Category Archives: Uncategorized

August 16, 2009 · 11:15 am

“Spring Cleaning”?

Well, I couldn’t take it any longer. I yanked out all of the cucumber plants, all but one of the Porter tomatoes, all the green tomatoes, the Tam peppers, a flowering vine (which only blooms once a year and is taking up too much room) and probably this weekend, the purple hull pea vines. I am also frustrated with the ground cherries. I don’t think I will be able to scrape up enough ripe ones to make a jam, before they, too, succumb to the heat. Maybe all my summer purging will bring on Fall weather.

Besides, I need to plant my Fall garden. One of the plants I urgently need to get going is Parsley. Monarch butterflies LOVE parsley. Well, I should say the caterpillars do. In a month or so, the Monarchs will be winging through here and I need to be ready. In the meantime, I am enjoying the swallowtails.

He was very cooperative. Don’t you just love butterflies!!

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August 11, 2009 · 6:06 pm

If You’re Gonna Plant a …

It really is too hot to do anything but sit here and type. I hope I can find something to write about as the garden is in limbo. Vegetables are growing, but at such a slow pace. I am tempted to go out and pull up everything to get ready for Fall. But then I’ll see a tomato or a pepper or better yet a cucumber and I decide to wait jussst a little longer.

I have learned a lot this growing season. Mostly what NOT to do next year. Here are a few decisions I have made.

I won’t be planting anymore Green tomatoes. I’m sorry but it’s too hard to tell when they are ready to eat. AND I believe I prefer the red ones. My space is too limited to plant something I don’t really LOVE.

If you are gonna plant a hot pepper plant, plant a variety that is HOT. I planted some TAM jalapeno plants which were very mild. I thought this was a great idea, (jalapeno flavor without all the heat) but they were pretty much like a sweet pepper.

And IF you plant a hot pepper plant, seriously consider how many you really need. For me, probably one plant. (Note to self: please remember this in Jan. when you go wild with the seed buying)

When planting cucumbers plant only one variety. This way when the vines start to grow into their neighbor’s area, yikes! it won’t be necessary to figure out which variety is which.

Never buy seed from the local feed store where it has been sitting for God knows how long. ( I was desperate for Purple Hull Peas and my normal supplier was OUT) I could definitely tell the difference in quality.

Do plant lettuces early and frequently to have a continuous supply.

Do plan ahead how you are going to utilize all that bounty. Man cannot live by salsa alone. Well, maybe.

I also realized I am going to need to build up my beds EVEN MORE with excellent composted soil. I think for me, raised beds are the way to go.

So, here is the last of the Porter tomatoes, a few cucumbers and my beloved purple hull peas.

While I may not be ready to say goodbye to summer, I am ready to say goodbye to 100+ temperatures.<a title=”Cucumber on Foodista”

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August 4, 2009 · 7:48 pm

Just Peachy

Well, I just remembered that today was the second week of Summer Fest at www.awaytogarden.com and the other participating blogs. What to contribute? What have I made lately bearing stone fruit?

Yes, a peach cobbler and it’s a good one. It’s southern and sweet. But Margaret made a clafoutis and while not the same, it is similar. So, no. Peach ice cream? no, did ice cream last week.

So, WHAT!!! Then, it hit me. Bloomer Droppers. My birthday was in June and (gulp) it was the big 50. My incredible friends Jacque and Karen took me out for not just one day to celebrate, but two. Some food, some drinks, some shopping. All the good stuff. But the BEST part was the drink that Karen made. Bloomer Droppers.

Even though Matt from www.mattbites.com is on the wagon this week. You won’t be if you try these. Be warned, they sneak up on you but they are AWESOME!

Bloomer Droppers

2 medium to large peaches (you can use nectarines, white peaches, the better the peach the better the drink) pitted and sliced – no need to peel, in fact I wouldn’t
6 oz. frozen lemonade concentrate
6 oz. vodka (again, the better the vodka…)
crushed ice
Give it a whirr

Oh my gosh! These are, to date, the best drink I have ever had. Hope you like them!

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July 28, 2009 · 4:36 pm

Dill-licious

I think I am finally beaten down by the heat. If I try to go outside in the “cool” of the evening I am attacked by mosquitos. Daytime is just too hot. Thank goodness for rain last night so I don’t have to get out and water. The tomatoes are done, I think. Peppers have slowed down.

The purple hull peas have multiple pods, but the leaves are looking a little mottled on some of the plants and I have a baaad feeling about them. The cucumbers have a bizzillion blooms but some of the cucumbers are normal and some are yellow and gourd-like.

I did some research on this with these possible results. 1. Poor pollination. It’s not this one because I have many bees working the blooms every time I go out to look for a new cucumber. 2. Nutritional deficiencies. This is probably the culprit. So, I fertilized the plants and am hoping with this rain they will improve.

I am also wondering if it could be the seed, as I planted two different varieties and only one type seems to be affected. Hmm. But, I did manage to scrounge up enough cucumbers to make refrigerator dill pickles.

Hehe. I didn’t get the picture before we dug into these, so the jar looks a little empty. But… it WAS full.

