The Back Garden Update

With all of the hot weather we've been experiencing, the plants in the back garden have really taken off. It's getting harder and harder to move in between the rows. I must admit, I didn't realize how much space zucchini plants required. I have to wear pants just to avoid their abrasive leaves! Also, they seem to be shading everything around them. Hopefully they won't get too much bigger or they'll have to go. I'll take peppers over zucchini any day.

In other news, something has devoured all of my soy beans . Today, I noticed a half eaten baby Charantais melon and numerous stripped leaves. I thought it might have been a chipmunk but then found a small gap under my fence. Those dastardly rabbits found a way in! Needless to say, I tried my best to block the gap. Also, think I'll try my hand at trapping them. In the past 2 and a half weeks, my Havahart trap has caught 8 chipmunks 3 squirrels, all of which were relocated to a nearby park. I haven't spotted a chipmunk in my garden since. Can anyone suggest a good way to trap rabbits?


Here's a view of the back-half of the garden. The melon vines are out of control. I'm gonna have to install some kind of trellis for them to climb onto soon or I won't be able to access the tomatoes.

Here's a closer looks at the melon vines. They are flowering abundantly now.

The tassels are also beginning to form on my corn plants. Anyone know of a good way to hand-pollinate corn?

Veggie Notes

I harvested new potatoes from 3 of my buckets last weekend. After a disappointing start, the Red Thumb potatoes came through this time around. Also, I was pleased to find that the All Blues had produced many golf ball sized tubers. Both seem to grow relatively well in pots (though the grand prize would go to the All Blues) so I think I'll give it another go next year but tweak the method a bit. I definitely won't be as heavy-handed when adding more soil to the pots (maybe an inch at a time). They didn't respond well when I raised the soil level by 4 inches all at once. Also, I think I'll skip the straw next year.

Finally, I won't be growing Rose Finn fingerlings in pots next year. The plants grew weak and the tubers were awfully tiny. The ones I have in the ground on the other hand are thriving.


I love cutting into these potatoes. The interior coloring is so striking, particularly in the All Blue. Homegrown potatoes are so delicious; I don' t know if I could ever go back to buying supermarket spuds.

My Florence Fennel have bolted. I'm kicking myself as they looked perfect and large enough to harvest last week. Just goes to show that knowing when to harvest is as important as knowing how to grow a particular veggie.


I'm beginning to understand way wild strawberries are not grown commercially. They generally end up in our bellies before they make it into the kitchen. There's just something about them screams, "Eat me!"


Awful! All of my cauliflower have bolted due to the excessive heat we've had lately. I knew cauliflower was difficult to grow but this is ridiculous. I'm assuming that they are inedible at this point???

I was really looking forward to trying this purple variety. Oh well. Maybe they will do better as a fall crop.


The Piracicaba broccoli on the other hand is still producing many side shoots. I'm trying a different variety this fall but will surely grow this one again next spring.

Earlier this spring, I saved a clump of leeks to divide and plant this summer. Now that space has opened up, these will be moved soon.


Finally, this is a baby Calabash gourd. After it sizes up, it will surely be tasty in a soup.

Early Summer Harvest

I hope everyone had a great weekend. We spent most of our time indoors as the heat and humidity here have been pretty unbearable. At the moment, I'm clearing and tidying several beds to make way for fall crops in the coming weeks. Admittedly, the work is going rather slow. I have to remind myself that we ought to appreciate the hot summer days as the air will grow crisp and leaves will begin to change color before we know it. Such things have a habit of sneaking up on us here in New England.

Anyway, here are some random harvest photos that I took during the past few days. The numbers are really starting to add up now. Pretty soon, we'll have to purchase that extra freezer to accommodate our excess veggies. I'm already getting tried of the zucchini...is that normal?

