Gardening

[sholio]

I am so happy with the garden this year. I started everything from seed (the only sets I bought were a couple flats of petunias for the front garden bed and baskets, since my petunias didn't bloom 'til late July), and the entire garden, beds and all, was constructed from scratch this spring. And everything has been doing great. From two large garden beds (one in the greenhouse, one outside) and one small one (that I built to use up the extra dirt) I've been able to supply most of our salad and vegetable needs this summer. I haven't had to buy anything for salads since early July, except the occasional tomato -- the one thing that has done rather poorly this year has been the tomatoes, because of all the rain.

But I'm going to have way more cabbage than we can eat (I will be making saurkraut, I think -- from purple cabbage! That'll be fun!). I have three nice-looking pumpkins on the vine; I don't expect they'll last all the way to Halloween, but I can make some nice autumn pies (which I guess means I need to learn to make a decent pie crust).

And autumn is coming. There are yellow patches in the trees and a chill bite to the air. We're still about two weeks out from the first frost (three if we're lucky) but it's definitely on the way.

Garden notes for next year:

-I need to start my tomatoes earlier. A lot earlier. This year, I started almost everything in mid-April. That seems to be good for the squash and pumpkins, but the tomatoes need more of a head start. Maybe try late March next year? Also, if I'm going to grow my own flowers and have them ready to bloom by June, I have to start much earlier. February?

-Plant less lettuce. I planted four (short) rows this year, plus a couple rows of spinach, and while it didn't look like much, either we're going to be eating nothing but salad from now 'til frost, or some of it is going to waste. Also, five cabbages is way too much, except for making 'kraut.

-My spinach bolted and went to seed almost immediately. Next year, I need to plant the spinach a little later, maybe in June, to bypass the longest, sunniest days.

-Radishes: plant fewer to begin with (I don't need many) and plant them twice. Radishes mature fast, which I knew, but I didn't realize just how fast they'd grow, and it's not like you can keep them around. They were all eaten before the rest of the salad stuff was mature enough to eat. Next year I'll plant just a few with the carrots, and then plant them once or twice more throughout the summer.

-The turnips did great (nice big roots) but I planted them way too thickly and they matured later than they would have because I didn't thin them well enough. Ditto for the carrots - thin early, thin often!

-Maybe next year I'll grow some potatoes. Speaking of which, I think I'll hop over to the farmer's market this week and see if the local potatoes are in yet.


Anyone have good recipes for things to do with green tomatoes?

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Comments

[ellenmillion.livejournal.com]

We have an AMAZING coleslaw recipe, if you'd like it - it has mustard and bacon in it, and we make it by the vat, because it keeps well for nearly a week.

[black-raven135.livejournal.com]

Summer did not arrive here till July 27 so we are seriously behind and some
of the farmers have given up some of their crops, particularly fruit due to
the continuous rain in May, June and most of July........

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

You can do the ubiquitous Southern fried green tomatoes which I think are really good. What I do is just season up some cornmeal with Tony Cachere's (http://www.tonychachere.com/) (which is pretty much the number one seasoning besides salt where I grew up) and then lightly dredge the tomato slices in it and then fry them up in a small amount of olive oil. We're not talking deep frying here. And it is yum yum yum.

Lots of people like to eat them with dipping sauces but I am a purist. LOL

[liz-mo.livejournal.com]

Ohh. Three weeks out from first frost? *shivers*
Sounds wonderful to have all the vegetables from your own garden. Yummy!
How are the chicken doing?

[leesa_perrie]

Green tomato chutney! My husband makes it - in fact, he grow tomatoes so he can pick the majority of them whilst still green!!! I can PM you the recipe if you're interested - let me know!

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

I second the suggestion to fry the green tomatoes, because seriously, SO DELICIOUS. I would consider growing a tomato plant just so I could have fried green tomatoes! (once I live somewhere with ANYWHERE to grow things, that is)

Although my recipe varies in that you dip the slices in flour with salt and pepper before frying in lots of butter, instead of the cornmeal and olive oil lunabee suggests.

Make sure when you do this that the tomatoes are thoroughly green -- they're not nearly as good if they've started to head in the direction of ripening.

[flingslass.livejournal.com]

How are the Chooks?