Mid-September Harvest

This week will officially mark the end of our summer growing season. Strangely and unlike years past, I'm actually looking forward to the fall and winter. Growing you own food teaches you many virtues, including patience, and the fact that there's a time for everything. As the colder and darker months approach, the garden will rest and I'll get to take a break from the daily chores associated with it. Maybe I'll even find the time and focus to work on that cookbook I've been neglecting. Maybe.

It's only appropriate that we should celebrate the end of summer by harvesting our one and only pumpkin. I hadn't planned on growing pumpkin this year but Jonathan suggested it during one of our many trips to the plant nursery. This will be the first time we get to carve a pumpkin we grew ourselves.

Also, I couldn't help thinking of the recent cantaloupe recall when I picked the last cantaloupe of the year.


This might also be the end of our tomatoes and cucumbers. We can't be too heartbroken because we've had a good harvest this year. I also picked most of our Poblano peppers, which are tasting quite hot. The long beans continue to produce even when the bush beans are long gone.


This is most definitely the last of our slicing tomatoes. The vines are screaming to be pulled up. Anyway, they were delicious in a BLT sandwich I made the other day.


Finally, I harvested the first of our fall bok choy yesterday and they are looking terrible. The slugs and cabbage worms are really active right now, much more so than last year. The delicate green parts of the leaves were too hole-y to eat, but fortunately for us, the white crunchy bits (my favorite part) are still flawless. Thank goodness for small miracles.

Tongue of Fire Beans

I meant to write this post last week when I harvested my Tongue of Fire Beans. The pods are quite striking when mature.


As you can see, I ended up shelling a number of the beans prematurely. Oh well. I needed the bed space so all of the plants had to be pulled. Presently, the beans are lying in the freezer as I haven't decided what to do with them yet. I'm picturing some sort of stew with tomato and sausage. Any other ideas?

Mid-August Bounty

This post is a bit late, but here is what we harvested in the past week. The tomatoes are finally starting to ripen in large numbers. This year I grew half as many plants as we did last year (forty), which in some ways is good since last summer at this time, it was quite stressful trying to keep up with the tomato harvest. However, this year I'm a bit worried that we may not have grown enough to get us by in sauce and salsa for the next twelve months. I may have to increase the number of plants for next year.


Speaking of tomatoes, my Gold Medal and Brandywine (Sudduth's Strain) vines are producing enormous fruit. It's not uncommon for a tomato plant to produce a couple of whoppers but in this case, most of them are pretty hefty. I'm a sucker for big ugly tomatoes.

As you can see, I have a few green paste tomatoes here as well. They were salvaged when the branch holding the cluster snapped.


I picked all of my Tongue of Fire beans this week. I've never cooked with fresh shell beans before. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know!


The last of our sweet corn. :(


Two delicious Athena cantaloupes. (On a side note, I bought two amazing Canary and Piel de Sapo melons from the market the other week. I saved some seeds to hopefully grow them next year.)


I must be growing a different variety of purple tomatilloes this year because these are almost jet black. I'm excited to make a batch of purple tomatillo salsa. The watermelon you see here was picked because a section of the stem attaching it to the vine had died off. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite ripe yet.


The last of the Spring-sown carrots and possibly the last of this year's artichokes. They will surely be missed.


Finally, the last of the spring-sown beets. It will be at least another month before the fall beets are ready to harvest.

An Early August Harvest

I won't say too much about this week's harvest. The tomatoes are still coming in slowly (annoying) and the corn harvest has been fantastic this year, despite our minor raccoon setback.

Homegrown corn, when picked at the absolute right moment and cooked soon after, is a completely different vegetable from what you get at the supermarket and even at the farmer's market in my opinion. For this reason, I will do battle with every insect and rodent to grow it each year.


We picked our first years of Ruby Queen corn this week. This is my first time growing this variety and I'm happy to report it is incredibly sweet and tender - definitely one I will grow again.

And here is some of the other things we picked this week:








I can't wait to see what all of you are harvesting this week!

End of July Harvest

I can't believe that July has come to close, which means that we only have one full month of reliable warm weather left this year. I'm really hoping for a hot August as most of our slicing and paste tomatoes are still green on the vine. We're down to about five jars of tomato sauce from last year and it would be a shame if we weren't able to preserve as much this time around. Then again, I did cut down the amount of tomato plants this year to 20. We'll see if that was a wise decision.

In no particular order, here are a few things we harvested this week:


We picked and ate our first ears of Argent corn today. Out of all of the veggies we grow, I think we look forward to the first corn harvest the most. It tasted just as I'd remembered from last year. Unlike the bland, tough and overly sugary corn you find at the market these days, Argent has an old-fashioned sweetness and a very tender kernel that explodes in your mouth. I plan on growing this variety year after year.


Another good week for artichokes, I also picked a ton of basil to make pesto.


The string beans have peaked this week. It took me quite a long time to pick them all. The bulk of this will be blanched and then frozen for future use. I've never eaten frozen string beans before. Hopefully they retain at least some of their crispness.


Aside from the usual suspects, I picked our first long beans. I have a feeling they will continue to produce for us long after our bush beans have given up.


I'm still waiting for the BIG one. Hopefully it'll come soon.