Harvested this week:
Beans, Peas, Favas - 1.21 lb
Beets - 2.27 lb
Zucchini - 8.29 lb (10)
Cucumbers - 4.05 lb (6)
Celery - 0.79 lb
Kale - 1.69 lb
Carrots - 1.68 lb
Cherry Tomatoes - 0.56 lb
Red of Florence Scallions - 0.40 lb
Florence Fennel - 0.36 lb
Baby Lettuce - 0.20 lb
Softneck Garlic - 0.85 lb
Shallots - 0.24 lb
Broccoli - 0.25 lb
New Potatoes - 1.97 lb

Total this week: 24.81 lb

The Toasty July Garden

It's been hot hot hot. Some veggies are loving it; others are not. Here's a quick update on what's going on right now:

The peas are toast (and hung over). I can't complain. They've given it their all and then some. Thanks ol' friend. Now I must rip you from my life.


Isn't this flower pretty?! They are being pumped out by my Calabash gourd, an edible Asian variety. Unfortunately, half of the plant (the part hanging on my garden fence) is now in the belly of the grumpy groundhog that lives underneath our shed. Judging by the rather large size of its leaves and vines, I'm sure the plant will recover...


On a side note, its tendrils are as tough as nails...

I guess I only have myself to blame. The rather obese groundhog has up until this point largely ignored my fenced-in garden, that is until I let one of my long Asian cukes wander past the green zone. Not only did he consume this one but also managed to reach into the fence and devour another. Now we see him propped on his hind legs pulling at the fence like a crazed crack addict. I'm sorry but I have to cut you off now! Better a fence than a shotgun (which I'm not ruling out)!


You would think that with all of the hot weather we've been getting, these tomatoes would be a different color now. Not! I have started to give them regular foliar feedings of seaweed emulsion now - something I've been neglecting. Hopefully that will give them the kick in the backside that they need to reach for the moon. Not that they need too much help. They are already over 6 feet tall!


Ohhhhh, how you torment me so.

Finally, the peppers seem to be loving the heat. This guy is coming along nicely.

One of my pepperoncino plants is fruiting like crazy. It's nice to know that the aphids didn't hinder their growth too much.

As you can probably tell, I'm sort of on the warpath today. I must be ready for the weekend.

Digging up the Hardnecks - It's Garlic Time!

I haven't been this excited in a long time. On Tuesday, I finally mustered enough courage to dig up all of my hardneck garlic. I am so unbelievably happy with the results. Most of the bulbs are as big as the ones I planted back in October. It's turning out to be a great year for garlic. I'm sure the warm spring had something to do with it. I grew two varieties this year:


Pskem River - I planted two bulbs of this garlic last fall. Each had only 4 cloves. Two didn't survive the winter and another 2 didn't develop properly. However, the 4 that did look beautiful. I will save the largest one to replant this fall.


German Extra Hardy - I planted 6 bulbs. Out of 36 or so cloves, all but 1 went on to develop nice sized bulbs. Hopefully, this variety will grow reliably each year.


All of my hardnecks were left to dry on our covered patio. I feel a sense of accomplishment every time I walk out of the kitchen door and get hit with the almost overpowering scent of garlic. (How can you not when you have to wait 9 months for something to mature.) Hopefully they will all cure well. I wonder how long their shelf-life will be...yet another thing to research.

For those of you who might be wondering, I purchased my hardnecks from Seed Savers Exchange. The bulbs were flawless. I think I will get two more varieties to plant this fall. Hurry though, they always seem to sell out quickly.

On a final note, my supermarket softnecks are drying well. These will come in handy after the hardnecks have been consumed.

My Take on Italy - Making Pizza on the Grill

A Sure Bet - Bacon and Pepperoni Pizza

I realized the other day that it has been quite some time since I've written a foodie-related post. And while this is indeed a blog about vegetable gardening, sometimes it's nice to break free from the norm. So in the spirit of shaking things up a bit, let me tell you about my latest culinary addiction - backyard pizza.

