*Click to enlarge photos*
A yard of food....actually more, as I forgot to photograph the berries. There are two varieties of carrots, the longer ones are Imperator and the short ones are either Chantenay or Scarlet Nantes. That's my first green pepper of the year! Actually, it could be a gold or red bell, but whatever it is, I needed one for tonight's salad. There will be more green beans this evening, it got too hot in the garden before I finished picking them. Shallots, shallots and more shallots! I'm using these fresh, drying some I pulled earlier this week, and there are still a lot of them in the garden! Golf ball sized onions are used fresh. This bouquet of herbs consists of parsley, basil and rosemary. Those four smallest potatoes are already gone...nothing better than a home grown raw new potato with a sprinkle of salt! I noticed a bit of scab on one potato. The bed is rich in composted manure, so some scab is not unexpected.
As they come from the garden. With the pound of potatoes I snitched from a single plant five days ago, and the 2 pounds 12 ounces I dug from the same plant this week, that's a respectable 3-3/4 pound harvest from one potato plant!
Everything is washed and trimmed before weighing. Today's harvest had to be weighed in two batches, as my scale only goes to five pounds.
Six pounds four ounces for this morning's harvest.Saturday's Garden Dinner
Crockpot Meat Loaf with Sauce (onions, parsley)
Pan Roasted New Potatoes with Fresh Rosemary (potatoes, rosemary)
Steamed Green Beans with Sauteed Shallots (green beans, shallots)
Buttered Carrots (carrots)
Cole Slaw (cabbage, onion, green pepper)
Iced Raspberry Green Tea
Evening Treat: Strawberry Smoothie (strawberries)
************
Pan Roasted New Potatoes with Fresh Rosemary (potatoes, rosemary)
Steamed Green Beans with Sauteed Shallots (green beans, shallots)
Buttered Carrots (carrots)
Cole Slaw (cabbage, onion, green pepper)
Iced Raspberry Green Tea
Evening Treat: Strawberry Smoothie (strawberries)
************
The pan roasted potatoes, green beans with shallots, cole slaw and carrots were awesome. The meatloaf not so much....it fell apart when I tried to remove it from the crockpot, and it tasted just exactly like the cabbage casserole I had on the 24th, sans cabbage! Oh well, at least I didn't heat up the house by cooking it in the oven.
Granny - you sure are good with your presentations, I can see why it drives Mr. H insane! Ha! That meal looks very good, especially the potatoes...Yum!
ReplyDeleteThe garden produce is sure kicking up into high gear! The plated up dinner looked good - even if the meat loaf was not quite up to your expectations.
ReplyDeleteYum! Dinner sounds wonderful! And the amount of stuff you harvest is amazing.
ReplyDeleteI've found that putting a layer of foil that's an inch or so taller than the crockpot in with the meatloaf makes it much easier to pull out. I love doing the meatloaf in the crockpot. Comes out nice and moist, and you just throw it in there, forget about it, and eat later without heating up the kitchen.
What a clever way to measure. I tell you, your organization is impressive. As is the harvest!
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about you cooking after gardening today when I realized that I did not have enough energy to make dinner after spending all day digging and moving wood on the great patio project. I don't know how you do it!
MMMM...Granny, what big havests you have! (This is where you say, "The better to feed you with my dear.") Your dinners are divine.
ReplyDeleteKitsapFG, I have enough for us and everyone else in town! But have you noticed, they all wait for ME to pick it.
ReplyDeleteSB, what a good idea! I never thought to do that. I usually like crockpot meatloaf, but Mr. H wanted tomato soup on it (his mother ALWAYS made hers with tomato soup!), and that just made it fall apart gooey. It's fine fixed that way in the oven, but my next crockpot meatloaf will be plain with the sauce cooked separately!
Stefaneener, I get pretty tired. I'm the only one who does gardening, yard work (other than mowing), compost turning, cooking and cleaning, plus I'm trying to paint the exterior and the interior of the new garden shed....needless to say, the yard work and cleaning are suffering right now! I probably wouldn't cook quite so much if I weren't blogging about it, LOL!
Ribbit, OK, I'll bite..."The better to feed you with my dear."
ReplyDeleteI just did the evening bean picking and got another 12 ounces...that's 1-1/2 pounds of beans again today. Now I have to freeze the #^%*& things before bedtime!
