past couple weekends. Right now he has 2 brews going (hard to tell but that is what that picture is of: carboys wrapped in jackets to keep warm). He's got an Oktoberfest Ale, and a Belgian Strong Ale bubbling away in our dining room.

Harvesting our Cranberry Pole Beans, dried nicely.

Our heirloom Blue Potatoes. I just started digging some of these up.

Miraculously the summer squashes have come back after their Powdery Mildew attack...but now I don't mind the squash bugs all over them.

Thai Chili Peppers enjoying the past heat wave.

Newly planted peas getting bigger.

Brussle Sprouts, looking kind of sad, but I think we will be able to harvest them soon. Unfortunately because it is still warm, there is a serious aphid infestation that may prove deadly to these guys.

Nasturtium that is flourishing now that the winter squash is out.

And because I wasn't on top of my game, the broccoli bolted. Which is no big deal because the blossoms have attracted some bees that are happy for the pollen. It is crazy how many bees are in these couple plants, you can hear the buzzing from the sidewalk!

I'm glad I left these plants in. Who knew how pretty broccoli flowers are!

And, we have made the fall transition to Mums.

Stocking Up...Literally

2010-08-31T11:55:00.000-07:00

This week has started my mad dash to preserve as much as summer as possible. Although it may be 90 degrees out, to me it was the perfect time to make some chicken stock. This is invaluable for us in the winter for soups and curries. And the stock is best with fresh produce and herbs. This can be pressure canned or frozen.

Another big deal that happened last week was that we finally purchased a chest freezer! I can't explain how excited I am about this since our normal freezer was jammed. Now I just need to finish filling it up.

So today I went to town blanching and freezing some of the local veggies.

Corn and Red Peppers

Broccoli

Roasted Red Peppers. I got this recipe from Happy Valley Locavore.

And miscellaneous other preserving projects.

Oregano, Sage and Parsley

10 lbs of local onions (can never have enough)

And this is what our cabinet looks like right now. We are looking pretty good for this winter, and we are charging away at the Harvest Keeper Challenge! Check out the sidebar for our current preservation tallies.

Punjab Eggplant

2010-08-27T07:16:00.000-07:00

This has been a great summer for eggplant, and here in our garden we have had a plethora of these black beauties. And since I am going to miss them this winter, I made a big batch of Punjab Eggplant to freeze.

We came about this recipe from a Tasty Bite and really enjoyed the unique barbecue flavor. I have tweaked the recipe slightly to be a little more filling for a dinner. Enjoy!

Punjab Eggplant

2 medium eggplants

2 medium onions

1 large tomato (approximately 1.5 cups chopped)

3 tbsp olive oil

1 cup re-hydrated beans of your choice

1 clove garlic, minced

1 tsp coriander

1 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp chili powder

1/4 tsp cayenne powder

1 tbsp dried cilantro or 2 tbsp fresh chopped

1 tsp garlic salt

1/2 tsp garam masala

1) Slice eggplant and place center down on a greased baking pan. Cook in oven at 400 degrees for 30 minutes or until eggplants are soft to the touch. When cool enough, scrape out eggplant flesh, mash and set aside. (You can do this step a day ahead of time and just put eggplant flesh in the fridge)

You can also chop up 1 of the eggplants and place it in a greased oven dish. Then roast it at 400 degrees for 30 minutes and have a more broiled eggplant. This way will make the overall dish a little chunkier, but YOU HAVE TO HAVE AT LEAST ONE OF THE EGGPLANTS ROASTED IN THE MANNER MENTIONED ABOVE in order to have a good sauce.

2) In a large sauce pot, heat oil and saute the garlic and onion until tender, approximately 7 minutes.
3) Add all the spiced except the Garam Masala and continue to saute another minute until fragrant.

4) Add eggplant flesh, tomatoes and 1 cup of water and mix well. Bring mixture to a boil and reduce heat to a simmer. Cover and simmer 30 minutes or until eggplant and tomatoes have made a thick paste.
5) Remove cover, add beans and Garam Masala and continue to cook 5 more minutes.

6) Serve over rice or with Naan, or with both! If you have a lot of eggplant, double the recipe and then freeze the rest for a later time. The flavors will be even better the longer you wait.

Zucchini Chocolate Chip Cookies

2010-08-25T13:13:00.000-07:00

Every summer I find myself with zucchini the size of baseball bats. And every year I tell myself I won't let them get to this point next year...but inevitably it always seems to happen and then the question is: what do you do with it?

Well this recipe has answered that question for us. Zucchini Chocolate Chip Cookies are delicious and you can use as many of those giant zukes as you have because you just get more cookies! Who can complain about that! I got the recipe from the great book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver and made some adaptions because we are lucky enough to have local whole wheat flour from Four Star Farm, and local honey from Shelburne Honey Co.

Zucchini Chocolate Chip Cookies

2 fresh eggs beaten

1 cup butter softened or olive oil

1 cup brown sugar

2/3 cup honey

2 tbsp vanilla extract

2 cups whole wheat flour (not local only because it is a finer texture)

2 cups Four Star Farms Whole Wheat Flour (be sure to pack it into measuring cup)

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp nutmeg

2 cups finely shredded zucchini

12 oz chocolate chips

1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2) Finely shred zucchini in food processor and set aside.

3) Combine all wet ingredients except zucchini in a large bowl. Mix well.

4) Add flour and dry ingredients to wet mixture.

5) Slowly fold in zucchini and mix well. Continue mixing and add chocolate chips and walnuts.

6) Drop tablespoons of batter on greased cookie sheet. Flatten with back of spoon.

7) Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes until browned on edges. Cool on wire rack.

Mmmm

And don't forget it's the Loving Local Blogathon week, along with the Massachusetts Farmers Market Week! If you are interested in seeing other blogs or posts about the local markets or local food in Massachusetts check out In Our Grandmother's Kitchen and if you want to support the Federation of Massachusett’s Farmer’s Market click here.

In the Red!

2010-08-22T09:35:00.000-07:00

This week kicks off the Loving Local Blogathon to support our local Massachusetts Farmers Markets. Check out some details at In Our Grandmother's Kitchen and see all the participating bloggers at the Loving Local blog. The blogathon is hoping to raise money to support massachusetts farmers markets so if you would like to show your support and make a donation, click here.

And in our garden this past week, the tomatoes were in full gear. What seemed like a manageable amount of toms turned into an obscene amount in two days time. So, yesterday, and finishing up today, Marc and I went to work.

We have put up a lot of tomatoes already, but this time we decided to make more sauce.

The wash

Followed by the chop and press

Into the pot to boil off...but at this point we were only half way through our tomatoes and the 5 gal pot was almost full.

We still had these babies to go!

So another pot was started. We boiled this down for hours until it was all in one pot and nice and thick.

We decided to start the actual canning the next morning. Which turned out to be a good plan.