I got this recipe from Margaret Roach’s blog www.awaytogarden.com. She has an amazing website and gardens in zone 5. She was the garden editor for Martha Stewart several years ago and has written a book A Way to Garden and is currently working on a new one.

Anyway, she was given this recipe for refrigerator pickles and it is really easy and they are fantastic! http://awaytogarden.com/dan-koshanskys-refrigerator-pickles. They are deliciously dill with a spicy kick.

Margaret is also having a Food Fest, along with other host bloggers, for the next four weeks where you can submit your favorite recipes. Here are the rules http://awaytogarden.com/starting-tuesday-4-week-summer-food-event#more-5760. It should be fun. It’s where I got the pickle recipe last year. Who knows what delicious recipes we’ll find!

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July 14, 2009 · 1:58 pm

104 degrees = ice cream!!!

Last year, in fact almost a year ago to the day, David Lebovitz at www.davidlebovitz.com made a lemon verbena ice cream. Lemon verbena is MY fragrance. I love the smell and frequent L’Occitane where they have a whole line of verbena products. Well something possessed me and I really wanted to make this ice cream. But, I could NOT find a lemon verbena plant ANYWHERE in the city of Dallas or surrounding suburbs. The year before I had a couple of plants, but I have a very difficult time keeping them alive during the winter. So… I did what every desperate nut person would do. I bought some on ebay. One of the three plants survived.

Survived just for the day that I would defoliate it for this ice cream. Not a bad way to “go” in my opinion. I mean it’s only been 100 degrees plus for several days, so I do believe ice cream is in order.

Lemon Verbena Ice Cream

recipe by David Lebovitz

1 1/2 cups loosely packed fresh lemon verbena leaves, rinsed and dried

1 1/2 cups whole milk

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

3/4 cup sugar

6 large egg yolks

pinch of salt

optional: a dried leaf of lemon verbena to crumble in the just churned ice cream, or a very finely chopped fresh leaf

In a medium saucepan, warm the lemon verbena leaves with the milk, 1/2 cup of the cream, and the sugar.
Once warm, remove from heat, cover, and let steep for one hour.
To make the ice cream custard, pour the remaining cream into a large bowl set in a larger bowl of ice water, and put a mesh strainer on top.
Use a strainer or slotted spoon to skim the lemon verbena from the milk and squeeze the leaves to extract as much liquid as possible back into the saucepan, then discard them. Rewarm the lemon verbena infusion, then whisk the eggs together and slowly pour in the warm infusion, whisking constantly.
Scrape the warmed egg yolks back into the saucepan and cook, stirring continuously with a heatproof spatula, until the custard leaves a trail on the spatula when you drag your finger across it.
Immediately strain the custard into the bowl of cream. Stir until cool.
Chill thoroughly. Once chilled, stir in the dried or finely chopped leaf of verbena (I used the finely chopped fresh leaf) (I waited a year for this ice cream and I wasn’t waiting another day for a leaf to dry up. Then freeze in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

I have to say this was really delicious. It was creamy with a hint of the lemon verbena. But mostly it was COLD!

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July 8, 2009 · 6:47 pm

Presto. Pesto.

I have a friend at work named Marjorie. Marjorie and I have the same birthday. June 27th. Go ahead and get a pen to write that down, I’ll wait.

I’m not exactly sure how this tradition started, but now every year on “her” birthday I make her pesto ( “tradition” means it’s kind of expected). Last year, it was told by another coworker that Marjorie ate her pesto with a spoon right out of the jar. This year, she said she did put it on crackers. She loves her some pesto!!

And so do I!! I did have to make Marjorie wait until the basil was ready which wasn’t until this past holiday weekend.

I have also sowed another packet of seeds which are coming up nicely

and then today I sowed another packet. Here in Texas, we will be having “warm” days up until September, sometimes even into October. So we will have lots of perfect days for basil and we will need them because it takes four cups of basil leaves

to make 6 oz. of pesto. Yep, that’s the bad news. But the good news is, it whips up in no time. Here is the recipe I use and it came from a back issue (and that means years ago) of Cooking Light. I have tried several pesto recipes but I always come back to this one. So, don’t worry Marj.

Pesto

4 cups loosely packed basil leaves

1/2 cup (2 ounces) grated fresh Parmesan cheese

2 tablespoons toasted pine nuts (or walnuts), coarsely chopped

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 cloves garlic, peeled

1/4 teaspoon salt

With the food processor running, add garlic and pine nuts through the chute until finely minced. Add oil; pulse 3 times. Then add basil, cheese, and salt; Process until finely minced, scraping sides of bowl once. I recycle my pimiento jars (4 oz.) for the pesto.

and Presto……

Pesto!!

I also have a couple of other ways I put up all that basil. Sometimes, the pesto can get a little pricey and so I make this.

Basil Puree

Process 4 cups loosely packed basil leaves and 1 cup olive oil or (this is what I do most often) the basil with 1 – (8 ounce) can tomato sauce in a food processor until basil is finely chopped. Spoon into ice cube trays and freeze. Pop out the cubes and store in freezer bags up to 6 months. I use these in soups and sauces. This recipe I got from Southern Living magazine March 2004.