I've got the same deal going here-I'm trying to get the garden going, working outside all morning, then have to come in and cook (while he reads the paper!), serve, and then clean the kitchen before heading back out for more work. I think our men have a pretty good deal sometimes!
ReplyDeleteHA! Granny said, "#^%*&"
ReplyDeleteMy day's good already.
LOL those beans are too much of a good thing. You'll appreciate it this winter though. Or maybe not since you probably don't drag it all down to AZ. Your meal looks divine, but way too much to eat. I think I just don't eat like the normal American. I eat very small meals.
ReplyDeleteOf the carrot varieties which one do you like the best? I need more carrot varieties that taste really good. The Danvers just isn't doing it for me. The Sugar Snax are great however. Big Top is OK.
I can't beleive that you have harvested soooo much from the garden, and we are only half way thru the year. I finally got my FIRST tomato this week, it was wonderful. I also finally hit my goal for the year of 20 pounds (I know it was low, it was also my first year!!!). You are my inspiration!!
ReplyDeleteSue, don't get me started :-) Mr. H considers sitting on a riding lawnmower one day a week to be "I've been working all day, what do you want from me?"
ReplyDeleteRibbit, you might be surprised how often Granny says "#^%*&"! But I try to hold my tongue when the (grand) children are here. If you think that's exciting, you should have heard me when I went to kick Annie's toy down the hallway, missed and hit the laundry room doorway with three toes. That's been over two weeks ago, and my foot still hurts!
ReplyDeleteDaphne, we are big dinner eaters. If it were up to me, it would be a bowl of cold cereal or soup and sandwich, but I've spoiled Mr. H for nearly 47 years, I can't stop now!
ReplyDeleteI like Imperator, I've grown and loved it for many years, and I believe Sugar Snax is a newer Imperator type. I think I might try it next year (I need to study my seed catalogs). I'm not a big fan of the stubby carrots, and have no problem growing the longer ones in my soil.
Eric, good for you and the first tomato! I'm still waiting for mine...lots of green, none ripe. They'll all come at once and I'll be sick of them....like the green beans! Last year I started weighing my produce in August, and I was getting about 7 pounds a week. This year I've started earlier and planted more, so I should go well over 100 pounds easily.
ReplyDeleteI miss a few days of reading and see you've harvested almost more than I've got planted.
ReplyDeleteWe're in sync on a couple of things. My borage is flowering too. You're right, they would look nicer if the flowers pointed up. I just harvested one head of broccoli, and I've started picking raspberries and string beans. Nothing like the amounts you're getting, though. You're making me want to find more places to plant.
Cheryl, just plant 16 squares of green beans. That's what I've picked the most! I'm just so darned happy with my potatoes. Only two plants bloomed, so I was afraid I'd planted some duds!
ReplyDeletewow, granny. your harvests knock my socks off! will you teach me to grow potatoes like yours, pleeeease? =)
ReplyDeleteKelli, all my boxes are on soil, with only newspaper as a barrier between the native soil and the new soil addition. The box is 11" deep (2-2x6s) and I laid out the seed potatoes on top of about 3-4" of soil (composted cow manure, some peat moss and native soil mixed, with a cap full of slow release pelleted fertilizer like Osmocote). I put 15 seed potatoes in the 3x4-foot box, then covered them with about 3" of soil/ manure/ peat mix. As the growth emerged, I added the soil mix to cover all but a couple inches of the top foliage, and repeated as they grew, until the box was filled. That meant the potatoes were covered with 7-8" of soil. You can rob the small potatoes out from under the plants if you feel for them carefully, any time after they blossom. When the foliage begins to die back, withhold watering if possible, then harvest the crop....if you can wait that long, I never do. I begin digging them as needed any time after they blossom.
ReplyDeletethanks granny! i really appreciate it! i will definitely follow your method for next season.
ReplyDeletei've been going back and reading your old blogs - it's great reading! thank you for sharing. =)
You're very welcome, Kelli. If I can help you with anything, just ask.
ReplyDeleteI loved your first picture in this post (the yard of produce) - especially how you lined up the potatoes from largest to smallest! It tickled my OCD fancy. :)
ReplyDeleteLOL, Kristina! I wrack my brain trying to think of different ways to photograph the veggies! I'm glad you enjoyed it.
ReplyDelete