Final tally was 16 quarts and 1 pint of tomato sauce!

Here's the Down and Dirty Tomato Sauce Recipe (no salt, no sugar):

10 lbs tomatoes (or however many you may have)

1 bell pepper

1 large onion

4 cloves garlic

1 bunch fresh basil or 1 tbsp dried

1/2 bunch fresh oregano or 1/2 tbsp dried

* This amount usually fills our 5 quart spaghetti pot, so do the math if you have more or less tomatoes.

1) Clean tomatoes and remove skin, core and seeds. We use an amazing hand press which does almost everything except wash them and we do have to cut the big tomatoes. You can always skip the step of removing seeds and skin and keep the extra fiber too!

2) Put puree into large spaghetti pot and bring to boil. Add all other ingredients and continue to cook down over controlled boil until desired consistency is reached.

3) If canning, process in boiling water bath for 45 minutes for quarts and pints.

Sauce with homegrown summer squash and Hager's Grass Fed ground beef.

News from the Garden

2010-08-14T12:55:00.000-07:00

Well, once again I have been slipping on the posts. With the veggies, especially the tomatoes, getting into full swing and canning needing to get done, I have definitely been a slacker on this end. So let me start off by giving you an update on some things Village Veggies will be participating in during the next couple weeks!

First off: Loving Local Blogathon. I am pretty excited about this! During the week of August 22 - August 28, In Our Grandmother's Kitchen will be hosting the Loving Local Blogathon; celebrating Massachusetts Farmers Markets and Local Flavors. During that week people from all over the state will be posting recipes, entries, thoughts and good cheer about our home grown food. Donations will be raised for the Mass Farmers Markets. Even if you aren't a regular at your local farmers market (and I will admit, this includes myself), it is a great opportunity to give your support to these farmers. You can friend Loving Local on Face Book, and/or check out their blog spot for all the different posts from individuals across the state. This starts ONE WEEK from today, so mark your calendar!

The other thing Village Veggies has started participating in, is the Harvest Keeper Challenge hosted by the folks at Path To Freedom. People all across the nation are tallying their harvests and preserves. Here's the tally for Village Veggies:

Diced Tomatoes: 24 pints
Tomato Sauce: 8 quarts
Garden Salsa: 3 pints
Curried Beets: 6 quarts
Madras Lentils: 5 quarts, 3 frozen quarts
Sweet Potato Minestrone: 12 quarts
Kosher Dill Pickles: 15 quarts, 3 1/2 pints
Sweet Relish: 8 pints, 4 1/2 pints
Sweet Pickles: 6 pints
Dill Relish: 5 pints, 10 1/2 pints
Onions: 10 lbs
Garlic: 15 cloves
Spiced Peach Preserves: 2 pints, 1 four oz.
Baba Ghanoush: 3 quarts frozen
Pesto: 5 misc. pints frozen
Peas: 1 quart frozen
Broccoli: 2 quarts frozen
Corn: 1 quart frozen
Strawberries: 3 quarts frozen
Raspberries: 1 quart frozen
Sweet Potatoes: 12 lbs
Carrots: 10 lbs

Whoo Hoo! And that isn't even including all the things we harvested and ate already! Next season I am hoping to invest in a scale so I can weigh the bounty when I harvest it and then get a better idea of what our little front yard is capable of. We are going to be so excited when we open this stuff in January!
Well, I will post again about more updates about the fall plantings we have done around here, but for now, I will leave you with this picture: Can you guess what used to be here?

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Reminiscing and Updates

2010-08-05T16:11:00.000-07:00

I have had the pleasure of talking with some of my neighbors this week; who reminded me of the time I said that "we were no longer going to park our cars on our lawn because I was going to make a garden". That time seems ages ago, so I am going to take this time to give you a little photo time-line of how amazing this endeavor has been!

The parking lot.

Hand turning it.

Beds in place this spring...not knowing if anything would grow...

...more than we EVER imagined! I feel incredibly blessed every time I look at our "parking lot".

Remember the tomatoes?

It's hard to see, but those are the same trellises and plants!

Our beautiful bird bath...

...is like a 'Where's Waldo' now.

I have truly enjoyed this process!

And enough of the self-praise; updates about the garden: We finally pulled a sweet potato and they are HUGE! Pretty psyched about that and we got roughly 10lbs for storage.

This is the Benning's Summer Squash I let get away...Yikes!

Eggplant still doing well, our biggest harvest yet!

And before the rain, I pulled our dry beans to find a pretty good amount of Mexican Bean Beetle Larvae. I have taken measures to kill most of them by hand, and hopefully the organic spray I put on them will take care of any other larvae in the soil. Don't want that to spread through the compost! Luckily, the beans will finish drying in our solar dryer and won't be effected too much by the bugs.

And in the place of the beans, cauliflower (which was canned as Madras Lentils), and sweet potatoes we now have more Peas, Daikon Radish, Japanese Turnip, more Danvers Carrots and more Beets. It was a busy productive morning!

Current status of our garden.

And lastly we have been bringing in a ton of tomatoes daily, so I made some Tomato Sauce and Diced Tomatoes this week.

Tomatoes love this hot summer and so do I!

Curried Beet Recipe

2010-08-03T12:27:00.000-07:00

After checking out one of my favorite blogs: Happy Valley Locavore, I realized I needed to share this beet recipe. It essentially changed my outlook on beets. I highly recommend it if you enjoy curries and have fresh beets. My homesteading friends in Vermont shared this recipe and they make a double batch without beans and pressure can it.

Curried Beets

3/4 lb or 1 bunch beets, peeled and cut into wedges

1/3 cup beans (I use a combo of kidney and adzuki) hydrated in 3 cups water

4 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp cumin

1 clove garlic, minced

1 large onion chopped

2 medium tomatoes, chopped

2 tsp garlic salt

1 tsp flour

1/8-1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

1 1/4 cups water

1) In a large sauce pan, saute garlic and onion in oil until tender, approximately 5 minutes.

2) Add spices, salt and beets and saute another 5 minutes.

3) Add tomatoes, beans and water and bring to a boil.

4) Turn down heat to low and simmer, covered, for 30 minutes or until beets are tender.

5) Remove cover and add the flour and continue to simmer for another 5-7 minutes until sauce thickens.

6) Serve over rice or quinoa with naan.

7) If canning, omit beans and pressure can at 15 lbs pressure for 45 minutes.

This Week in the Garden

2010-08-02T13:31:00.000-07:00

Just back from a quick vacation up in NH to visit the family. The garden is still flourishing even without the constant care from me. But when I got home, the powdery mildew had gotten a little out of control. It has infected all the squashes and the cucumbers. Luckily, I believe we can recover with some home-made garden spray of baking soda, dish soap and water. I will keep you posted on whether it works out!

