February 15, 2011 - A Day Late For Harvest Monday

I did have a real harvest last week! I pulled all the onions, lettuce and spinach from the Arizona garden. The onions, which started off much smaller around than a pencil, were much fatter than my thumb. The spinach and lettuces never did put on much growth, but I ended up with a gallon bag full of baby spinach leaves for our salads, and two gallon bags of lettuce for the pet rabbit.


A pot of onions were harvested.


Lovely after they were cleaned up!


A large mixing bowl full of baby lettuce plants.


Enough for two gallon bags full.


Spinach was uprooted.


Cleaned, they made a mixing bowl nearly full of baby spinach leaves.


Enough spinach for a large dinner salad, and a gallon bag full for the fridge.


When we got back home to Washington, I discovered more of my preserved 2010 garden vegetables than I had remembered! There were still thirteen more butternut squashes stored in the laundry room, and a few of them had a bit of mold around the stems. I took the worst two, cut off the bad spots, then steamed them in the microwave until they were soft. I also retrieved a gallon of garden green beans from the freezer.


Butternut squash and green beans for dinner.


I pureed the squash, baked half of it with butter and brown sugar, and froze the other half for another meal. Granddaughter Alicia came by and stayed for dinner of pan fried pork chops, squash and green beans. She loved the squash, and is now on her third helping! Annie and Otto got some nummy green beans with their dinner, too.

There are still many, many jars of tomatoes, jams, pickles......and it looks like the freezer is still quite full of green beans and bell peppers. I don't think Granny and Mr. Granny will be going hungry any time soon!

Visit Daphne's Dandelions to see what others are harvesting!

18 comments:

  1. That is some beautiful lettuce!

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  2. Way to go on the canning! It's a great way to preserve what we grow.

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  3. i wish i had some fresh greens from the garden!

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  4. Looks like you did Ok from the garden. I love butternut, think it one of my most favourite vegetables. I am working my way though last years veg pretty well now but still have masses of frozen cherries and we have already eat a huge amount. They are so yummy. Diane

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  5. You're killing me here, ya know that, don't ya? Spinach taunter!!!

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  6. Yum squash. When my daughter comes home she always asks for squash casserole. And she always eats a lot of it.

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  7. Boy that spinach looks good! I could really go for some fresh spinach right now!

    It sounds like you have a lot of stored harvest left to eat. We are getting pretty low on things around here.

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  8. Granny, the picture of the lettuce is beautiful....I like what you did with the squash - maybe I can make enough this year to do the same!

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  9. YEEHAW! It's wonderful to see you using the harvests from this year again! :-D

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  10. You are amazing!! You're hardly out of the car and you're already back at it with your amazing garden goodness -- and everything looks delicious! I am so craving my own fresh greens right now... but the garden is still buried under about two feet of snow! I was even looking online for greenhouse designs this morning... do you think that's a good or a bad thing???
    P.S. Welcome home!

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  11. Look at you at it again already! I have salad envy!

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  12. Bet you're glad to be back home! And just in time to start the garden there. That's a great looking haul of goodies you brought back with you!

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  13. Oh, looking good. My spinach isn't doing so well.

    Do you use fish fertilizer on all your veggies?

    Farmer

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  14. Farmer, I use rabbit food on my greens! Yes, alfalfa pellets. They're cheap, at around $10 for a fifty pound bag, I just scatter the pellets on top of the ground, and they swell up and look gross when watered. If you don't care for the gross look, you can dig them into the top inch or two of soil to provide a good slow release nitrogen. I don't use fish fertilizer on my greens....the smell is so horrid, I always feel like I can detect it in the taste of the greens! I do use it on most other crops though. My lemon tree loves it, but only gets it during the summer when she's outside and I can't smell it.

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  15. Es una bendición comer vegetales frescos y sacados de tu huerto,todo natural y con sabor,lindo blog,abrazos y cariños.

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  16. Rosita, thank you. Hugs to you, too!


    rosita vargas said...

    Es una bendición comer vegetales frescos y sacados de tu huerto,todo natural y con sabor,lindo blog,abrazos y cariños.

    Translation:

    It's a blessing to eat fresh vegetables and taken out of your garden, all natural and tasty, cute blog, hugs and affection.

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  17. Awesome harvest and the squash held up very well! We used the last of our storage pumpkins about two weeks ago and it was just barely starting to get a soft spot.

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  18. It is a pleasure to read about your salad greens and those beautiful butternut squash, even if I do feel woefully inadequate :-) It's OK. I always convince myself that I'll do better later.

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