I keep forgetting that I have scallions in the garden. These grew well while the red onion sets I planted this spring were a complete bust.


I'm very happy with my savoy cabbages. They took much longer to head up than I'd expected but are of a good size now.

Finally, I pulled all of my Paris Market carrots. I love the round shape of these carrots and have a feeling they'll be very tasty roasted.

My Other Summer Beans

I thought I'd do a quick post on some of the other beans I have growing in the garden at the moment.

The Tongue of Fire shell beans are coming along nicely. While it is considered a bush bean variety, the vines are very aggressive and will climb to three feet tall if allowed to. I might erect a short trellis for them next year as the vines are a tangled mess at the moment.

This is my first time growing shell beans. I wonder how much of a harvest we'll get from this one bed.

I'd almost forgotten about my long beans. They were transplanted out in early May and for the longest time appeared to be doing nothing. It was only a few days ago that I noticed the vines were beginning to climb their trellis and produce flowers. To me, the pods resemble shoe laces as they are produced in pairs. If you've never tried long beans, I would highly recommend them. They have a lot of crunch to them and a wonderful flavor in my opinion.

Finally, my early sown green soybeans (stripped of their leaves at one point by Mr. Groundhog) have rebounded and are setting their pods. My 2nd and 3rd sowings are just starting to flower now. If I can keep the field mice and chipmunks at bay, we might just get a good harvest this year.

Summer's Bounty - Picks of the Week

We hand another bountiful harvest this week. The Hungarian Wax peppers are producing abundantly at the moment. I'll have to set aside a night this week to pickle and can them.


Tomato season has officially begun. (Hurray!) The near triple digit temperatures of the past few days have really helped to produce our first vine-ripened beauties. Not surprisingly, our first ripe slicing tomatoes of the year were Cherokee Purple and Amish Paste.


Our cucumber harvest was a bit out of control this week. The Tasty Jades are producing like mad. We picked at least two dozen - much more than we can consume as a family. What we didn't give away, I'll have to pickle this week.


We also picked about a dozen zucchinis this week as well.


I love Napoli carrots. They are the perfect size for kids to munch on and are reliably sweet.


The first wild blackberries were very sweet this year. I picked a small bowl-full today and Jonathan gobbled them all up before they made it into the house.


It's nice being able to pick more than one or two artichokes at a time. Our plants are producing well this year.


The chipmunks left me these two tiny ripe Seascape strawberries to pick. It's my own fault really. I still haven't covered the bed with bird netting yet.


The string beans are beginning to roll in as well. I can't wait to cook these up.


A bouquet of cilantro, (pathetic) red onions and beets. I think it would be fun to open a store that sold organic vegetable bouquets and arrangements instead of flowers. I'm surprised no one has done it yet.

Colorful Picks of the Week

The weekly harvest is finally starting to take on some serious color. Up until this point, everything has been mostly green. A colorful harvest always reminds me that summer is in full swing. Pretty soon, the tomatoes will add their shade to this rainbow until fall arrives and the greens predominate again. I guess we should enjoy it while it lasts.

As you can see, we've picked a few new things this past week. While I'm planning on making a big pot of chicken soup with the celery (soup in July, I know), most of what's remaining in the garden will be frozen for winter use. Homegrown celery in my opinion is VERY pungent and a little bit goes a long way.


Our spring sown carrots are looking very good this year unlike last summer. We've picked a couple dozen of them already and all but one or two have been perfectly straight. I've built two other carrot beds for this year's winter crop. Hopefully, the voles will stay away this time around!


I also picked the first artichoke of the year (yes!) and all of my plants now are starting to produce. The two golden beets I pulled this week were so delicious. This was the first time I've tried them and they tasted incredibly sweet.


My chamomile is now flowering. Better late than never I guess.


The Fava beans continue to roll in and we picked our first string beans this week. The greens ones are 'Contender'. This is my second year growing them and what a disappointment they have been. I think I'll try a different variety next year. I also picked our early sowing of Dragon's Tongue beans. I love them. They have a nice flavor and keep their crunch when cooked.


The cukes and zucchini plants continue to be productive. I also picked my first head of savoy cabbage today, albeit a small one. It was about the size of a grapefruit. My cabbages are taking FOREVER to grow and the heads are stalling at the moment. I just hope they don't bolt before they reach full size.


Finally, this was the haul from my five potato plants. I was afraid that the voles may have gotten to them but to my relief they didn't. Only one potato showed signs of being chewed on so I think I harvested these just in time. I sliced up a few and cooked them up in a gratin for dinner tonight. Boy were they good!

Prelude to Beans

Today, I picked the last of the snow and shell peas. The vines look rather ragged these days and will soon be pulled up. The freed up space will eventually be planted with fall veggies in the coming weeks. The end of pea season usually coincides the beginning of the bean season. My early sown crop is flowering now. Pictured above is a Dragon's Tongue bean flower.


The Contender bean flowers are a lighter shade of pink.


My early sown Envy soybeans (edamame) have recovered somewhat from the groundhog attacks and begun to flower as well. It'll be interesting to see what kind of yield we get since the plants have been compromised.


The first pods have already begun to set. I can't wait until these Dragon's Tongue beans mature. They are very tasty in my opinion and their crisp texture holds up well when cooked.