Here are some shots of the stuff that is doing well. Zoo Loo Prince Daisy

An ear of corn (there are several now)

Soybeans

Tomatoes

Although this looks bad, these are our Jacob's Cattle Dry Beans. They are drying out pretty nicely despite the humidity this summer.

Cosmos

And when I got home I did some harvesting. All the cauliflower has been picked.

Zucchini and Benning's Squash. Unfortunately the zucchini are club sized and one of the Benning's is the size of a small pumpkin. That's what happens when you go away!

All kinds of tomatoes including some Amish Brandywine and Bolseno Heirlooms.

And I canned some diced tomatoes today.

It's Been A Little While...

2010-07-27T13:34:00.000-07:00

There are going to be three distinct sections in this post. I feel like I haven't been blogging very much lately, but a lot has been happening here, so this will be a big over-view. The first section is the garden. The picture above is a Rudbeckia flower. It looks fake, but it's not! Since the rain things have been doing well, and we have been harvesting a ton of produce and giving a lot away.

Daily harvests over the past week!

Companion planting with Soybeans, Dahlias and Black Eyed Susan's (left). And Verbena, Russet Potatoes, Dill and Rudbeckia (right).

Second planting of beets getting big.

The second part of this post is going to be about our preserving projects. I have been doing my best to preserve everything so that we don't waste any of our crops (or I give it away so other people can enjoy it). This week we have done a lot of canning. The main dilemma I have been having is finding room in our refrigerator to keep things until we use them. It's gotten a little crazy in there...

(box on left shelf full of eggplant and squash)

Hot Garden Salsa. We have tried this and it's delicious!

Baba Ghanoush

Spiced Peach Preserves...but I don't think this set.

Tomato Sauce

And finally the third update is on our dinners. They have been amazing due to all the fresh produce picked minutes before they go into the pot. I couldn't resist sharing these.

Eggplant Pomodoro with Homemade Ravioli

Steak Stir Fry

Steak and Homegrown Veggies

Homemade Ravioli, Veggies and Sausage

Home Grown Salad that went with pizza

Homemade Pizza with Fresh Tomatoes and Jalapenos

Pickling Cucumbers For Sale

2010-07-23T09:01:00.000-07:00

I have moved onto other things with the abundance of cucumbers here. No longer will I try and make every type of pickle possible, but instead I will attempt to make a little money on them...

...I just put these on Craigslist this morning. Here's the listing.

And if you want some good excuses to use these bad boys, here's some postings you might like.

How to Preserve 20 lbs of Cucumbers

Canning Continues

Canning Continues!

2010-07-21T10:19:00.000-07:00

So we harvested another 23 lbs of pickling cucumbers. I don't think we will have to buy pickles ever again! We have made Kosher Dills, Sweet Relish, Sweet Pickles, Fresh Pack Sweet Relish, and yesterday we made Dill Relish. (Check out this post for those recipes)

The Fresh Pack Sweet Relish which I made a couple days ago, looks good, but I won't officially know for 8 weeks. And when I was finally done peeling and chopping all the cucumbers in the blue bucket, we had 6 pints and 17 half pints of Dill Relish.

We pulled our beets last week and had about 4 lbs. So I canned some Beet Curry for this winter.

The main ingredient (obviously) is fresh beets, then beans and tomatoes along with onion.

All ingredients chopped and sauteed then beans added.

Simmering for 30 minutes.

Then canned in the pressure cooker for 1 hour 15 minutes.

It was a productive, hot day!

Weekly Update

2010-07-21T09:59:00.000-07:00

A lot has gone on this week with harvesting! Take a look:

"Chocolate Cherry" and "Fourth of July" Tomatoes

Garlic

Jalapenos, Cucumbers (another 23 lbs), Green Peppers and Benning's Summer Squash

Another box with some eggplant.

Pulled the "Finger" Carrots to make room for more.

Sweet Onions (5 lbs)

Lots of green beans and some Dinosaur Kale

Curing Onions in braids for easier storage.

Cleaned Carrots, roughly 6 lbs total.

"Super Sweet Cherry" Tomatoes hanging from a pot on our porch.

Cantaloupe about the size of a baseball!

Gorgeous night sky thanks to some rain this past week.

Summer's Progress

2010-07-16T18:19:00.000-07:00

Oriental Lilies thanks to my mom's Easter gift last year.

Peppers starting to turn red

Cauliflower

We've started with the green beans.

This is our tomato patch...I am 5'8 and the trellis is 6'. They are huge!

Cherry Tomatoes in our hanging pots.

Cantaloupe!

Bennington's Green Tint summer squash.

Eggplants

The beginnings of a summer stir-fry.

How to Preserve 20 lbs of Cucumbers!

2010-07-16T14:28:00.000-07:00

So I had a request to share my pickling recipes! I am pretty excited that people are interested so I will go through the 3 recipes I have done so far. But a little disclaimer: the fresh packed pickles we have made (Kosher Dills and Sweet Pickles) we haven't been able to taste because they need to cure for 8 weeks. Therefore, I am not sure the recipes I am giving are really good, but I am assuming they will be. Prepare at your own risk. All of the recipes I processed in a boiling water bath.

We will start first with the hot pack, Sweet Cucumber Relish. This I have tried, and it's officially good on hot dogs. This is a "hot pack" because you actually cook the cucumber in the brine before you can it.

Sweet Cucumber Relish
Makes approximately 6, 1/2 pints
8 cups chopped cucumbers
4 cups chopped onion
4 medium sweet peppers, chopped
1/2 cup pickling salt
5 1/2 cups honey
2 Tbsp celery seed
2 Tbsp mustard seed

4 cups white vinegar

1) Combine all chopped veggies with salt in large pot and cover with cold water. Let sit tin the refrigerator 2 hours.
2) Drain the veggies and rinse with cold water and drain again.

3) Prepare 1/2 pint jars for canning by boiling them for 10 minutes. I use the same pot that I will process the finished relish in for doing this step, that way the water is all heated up for when I need to process the relish.
4) Add honey, spices and vinegar in a large pot (one that will hold all that liquid plus all the cucumbers). Bring brine to a boil.
5) Add drained vegetables to the brine and simmer 10 minutes. While this is happening, put caps of jars in a small sauce pan and cover with water. Heat but DO NOT BOIL.

6) Once cooked, and using a slotted spoon, scoop relish into sterilized jars. Top off relish with brine so to leave 1/4 inch head space. Remove air pockets and cap.
7) Process 1/2 pints for 10 minutes in boiling water canner.
*Save the extra brine in the fridge for use with the Fresh Pack Sweet Pickle recipe*

The next recipe is another experiment because I had so much of the sweet relish brine left over, I felt it was a shame to waste. Therefore I came up with this recipe. The best part is that it is really easy to process these when you have some spare time. But, I haven't tried these yet, so make at your own risk!