I have lots more ways to use basil, so stay tuned for the next crop.

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June 29, 2009 · 9:24 am

Produce

Unfortunately, we are having 100 degree weather here at fromgardentotable. If I were a vegetable (no editorial comments, please) I am very sure I would have quit producing. But, luckily, that isn’t what has happened …yet.The tomatoes are ripening. I have to pick them just when there is the faintest blush of pink on them or the birds will peck them. So, I pick them as soon as I can and let them ripen on the windowsill.

These are the Porter tomatoes. But, I also have some Aunt Ruby’s German tomatoes which are a green tomato which when cut have a pink center and some Green Zebra’s which are rather small.

The basil is coming along, and I have sown some more. I am of the opinion one can never have enough basil.

My purple hull peas are growing, but as I was examining them yesterday SOMETHING has been chewing on the leaves. I suspect grasshoppers. Nasty little buggers.

But, the real show stoppers right now are the cucumber vines. Wow! They have really taken off.

So, I read the other day that cucumbers have two blooms. A male bloom which appears first and then falls off. A female bloom then appears which makes the fruit. I also read that honey bees are needed to pollinate the blooms. Look what I found when I was examining the vines.

If you look real close, there is a bee in the center of the flower. And evidently, they have been doing their job because I found THIS!

Um, now I just need a few more so I can make pickles instead of a pickle. Also, this photo makes the cucumber look sooo large but it is actually only about 5-6 inches long. There are tons of blooms, though, so I am very hopeful.

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June 26, 2009 · 7:22 am

Goldilocks and the Three Garlics

Here is a tale of garlic. Once upon a time a girl gardener planted cloves of garlic.

One batch was planted in an area too wet. Another batch was planted in an area too dry. But another batch was planted in an area just right.

The garlic in the wet area were too small. The garlic in the dry area were a little bigger. But the garlic in the ” best” area were the largest (although still not as big as they could be).

Here is how they started out.

Garlic after harvesting.

I must say knowing when to harvest is a tricky wicket. My best advice is to go to this web site www.gourmetgarlicgardens.com and read their wonderful guide. They even have advice for growing garlic in the south, especially Texas. Basicly, what I read is “when the lower leaves have all died and only top 6 leaves are still green, it’s ready”. I also learned that “the upper leaves of the plant determine how many bulb wrappers the harvested bulb will have” . There is a wealth of information about planting, growing, harvesting, curing and storing garlic.

Here is the garlic curing. Curing is basically a drying process. Gourmetgarlicgardens says “The idea is for excess moisture in the roots and leaves to evaporate or withdraw into the bulb. When the roots and necks are completely dry and don’t emit a typical garlic odor when cut, it is time to trim it.”

Garlic ready to be “cleaned up”.

I had hoped to have a picture of all my neatly trimmed and cleaned up garlic, but when I trimmed the top of three of them, they weren’t quite ready for storing. But these will be used this weekend in pesto and salsa.

YUM!!

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June 24, 2009 · 4:20 pm

The Cabin

We call it The Cabin because I suppose most of our my parents labor went into building it and the pond. I’m not sure why we don’t call it The Pond, but we don’t. Before it was The Cabin, it was The Farm. This was when my grandfather, whom we called Papaw and later Papaw Hawkins, so as not confuse him with my Dad whom my children and nieces also called Papaw, raised cattle there.

The cabin was built in the 80’s my boys being around two and five, now 23 and 26, my daughter not yet born. They loved it as you can imagine. Running wild, seeing wildlife and even a deer shot for food. My mother, because she is a wise woman, would take the boys only one at a time, with her and Dad, to “enjoy” for the weekend.

You just can’t imagine the quiet and solitude there. It is like being transported back in time. No phones, no lights except the ones from inside the cabin, and no agenda. We are always sighing and saying “Oh, it’s so peaceful here.” If we have said it once we have said it a million times!

One weekend, my mom and dad had taken my younger son Connor with them. Connor was never still. But, at one point in the weekend mother and Connor were sitting on the porch swing, swinging. His little legs, usually in perpetual motion, accenting the methodical rhythmn of the swing. After they had been swinging awhile (unusual for him to be in one place that long) she said he looked up at her and said “Isn’t this Peace?” Yes, darling, it sure is.

blackberries

Connor on the porch swing

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June 18, 2009 · 7:43 am

All in the Family

My mom has been busily working in her garden and wanted me to take some pictures of her hard work.

My mom and I have totally different gardens. If she were to have a blog it would be called The Immaculate Gardener or The Perfect Garden.

My garden is more of a “cottage” style garden if I had to label it. It has sprawling tomato plants and cucumber plants and trellises with vines or vegetables scrambling up them. Nothing ever seems to stay within the confines of their pot or planter and I’m okay with that. If leaves find their way into the garden, they are raked into the compost bed.

My mom, however, does not tolerate leaves messing up her beautiful garden. She is meticulous with her secateurs and frets when mother nature (sometimes in the form of squirrels) spits acorns onto her lawn.

I wish I could be more of a perfectionist, but I guess I will have to leave that to the professionals. Like my mom. Welcome to Mary’s garden.