I'll just come out and say it - I make a mean pizza. In fact, I'll probably never have pizza delivered again. I apologize if that sounds cocky. I'm just tell you how it is. Mind you, it wasn't always this way. I've also made my fair share of really BAD pizza. And as a result, I used to think that in order to make great pizza, you had to have a wood fired oven that can reach temperatures of 700 degree F or more. While in most cases this is true, you can still make some truly delicious pizza using your outdoor gas grill. I simply place a baking stone directly on the grill, close the lid and crank the heat up all the way. When the temperature inside reaches at least 500 degrees F, I know that I'm good to go. The pizza cooks very quickly - in about 5 minutes. The hotter the grill and quicker the bake, the better in my opinion.

So why not do this in your kitchen? Because the last thing I want to do is to have an oven on full blast during the height of summer. Plus I think a closed grill does a much better job of circulating the heat. And as an added bonus, the bottom of the pizza always browns beautifully.


Something More Exotic - Pizza Topped with Shrimp, Oyster Mushrooms, Garden Peas and Goat Cheese

It's true what they say - a pizza is only as good as its crust. In my opinion, the best pizzas have a Neapolitan style crust - one that's thin, crispy on the bottom and bubbly around the edges. The recipe I use comes from one of my favorite cookbooks - The Bread Baker's Apprentice - Mastering the Art of Extraordinary Bread. You can also find Peter Reinhart's recipe for Neapolitan-style pizza dough here.


Finally, here are some of my tips for making truly spectacular backyard pizza:

Use fresh herbs - commercial pizza can be really bland in my opinion. I usually sprinkle on top of my pizza plenty of chopped fresh herbs like thyme, oregano and basil from my garden. I also use herbs that pair well with certain toppings (like shrimp and dill for example).

One quick turn - I always turn my pizza 180 degrees half way during the cooking process. This ensures that it browns evenly. Aside from doing this, the grill is kept closed.

Less is more - Finding the right balance between sauce, cheese and toppings is art form in and of itself. Too much of anything and the pizza suffers.

The cheese - Use at least 3 kinds of cheese - 1 hard and 2 melting. Also, toppings should be placed on top of the crust in a certain order - sauce, then melting cheese, then toppings, followed by a light sprinkling of fresh herbs, melting cheese and hard cheese.

Shake and bake - getting the pizza onto the baking stone can be a tricky task. I don't use cornmeal to dust my peel. Semolina flour is a better alternative. However, I prefer to assemble my pizza on top of a prepared rimless baking sheet. To prepare the baking sheet, spray the surface lightly with some non-stick spray or cooking oil. Use a paper towel to evenly distribute the oil and remove the excess. Then evenly sprinkle flour onto the surface using a shaker. When you're finished assembling the pizza, transfer and bake it as soon as possible. Hold the baking sheet at a 30 degree angle to the baking stone and lightly shake from left to right to release the pizza.

Think outside the box - the beauty of making your own pizza is that you're not limited to Domino's toppings. The classics are always a sure bet, but coming up with the right mix of more exotic toppings can result in something that's truly amazing.

Cucumbers and Chamomile - Weekly Harvest

It's that time again...Honestly, does it ever get old? I know it can be a bit repetitive at times, which is why I try to grow as many different varieties of vegetables as we can fit within the limited amount of space that we have. Also, I noticed this morning that for at least the past month or so, I haven't bought any vegetables from the supermarket aside from say the odd tomato, which I'm hoping will end very soon. Sometimes I feel like we, in the industrialized world, have a tendency to take for granted the fact that at any time, we can go into a grocery store and find the shelves fully stocked with food. (I know I do.) In growing your own food, it's somewhat comforting to know that despite all of the modern conveniences available to us, we can still become relatively self-sufficient if we choose to be.