Fresh Pack Sweet Pickles
makes approximately 6, 1/2 pints
Extra brine from Sweet Relish Recipe
8 cups cucumbers, sliced
1/2 cup canning salt
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp mustard seed
2 cups white vinegar

1) Put sliced cucumbers in large pot with salt. Cover with cold water and let sit in the refrigerator 2 hours.
2) Drain the veggies and rinse with cold water and drain again.
3) Prepare 1/2 pint jars for canning by boiling them for 10 minutes.
4) In a large pot add the vinegar, left-over brine and extra spices. Bring to a boil. While this is happening, put caps of jars in a small sauce pan and cover with water. Heat but DO NOT BOIL.
5) Pack cucumbers into sterilized jars. Pour brine over top leaving 1/4 inch head space. Remove air pockets and cap. Repeat until you have no more cucumbers or brine.
6) Process 1/2 pints for 10 minutes in boiling water bath.
7) Once processed let cure for 8 weeks before trying. (That is the step I am currently on)

And finally the Kosher Dills and Spicy Dills. This is a fresh pack recipe which I find to be easiest. Once again, they are yet to be tried. So if you aren't a fan of spicy pickles, I would just stick to the regular recipe. But, if you want to experiment, which is what my husband did, you can try adding the Jalapeno or hot pepper or any hot pepper for that matter!

Kosher Dill Recipe
makes approximately 6 quarts

8 lbs-10 lbs or 1 sink full of pickling cucumbers
4 cups white vinegar
12 cups water
2/3 cup pickling salt
6 heads fresh dill
12 sprigs fresh dill
12 cloves garlic or 1/2 Tbsp minced garlic per quart

1) Soak pickles in ice water for 3 hours. Change out ice packs every 1/2 hour to ensure their cold. (This is important for the crispness of the finished pickle.)
2) Prepare quart jars for canning by boiling them for 10 minutes.

3) In large stock pot, combine water, salt and vinegar. Bring brine to a boil.
4) Chop cucumbers into quarters ensuring they will fit into the quart jars. If necessary, cut off tops and bottoms of cucumbers. Leave quartered cucumbers in ice water until they are packed. While this is happening, put caps of jars in a small sauce pan and cover with water. Heat but DO NOT BOIL.
5) Once brine is boiling, place 2 cloves garlic and 1 head of dill in bottom of sterilized quart. Pack quarter cucumbers tightly in jar, add 2 sprigs fresh dill and cover with brine leaving 1/2 inch head space. Repeat process until you have used all your cucumbers or brine.
6) Process quarts in boiling water bath for 15 minutes.
7) Let cure 8 weeks before opening.

For Spicy Dills add 1/4 tsp hot pepper or 1 Jalapeno cut lengthwise to the bottom of the quart jars along with the garlic and dill head. Pack and process the same as above.

I hope this helped everyone with their abundance of cucumbers! Happy Canning!

Canning

2010-07-13T05:17:00.000-07:00

It's been a hectic week, but just a quick post about what's new here.

Pickles!

Saturday we spent the day taking care of our 10lbs of pickling cucumbers that were overtaking the fridge.

The tally of what was processed was:

9 quarts of Kosher Dills (3 of them Spicy Dills)

6 pints Sweet Pickles

4 half pints Kosher Dills

It was a bit of a push, but it is nice to get all the cucumbers out of the refrigerator.

And we harvested our Beets for another canning project later this week (I will keep you posted).

Another Week in the Garden

2010-07-09T17:38:00.000-07:00

The cosmos are blooming.

And although the heat wave hasn't let up, there are some veggies that love it, like the eggplant!

We have a couple of these guys forming, and I already can't wait for some eggplant grilled up. And we are starting to harvest the first of our Jalapeno Peppers.

The beans are growing strong.

Calypso Bean

Cranberry Pole Bean blossoms.

Our pathetic corn patch seems to be doing alright next to the giant tomatoes.

The beginnings of a butternut squash, and...

...cucumbers

They are multiplying and forming masses in the refrigerator. It is unclear when their world domination will cease, but as it looks now, we are in it for the long haul! I am harvesting one of these boxes full, every other day, yikes!

So tonight I made sweet cucumber relish.

Another picture of our cucumbers taking over the trellis addition. Hope everyone likes pickles!

The Heat is On

2010-07-06T11:51:00.000-07:00

It is hot out here, and although we don't like it, the garden apparently does. The squash has started coming in and every day there is more then the day before, and that includes the cukes.

So we have had some great meals in the past week that I thought I would quickly recap on.

Curried Mustard Greens

With homemade naan (flat bread great for dipping).

Can you guess how this medley works up?

Grilled up with a seasoned dressing from our fresh herbs.

Then rice and local homemade smoked kielbasa (from Hager's Farm Market of course)....delicious!

Another look at our homemade ravioli and sauce...still amazed how good it is!

And last night was particularly hot so we started off by having one of Marc's home brews in a frosted mug. That definitely took the edge off the humidity!

Then we made some salad with our home grown greens and cukes, local feta, homemade croutons and our fresh made herb dressing.

And then topped with Hager's London Broil steak. Hit the spot.

And today, because of the abundance of cucumbers or maybe because I have been putting this project off for a week...I decided to make pickles.

Ice water bath.

Prepping with garlic and homegrown dill.

Processing...which was super hot.

Finished product. We just have to wait 8 weeks before trying these kosher spears.

Happy Fourth

2010-07-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since my last blog, so I will do a little recap of the past week.

We have had some things flourishing in the garden (like the sunflowers).

Yellow Squash

Pole Beans

Tomatoes are approaching eye-level.

Tons of cucumbers, broccoli, swiss chard and Romaine lettuce.

We had our first meal with our homegrown broccoli in it this week!

The butterflies have been loving our purple cone flowers. I have identified the Tiger Swallowtail and possibly the Red Admiral butterfly.

And our cucumbers are still attempting to take over the world...

...so I added onto the already 5 ft. tall trellises.

And they just aren't getting the picture. But we have an abundance of pickling cucumbers that have been in our Pasta Salad, Fresh Salad, on sandwiches and soon to be pickled.

We had my family over for a cook-out yesterday! The cucumbers were in everything and I was able to give 1/2 a dozen to my mom for distribution in Eastern Ma. (Gotta love family!) We also got to taste some leaf lettuce from my mom's garden (a surprise picnic lunch when they arrived)! We had a pretty good day of delicious food.

We had a great spread, and relaxing evening on our porch. Plus the bonus of Hager's Farm Stand homemade ice cream sandwiches. Can't go wrong!

And just a Follow-Up on the Homemade Ravioli Front:

We had them for dinner the other night with a hearty meat sauce and they were great! Phew!

The key with these will be a hearty sauce. Since they are made with the local wheat flour, they have a distinct "these are good for me" taste. But with the sauce we had, it was awesome! They didn't even fall apart in the boiling water.

