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Posts Tagged ‘Vegetable Gardening’

Spaghetti Squash with Tomatillo Sauce

Posted in recipes, tagged , on July 1, 2015| 2 Comments »

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Especially during the summer, I let the garden inspire me on what’s for dinner. Tonight’s combination was spaghetti squash, tomatillos, jalapeños, onion, and tomatoes.

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I started by cutting the squash in half, and placed it upside down in about 1/2 in of water. I cooked it at 350 for about 40 minutes.

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Next I chopped up an onion, about 10 tomatillos, 2 jalapeños, and a tomato. I also added 1 clove of garlic (grated), salt, and pepper.

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I cooked this down for about 30 minutes, until it thickened up. I did more of a chunky sauce, but you could also add chicken stock.

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Meanwhile, I cooked up some venison micro-stew pieces with some salt, pepper, and olive oil.

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I pulled the spaghetti squash with a fork and added a little butter, salt, and pepper.

Then I put it all together. Simple and so yummy!

Update … the leftover venison and tomatillo sauce make an excellent addition to breakfast tacos. Just add eggs, cheese, and tortillas. Wow! I could open a food truck with those.

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Canning Pickles — What not to do!

Posted in cucumbers, Vegetables, tagged , on June 24, 2015| 2 Comments »

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We have had an extremely rainy spring this year and the cucumbers have loved it. The lemon cucumbers are doing especially well. I’ve been pickling like crazy, and unfortunately the cucumbers don’t always ripen at the most convenient time.

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I was in a rush, so rather than wait until the brine had come to a complete boil, I decided that the salt had dissolved, and that was good enough. Bad mistake! Turns out that when the temperature outside of the jars is hotter than the temperature inside of the jars, they break. The jars just started popping, and the bottoms cracked right off. 4 quarts of pickles in the trash.

Luckily, I have been able to make another 8 quarts of lemon cucumber dill pickle wedges, so my daughter is happy and I learned a valuable lesson.

 

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Freezing Carrots

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , on April 21, 2015| 2 Comments »

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We’ve been eating carrots for month, from one of the garden beds, but with the weather warming up, I needed the space. This past weekend I planted my second bed of okra so that carrots had to come up.

I filled an entire refrigerator drawer with carrots. I tore off the tops, brushed (not washed) the dirt off and stored them until I had time to freeze, which was last night.

Then I just set up an assembly line …

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Wash, Peel and Slice the carrots. You could also chop or dice.

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Blanch for 2 minutes.

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Ice bath for 2 minutes

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Drain

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Seal in food saver bags. You can use other freezer bags, but I have found veggies really do best with a very tight seal. I managed to get 9 sets of carrots.

I still have about half a drawer full of carrots. I decided to freeze all of the larger ones, and leave the smaller, more tender carrots for eating raw.

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Tomatoes In

Posted in tomato, Vegetables, zucchini, tagged on March 9, 2014| 4 Comments »

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Most years I have already planted the tomatoes by now, but this spring has been very cold, and even this week is pushing it. The weather is predicted to be mid 30s and windy Wednesday night, but the veggies were getting too big, and had to go outside. I will be putting row cover over everything on Tuesday night.

This year I up-ed the tomatoes to 46. One major change, is that I decided to forgo Romas this year in favor of Juliets. I did a few of these last year, and found the production was much better, the flavor just as good, and they serve the same function as far as canning/sauces etc.

When starting seedlings I couldn’t find a sharpie, so told myself that I would mark the tomatoes later. Well later came and went and I forgot all about it. Needless to say, I have no idea which tomatoes are which, guess we’ll find out in a few months.

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I planted 13 squash, 5 tatume, 5 zucchini, 3 scallop.

I planted 4 lufffa.

I planted 10 cucs. 2 gerkins, 2 lemon, 2 white, 2 straight 8 and 2 parisian pickling.

Elsewhere in the garden I still have

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2 beds of greens

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1 bed of carrots

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1 bed of beets/kohlrabi/lettuce

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1 bed of onions (red and yellow)

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1 bed of garlic

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Potato bags, The green all froze, so I’m hoping they are still alive down there.

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1 bed that was snap-peas. I babied them all winter and they were finally starting to flower when we got another cold snap. I had them covered, but I think there was a hole in the row cover, since the next morning they looked like this.

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In all, I planted 8 new beds today. The cool thing, is that I didn’t have to buy compost for any of them. I was able to use compost from the pile I’ve been working on. This is the first spring I’ve been able to say that.

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Curing Onions/Garlic

Posted in How-to, tagged , on May 31, 2013| 1 Comment »

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The onion tops were starting to wilt and falling over, so it was time to harvest. I have more onions this year than I’ve ever had and so I decided to try curing, which can extend the life of the onions/garlic for up to 6 months.

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Step 1

Pull the onions and garlic from the beds and lay them out in the sun for 1 day. I made sure to wait until today to give time for the soil to dry out a bit from our rain last weekend.

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Step 2

Braid the onions. I did these in groups of 3-6

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Step 3

Hang the onions in a shady location where they get air circulation. I hung these under the front and back eaves.

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My husband didn’t seem to happy about the string of onions at the front door, but we borderline live in the country, so why not.

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Step 4

Lay out the garlic in a shady location. The garlic can be hung like the onions and vice-versa. Since I had less garlic I chose this option.

I am now supposed to leave these for 2-3 weeks if the temperature is 80. Since we will be at 90-95 it will probably take 1-2 weeks. I’ll update my progress.

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