We had tomato sauce, and then added a mushroom, garlic scapes, onion, a huge amount of our home grown basil and parsley, some red wine and Hager's Grass Fed ground beef.

Then just when the ravioli went into the boiling water, I added the first of our summer squash to the sauce.

The end results were great! It was definitely filling and we would have homemade Whole Wheat, Olive Ricotta Ravioli again.

Hope everyone enjoyed their weekend!

Mama Mia!

2010-06-29T14:41:00.000-07:00

It's been an interesting week for kitchen projects this week. We officially have local whole wheat flour that Four Star Farms has been growing, milling and selling at our Co-op and favorite farm stand, Hager's. Because of this luck, I started figuring out all the things made from wheat that get shipped hundreds of miles to us, and have been researching how to make these things myself instead. Essentially saving barrels of fossil fuels and being healthier for us. With that said, the first 2 things I wanted to try was bread (obviously) and pasta.

The first one started off as what was suppose to be the easiest bread recipe, "No Knead Bread". I followed the directions and in the morning went to check on the dough and it was a watery gross mess, I thought it might have resembled sour dough starter if I had ever seen it before. Not being discouraged I decided to add some more of our local flour and give it a go anyways. But I am not a masochist, so I decided to make a mini loaf and use the rest of the messed up dough for home made naan.

We cooked this stuff on the grill because it was 85 degrees out, and the naan tastes better that way. As you can see the naan was a success. (It's pretty hard to screw up unleavened bread)

We cooked the mini loaf in a casserole pot on the grill as well (casserole pot recommended in recipe: grill was not).

It came out great! What a relief to not have wasted all that flour and effort!

Tasted great with our homegrown cucumbers for lunch.

Now onto Project #2: Homemade Ravioli. I just got a pasta maker and ravioli press. They are awesome.

So I figured I would whip up some raviolis with homemade filling...

Ironically making the homemade Ricotta was actually the easiest part. Yikes!

I then proceeded to make a double batch of pasta dough, (why double you ask? because I am an idiot!) and attempted to make thin sheets for the ravioli press. This was a little frustrating... I figured out that the local whole wheat flour wasn't the best flour to be trying this set-up with for the first time. The dough just kept crumbling and I couldn't get any sheets that were bigger then 1/2 inch by 1/2 inch. So, an HOUR and a HALF later, I finally started getting bigger sheets. No, they were not big enough to cover the entire ravioli press, just big enough to make 3 (the press makes 12 at a time).

So, after I got a few with cracks in them from the excess filling (nowhere in the directions did it say anything about how much to fill these little guys with) I decided I should probably try some of these Olive Ricotta Whole Wheat Raviolis before I spent the next hour making more...

They were actually pretty good! THANK GOD! So I made a few more or I should say enough to have one dinner of them and froze the rest of the filling and dough.

LESSON: Don't double a recipe until you know it will work!

In a moment of despair I made a Bow Tie pasta, just in case the Raviolis were destined for failure.

And the best part was the clean up....Yikes!

I will put a little more time into some research on this homemade pasta situation. But I can't give up on the Four Star Farm's local wheat possibilities.

Thanks to the Peas

2010-06-28T16:24:00.000-07:00

Today was the last day for our peas in the garden. They were one of the best veggies this spring, and ended up in almost every one of our dinners. But, it was time to pull them to make room for some other veggies.

They weren't looking that good anyways. So I pulled them out, along with the spinach, mustard and leaf lettuce that had been growing under the pea trellis. All of the greens had gotten unruly, so I was happy to pull them out. I managed to salvage the netting and sticks for another pea trellis at another point.

Once they were all pulled, a little compost added and potatoes went in. Although a little late for these guys, they should be ready to go in September.

From the rest of the pea stalks we were still able to harvest a pretty good amount of peas that we froze tonight for meals in the future when we are missing these little guys.

And more things still growing all the time!

Our first Dahlia

Our first Black Eyed Susan (started from seed)

Jacob's Cattle Beans flourishing

And a look at the garden with peas...

...and a garden without, but soon to be potatoes

Pictorial Update

2010-06-26T12:45:00.000-07:00

Another update on how our garden grows...

Bolseno Tomatoes

Eggplant Blossom

Broccoli

Our one Gladiola

Jalepenos

Calendula

Bell Peppers

The beginnings of Brussel Sprouts

Zucchini Blossom

Nasturtium hiding among the cucumbers.

And because I can't get enough of them, I picked up some more garlic scapes at Hager's Farm Market. Then spent some of the afternoon making some pestos.

Scape pesto with almonds.

Scape Radish pesto with cashews.

Sage Parsley pesto with walnuts.

Another little bouquet because it has become one of my favorite things to do in the morning.

Over Ambitious Veggies

2010-06-25T07:12:00.000-07:00

When we returned from our vacation, the garden had grown/overtaken certain areas. Mainly the walkways. This I feel is a pretty good problem to have...except I am still trying to come up with some more trellising ideas.

For now, I have put in some little fences to help keep the cucumber vines and vigorous tomatoes our of the danger of stomping feet.

Some harvesting notes from when we got home.

We are pretty flush with peas. It is almost the end of these early season peas, so we have been eating them almost every day and freezing the excess. Nothing more beautiful then these little guys though.

We also had a little mix up in the seed packet I bought. There was a snow pea seed in there, so after finally trying one of these odd shaped peas, I realized what it actually was! Lucky us!

Here is the rest of our bounty.

We made some fresh basil pesto and had the rainbow chard last night with home made tofu and noodles.

View from our porch.

Back from Sunny Island

2010-06-23T12:05:00.000-07:00

We made it back from our little vacation on Sunny Island. It was warm, perfect weather and relaxing. When we got home there was some gardening that needed to be attended, but more importantly, tons of produce and flowers. I won't bore you too much with that stuff yet...

But there was one big surprise waiting for us when we got home! A cucumber!

First of the season, with probably a million more to come based on the blossoms. We had a delicious cucumber sandwich for lunch today. I will post more on this later. But I want to do a quick recap of our delicious food while out on the island.

A usual stand-by for us here is tortellini, sausage, broccoli and brussel sprouts. But, our broccoli isn't ready yet, and we didn't get any at the farmers market, so I had to come up with something else. And what was ready in our garden was Dinosaur Kale and Peas. So we changed up the veggies in the original, and brought it to Sunny Island.

Cooking up the Kale with garlic on our camp stove.

Final product and better then the original recipe!

We made bruschetta with the white bean and scallion dip I made and local Parmesan and tomatoes.

And our favorite dinner was the steak tips (local of course).

Getting the mushrooms and onions ready for grilling.

Marc cooking up steak tips and veggies on the fire pit.

Final product with home grown salad greens, homemade pasta salad (with our fresh peas) and Marc's family recipe for tomato salad. Perfect summer meal.

And just a couple shots of the garden when we got home, growing strong.

Processing the Produce

2010-06-17T13:12:00.000-07:00

My husband and I are getting ready for a nice vacation in New York this coming week. Along with that comes the process of getting things ready here at home. For me, that entailed going out to the garden, doing some weeding and harvesting the stuff that is ready now, and will be past by the time we get home. It seemed like there was a lot more ready than I anticipated. But, you definitely can't go wrong in that department. The important part it to process it and put it into some sort of storage, which is what I spent the afternoon doing.

The peas are still growing and some are taller then me now!

Salad greens including beet greens and some swiss chard.

Garlic Scapes

I did some thinning of the carrots and some had grown into itty bitty little things. Not to be wasted, these guys are super sweet and perfect for dips.

Local cherries are now in season.

The radishes are popping up everywhere. These are also great for dipping, and since we have an abundance, I figured I needed to make some dips.

Homemade hummus with home grown scallions.

This cookbook is from our town's farmers market which collaborated several farms and locals to get some amazing recipes. The following three spreads I got from there. It is definitely a great resource for some delicious ideas for whatever is in season.

Chive & White Bean Dip adapted with home grown scallions and garlic scapes. Courtesy of Pitchfork Farms

Tinky's Savory Apple-Blue Cheese Spread adapted with home grown scallions & local made chevre instead of cream cheese from Hillman Farm. This recipe is from a woman named Tinky Weisblat and she also has a blog you can check out with more of her recipes for seasonal food.

Garlic Scape Pesto with some added almonds. Courtesy of Dolores Griel. This I put in the freezer for a later dinner option.

Peas, salad mix and fruit salad all in the fridge ready to be eaten. It was a productive afternoon! And since we are going on vacation, I have worked up some great dinner ideas: I will keep you posted on how they turn out!

Balsamic Primavera

2010-06-14T16:26:00.000-07:00

Tonight we had the most amazing concoction yet! Balsamic Primavera which can be adapted to whatever is fresh in your garden! For us tonight it involved: fresh peas, fresh swiss chard, farmers market broccoli and tomato (local Massachusetts greenhouse), fresh garlic scapes, green onion, basil, parsley & oregano (all from our garden), and local asparagus. The sauce idea was thanks to my brother and sister-in-law's amazing fresh salad dressing recipe that we have recently become obsessed with. It was DELICIOUS!

Here's the recipe:

1 cup fresh, shelled peas

1 bunch broccoli

1/2 cup asparagus cut into 1 inch lengths

1 carrot, peeled and chopped

1/2 cup onion, chopped

1 clove garlic

handful of fresh greens (we used swiss chard)

1 cup cooked chick peas

2 tbsp olive oil

1 tomato, chopped

1/2 tsp garlic salt

pepper to taste

whole wheat pasta, prepared as directed (we cook a 1/4 lb)

Sauce:

handful of fresh basil (I took whatever was ready in the garden)

1 bunch fresh parsley (about 2 tbsp leaves)

2 sprigs fresh oregano

1 clove garlic

3 green onions

1 garlic scape (the top curled part of spring garlic)

1/4 cup lemon juice

1/2 cup olive oil or more if too thick

1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

1) In large pot, bring water to boil for pasta. Follow directions for pasta and cook to desired tenderness.

2) While pasta is cooking, combine all sauce ingredients in blender, pulse to combine.

Herbs in blender ready to be mixed into deliciousness.

Sauce after blended...not too appetizing right now, but just wait!

3) In fry pan, combine 2 tbsp EVOO and onion and saute over medium heat until onion is tender, approximately 5 minutes.

4) Add carrots, chick peas, broccoli, asparagus and garlic salt. Cover and steam 5 more minutes.

5) Uncover and add peas, tomatoes and swiss chard. Saute 2 more minutes.

6) At this point pasta should be done and remove and drain. Add sauce to fry pan and cook for 1 minute (or while you separate pasta onto plates).

7) Spoon out vegetables and sauce over pasta and garnish with fresh Parmesan cheese.

The beauty of this recipe is that it only took 20 minutes from prep to eating & you can substitute whatever herbs and veggies are in season! This will be a regular dinner for us from now on. My only recommendation would be to serve it with some crusty bread to scoop up all the extra sauce...it is pretty amazing and not something you want to waste.

Weekly Update

2010-06-14T11:33:00.000-07:00

It has been a hectic rainy week, and today I finally got out in the garden to see how things were going. Although the weeding never seems to end, things are looking pretty good.

Day lilies are finally blooming, they act as a living fence close to the sidewalk.

Tomatoes are still growing even though it has been cooler this past week.

Cucumbers taking over the trellises...I am not sure how my pole beans are going to do sharing the trellis with these crazy cukes.

Johnny-Jump-Ups

French Marigolds that surround the tomatoes, hopefully keeping pests away.

Brassica bed thriving, especially the kale.

Petunias sneaking under the tomatoes acting as a living mulch, attracting beneficial insects to help pollinate the tomatoes and squash.

Lettuce

My harvest of peas, swiss chard, and radishes.

The peas got shelled, blanched and are now frozen to be enjoyed at a later point.

And best of all this week was that cherries are coming into season! So I picked some up at Hager's Farmers Market to eat fresh, and freeze for later.

And once again we had some great meals this week with some fresh peas and greens!

Curried steak (local grass-fed from Wheel-View Farm) with fresh peas, and local carrots and potatoes.

Beans, Greens and Barley with fresh kale and mustard greens.

Northern Cardinals & an Ode to Pepsi

2010-06-08T13:10:00.000-07:00

Recently a pair of Northern Cardinals have decided to use my trellis twine to make their nest.

At first it seemed pretty harmless, and the birds are pretty.

But, a couple of my trellises are teetering and I have had to reinforce them because of this constant pecking of support strings.

I have decided that this won't go on forever, and so I put out extra string so that maybe they would choose that for their nest instead of the string actually holding structures together. So far, all trellises are still holding up.

But, ultimately the most effective tool I have at keeping unwanted pests/pecking birds out of our garden is our dog Pepsi.

She does garden patrol from our second floor porch, and although she can't pounce on anything, she manages to scare most things off with her quick pursuit and then quick stop at the porch banister.

She has guarded our rooftop garden as well, although I think she just likes the view better from the roof.

Constantly watching everything that happens on our street.

But she is officially the most cuddly dog I have ever met.

Lemon Pound Cake and Strawberries

2010-06-07T10:21:00.001-07:00

I am continuing my strawberry preserving! Well, actually all I am doing is hulling and freezing for now. But these will be usable for deserts, yogurt, smoothies and jams whenever I feel the urge. The strawberry season won't be for much longer, so I am stocking up.

And, because it has been such a big hit, I thought I would share the Lemon Pound Cake recipe. I have adapted a recipe from Allrecipes to make it more local and a little better for you.

Lemon Pound Cake:

1 cup whole wheat flour, preferably local (Four Star Farms)

1 cup bread flour

2 tsp baking powder

pinch of baking soda

1 tsp salt

1/2 cup honey (Shelburne Honey Company)

1/2 cup raw sugar

4 tbsp butter

4 tbsp EVOO

1 local egg plus enough milk to make 3/4 cup liquid

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tbsp lemon juice

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees and grease an 8 x 4 inch loaf pan.

2. Combine dry ingredients in a medium bowl. Cut in butter and olive oil until slightly crumbly.

3. In a measuring cup combine egg and milk, then add to dry mixture . In same measuring cup measure honey (this helps prevent the honey from sticking to measuring cup), and then add to mixture. Add the rest of the ingredients to bowl and stir well.

4. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes or until tooth pick insert comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then remove from pan and finish cooling on wire rack.

The lemon pound cake would probably be amazing with any type of berry, and it definitely is even better with whip cream or ice cream on top.

Week in Review

2010-06-06T17:37:00.000-07:00

Farmers Market on Friday was great. We didn't get a lot because our garden is pretty flush with greens, peas and radishes, but a lot of vendors had a lot to offer!

Garden growing strong.

First taste of strawberry shortcake on lemon pound cake. Too good to bother with the whipped cream.

My downstairs neighbor and gardening buddy Gretchen.

Straw on the walkways in an attempt to eliminate weeding the walkways.

Cantaloupe

Echinacea

Delphinium

Tons of shelling peas, and they have been so delicious raw on our salads.

Bush Beans

Onion Blossom

Sage

Brussel Sprouts and Calendula

Tiny beginnings of a cucumber.

Cucumbers on the trellis.

Romaine

Tomatoes getting bigger by the day.

Madras Lentils

2010-06-03T13:52:00.000-07:00

Today I went up to Lively Spring Farm in Rowe to help my friend Carol do some planting and get ready for the farmers market tomorrow. Carol had made a ton of goats milk soap and I was lucky enough to take 2 bars home with me! But on top of that she also makes goat milk cheese, she sells goat meat, eggs, various veggies and all kinds of fruits including red currants. Pretty cool! She will be selling her soaps and veggies tomorrow at the Shelburne Falls Farmers Market 2-6pm if you want to check it out!

One of the best things in season right now are strawberries! I just picked up 2 pints at Hagers Farm Stand and will probably continue to get more to dry and freeze for the future. These things taste amazing!

And from my garden I have just started to harvest fresh peas which happen to be an ingredient in Madras Lentils.

This is so delicious with home made naan! Takes a little while to cook but it freezes or cans nicely.

Madras Lentils Recipe:

1 small head cauliflower

2 medium sized Idaho potatoes

2.5 cups tomatoes (fresh or canned)

1 cup red lentils

3 cloves garlic

1 cup peas

3 tsp ground ginger

2 tbsp cumin

2 tbsp coriander

1 tbsp or less red curry paste

1 tbsp garlic salt

2 cups water

2 tbsp EVOO or butter

pepper to taste

1. Heat oil in large stock pot over medium heat. Add garlic and ginger and saute 5 minutes.

2. Add potatoes, lentils, cauliflower, curry and spices and mix well. Saute 5 minutes on medium heat and stir to prevent sticking.

3. Add tomatoes and water, bring to a boil. Reduce heat to simmer and simmer 1 hour.

4. Remove cover and add peas. Cook another 5 minutes. Serve over rice or quinoa with naan.

And I made up another scramble for dinner the other night with fresh mustard greens and scallions from the garden.

Delicious quick dinner with all local ingredients!

Over view of the garden, growing like crazy with this warm weather.

Memorable Memorial Weekend

2010-06-01T10:09:00.000-07:00

We are back from visiting my parents over Memorial Day. It was a fun eventful weekend including gardening on my mom's porch garden, in my grandmother's back yard garden and brewing an all grain beer with my Dad and Uncle. One of the coolest things we did was attend an award ceremony for my grandfather because he is a surviving WWII veteran. But, now we are back home, and the garden grew A LOT while we were gone.

This morning I noticed some petite white flowers growing out of what I thought was only a forsythia bush. Obviously not so, but I don't have the slightest what it is. If anyone does, let me know!

Overview of the garden the night we got home. Much greener and much bigger.

Brassica bed: dino kale, broccoli, cauliflower and brussle sprouts.

Carrots, Onions and Parsnips...looks a little chaotic, but everything is doing well.

Before we left I planted the last of the two beds with bush beans including green beans, Jacob's cattle beans, soy beans and ying yang beans. Plus some rainbow chard is slowly growing in.

Pickling cukes doubled in size along with the Kentucky Pole beans. Unfortunately I found my first Cucumber Beetle last night, and immediately eliminated him. Guess I will now have to do that daily.

Tomatoes and petunias.

A Bell Pepper already growing, but something is going on with the pepper plants... leaves are browning.

And last week we had some amazing dinners and I couldn't resist taking some pictures.

Tofu Cacciatore with homemade tofu and sprouted noodles.

Grilled Portobello and Asparagus salad with home grown greens and homemade wheat croutons. The wedge of blue cheese really made this salad gourmet!

And last night we got our first taste of home grown peas! They are so sweet it is almost like a different vegetable then what you buy at the store. We will be making some madras lentils with them soon, but that will be for a later post.

Arugula Spinach Scramble

2010-05-25T17:14:00.000-07:00

It's really warm here tonight, and for dinner I wanted something fresh and easy. So, out to the garden to pick the last of the arugula and some spinach, and some scallions for good measure. And then this cooked up relatively quick! All the ingredients except the EVOO and garlic are from my garden or from Hager's Farm, the local farm stand open year round. And the sage was dried from last summer.

Ingredients (serves 1 hungry person):

recipe adapted from Happy Valley Locavore

2 tbsp olive oil

2 small russet potatoes

1/4 cup onion, chopped

1 cup chopped greens

2 eggs

2 tbsp milk

3 scallions, green parts chopped

1/2 tsp sage

1 tsp minced garlic

salt and pepper to taste

Saute potatoes, EVOO and sage in fry pan on medium heat, covered for 15 minutes, or until potatoes are tender.

Add greens, onion, garlic and saute another 5 minutes until onion is tender. In bowl, combine eggs and milk and beat gently.

Add egg mixture and scramble. Add scallions, salt and pepper to taste at the end.

Delicious dinner on a hot night!

Montage

2010-05-25T07:58:00.001-07:00

A fellow gardener from Pitchfork Farms in Charlemont told me about some heirloom Italian tomato seedlings she had. A man had given them to her, and they had been saved in his family for generations. So of course, I had to have some Sicilian tomatoes! Here is Red Pear Periformo. I also got Bolseno, Amish Brandywine and Chocolate Cherry. Thanks Pitchfork Farms!

Continuous Upgrades

2010-05-25T07:30:00.000-07:00

A lot of stuff has gone on this past week. It seems like there is always something to plant, build, or dig. We have also has some gorgeous weather which all of the seedlings have liked. Plants have literally grown inches overnight!

Our pickling cucumbers, still hidden under row cover to hopefully prevent attack from the infamous cucumber beetle.

Pea Pod growing!

Remember our peas, leaf lettuce and mustard greens?

They are much bigger now!

Since I have been getting a lot of our seedlings in the ground, I realized I over estimated how many seeds to start back in March. Here are some extra tomatoes, and various squashes that I will be giving to my family and neighbors for their gardens

Got all of the squash beds planted. This bed will hopefully have a summer squash trellised and a honey boat winter squash trellised. Hopefully the vines won't over-take the bird bath.

And the biggest improvement over the past week is our tomato trellises! Marc whipped these bad boys up in about an hour! We now have 16 tomato plants trellised and another 10 that are determinate in front.

And one of the highlights of the week for me was being able to harvest some of our greens, scallions and radishes to give to our family. It is the best feeling cutting food from your front yard.

Worth 1,000 Words

2010-05-15T10:36:00.001-07:00

Peppers are In

2010-05-14T16:58:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I took a little tally on the veggies in the cold frames, and to my surprise, all of them have outgrown their 4x4 containers. So, since the peppers were in the smallest of pots and wilting in despair, I replanted them....all of them: Jalapeno, Bell, Spicy Thai, Marconi and some Eggplant for good measure. Then, Marc and I covered them with light weight row cover because it is still a little chilly for these guys.

Row cover with rocks holding it down...we have an abundance of rocks from double digging the garden beds.

Today, I FINALLY finished doing the prep work on the last bed! There is compost and airated soil in all the beds, and now begins the fun work of planting all the seedlings/seeds in the nuturing garden beds. I also replanted some broccoli, cauliflower and alyssum that had been damaged and killed because of the high winds we had for about a week. Hopefully these little guys will fare better!

Once again this year, we have our gorgeous hanging plants that have already started attracting the humming birds!

Let the Gardening Begin!

2010-05-11T13:50:00.000-07:00

Well, it's been a while since my last post, and needless to say our winter was uneventful. But, there has been a lot going on here since the beginning of March! You remember how our front yard looked last fall....

It is starting to resemble a garden finally!

It took most of April to get the beds double dug, composted and ready to start seeds in, but already we have a lot growing on our little plot!

Tomato seedlings in our cold frames.

Shelling peas, leaf lettuce, mustard greens, verbena, and asters in this bed.

What we are Currently Growing:

Arugula, Beets, Carrots, Swiss Chard, Parsnips, Red, White and Sweet onions, Garlic, Shelling peas, Spinach, Butterhead Lettuce, Leaf Lettuce, Brussle Sprouts, Kale, Russet Potatoes, Radishes, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Pickling Cucumbers (under row cover), Sage, Rosemary and assorted flowers as living mulch.

In our Cold Frames: 3 Types of Tomatoes, 3 Types of Peppers including Jalapeno, and Eggplant.

Winter Improvements:

This winter we started doing serious water conservation in our house which means there are buckets of grey water everywhere. We have cut the amount of water we use in 1/2 just by saving the water from dishes and when the water is warming up in the shower and then using that to flush our toilet.

We have also joined a Co-op that sells bulk foods and local produce. And thanks to a great Christmas gift we are now making our own soymilk and tofu with our bulk organic soy beans.

And we are in the process of making some portable greenhouse structures to grow greens and other veggies over the winter. But, this is still in experimental stages!

All in all, things have been going well here, and the planting will be continuing! Now, I am going to enjoy our first salad greens of this season!!

Past Season Recap: Part I

2009-11-25T13:36:00.001-08:00

I thought I should give you all a recap of what our garden was like this past summer. In March I started approximately 60 seedlings in our spare bedroom. Most of them made it to be transplanted (huge success in itself). Then in April we started to finish the rooftop patio/garden. This consisted of our deck my husband built, the window we crawl out of to get to it, and a lot of containers ranging from recycling bins, old grease containers and real planters.

Our dog Pepsi was not a fan of jumping in and out of the window as you can tell from the picture. She would wait for us to pick her up and bring her back inside...what a baby!

When we first got started I had some flowers planted, mesclun greens, strawberries, 3 zucchini plants in containers (to the right in the picture), marigolds, blue potatoes, bush beans (in long window boxes), and pickling cucumbers (smaller window box). These were all in containers around the perimeter of the deck.

Then on the back section, my husband Marc had left a 1' wide by 13' long opening in the deck. We sank more recycling bins into it, drilled them to the studs, put holes in the bottoms and filled them up with dirt. This was going to be our "permanent" garden bed.

In the permanent bed we had our Roma tomatoes, sweet peppers, spinach, 3 more pickling cukes in the area closest the house (for shade), basil and some more marigolds (I had heard they kept unwanted bugs away). This rounded out our rooftop garden. I then had the brilliant idea to use our old seltzer bottles as a drip irrigation system to all the plants pots. This was a little time consuming; drilling holes into the caps, cutting off the tops and then burying them, all 20 of them. But I was determined not to waste any water that I would be lugging up to the second floor.

This project, along with our second attempt at a composter and our hand-made rain barrel was done in mid-May. It was then time to wait until the veggies started producing!

Hello Bloggisphere!

2009-11-23T11:02:00.000-08:00

Hello out there in the bloggisphere! It is a rainy November day here in New England and I have officially started our Garden Expansion Project! (Which also motivated me to start this blog I have been thinking about.)

Some background of what we are working with: We live in a 2 family victorian right on the main street of our little village, but we only have a front yard. And up until this morning, most of it was used for parking (another thing we don't have much of). This past summer my husband, Marc and I worked on a small garden which consisted of our rooftop patio and some containers on our 2nd floor porch. It produced enough to get us hooked on the idea that we could possibly completely sustain ourselves on what WE grow! Then came the realization that we were going to have to be creative to make it work where we were.

Along those lines, we don't want to move for more land because of our goal to lessen our impact on the earth. In our current location we are able to walk to the bank, grocery store, local co-op, library and farmers market. It is pretty ideal!

Now back to the GEP: I am making 1/2 of our front yard into raised garden beds...to the annoyance of our downstairs tenants. The goal is to have our produce needs met for 4 months out of the year by what we grow ourselves. Our goal is small right now, but hopefully we can do it!

Here is the 1/2 of our yard to be veggified (dimensions roughly 28'x55'):

And here is the same 1/2 of yard with the raised beds mapped out.

It is going to be a slow process over the next week or two, but we have to get the beds in and the soil tilled with manure before snow. The dirt in our yard is more like cement! Hopefully we can get some goodness in there before it snows and it will have all winter to ferment into amazing, plant growing beds.

More to come once I start hand tilling the "cement" and go and pick up some local llama manure! - Kate