This past week, we picked our first cucumbers (7 so far). I'm growing primarily Spacemaster cukes this year. On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give their overall flavor a 6. They don't have the ultra crispy and juicy flesh I look for in a good cucumber. However, they more than make up for it in the amount of fruit they can produce. I'm pretty confident that we won't be purchasing cucumbers from the store anytime soon.


Despite the fact that my snow and shell pea plants are looking awfully overgrown these days, they are still producing relatively well. Nonetheless, I think I will put them out later on this week as we still have about 2 pounds of snow peas left to eat. On a side note, I'm realizing that I didn't grow enough shell peas this year. Sure they are not as productive as snow peas, but their sweetness is winning me over.


Finally, I'm starting to pick some German Chamomile. The fresh flowers have a wonderful aroma, almost like melon. I don't think I'll bother weighing them, but hopefully by the end of the summer, I'll have a decent amount of tea stashed away for the winter months.

This week's harvest:

Fava beans - 0.47 lb
Peas and beans - 1.91 lb
Carrots - 1.05 lb
Cukes (7) - 2.71 lb
Zucchini (5) - 2.92 lb
Beets - 0.71 lb
Broccoli - 0.25 lb
Tomatoes - 0.18 lb

Total this week - 1o.20 lb

A Place to Call Home and Wild Strawberries

I hope everyone is enjoying their holiday weekend. All I can say is - it's hot. With temperatures in the 90's, it's hard to find the motivation to do much gardening. As a result, like so many other chores on my to-do list, the weeds will have to wait yet another day.

The other night, Marc and I watched the movie, "Julie and Julia." Part bio pic of the late Julia Child's adventures in Paris during her formative years as a chef, it reminded me of how much I want our lives to be centered around good food (and how I would love to visit France one of these days).

One day, I hope to live in a town in which I can purchase the bulk of my family's food from local vendors as passionate about what they sold as we were about eating it. I would buy only what we planned to eat for the next day or two, not what will keep in its shrink wrap for weeks on end. In the early morning, I would head out to the local baker for some crusty artisan bread. The produce market would be bustling - stalls overflowing with what was seasonal and fresh. The local fishmonger would go on and on about the morning's catch. And the town's butcher would describe not only the different cuts of meat he sold, but also how the animals were raised and slaughtered.

If all of these wonderful things describe where YOU live, please let me know! Who knows, maybe one of these days, we'll be neighbors. (I'm a good one, I promise.) Admittedly, Marc and I haven't fully committed to where we're living now, and we're excited to do a bit of traveling during the next few years in order to find a place that means to us what Paris meant to Julia. Until such time this dream becomes a reality, we'll have to settle for what's growing in our garden and baking in our home oven.


So what does all of this have to do with wild strawberries? Let's just say you'll never find one of these at your local supermarket. But if you're lucky, you may come across it at an open air market in Europe. Sometimes, I wish I could properly convey to my non-gardening friends some of the truly wonderful things they are missing out on. Until earlier this week, I had never eaten a wild strawberry before. And if I hadn't decided to grow some this year, I may have lived the rest of my life without having experienced this pleasure.

I'm growing two varieties of wild strawberries (Red Wonder and Yellow Wonder). The seeds were started in the beginning of February. These perennial plants are just now starting to bloom aggressively. During the past few days, we've been able to sample a couple of each variety. Both are extremely delicious but the yellow ones in particular are a feast for the taste buds. Aside from the intense strawberry flavor you ordinarily get from the wild sort, I would describe Yellow Wonder as having an interesting floral taste as well, somewhat reminiscent of roses.

I've said this before but part of the joy in vegetable gardening for me is being able to grow varieties that are almost impossible to source commercially. Maybe if more of us did, we as a country would expect more from our food economy.

On a final note, I just realized that today is my one year blogging anniversary. Oh, what difference a year makes. Thank you all for participating in this growing journey with me. Your wisdom and guidance are much appreciated.

Friday Blooms

I hope everyone is as excited about the long weekend as I am. Sometimes, you just need a break from the daily rat race. I'm looking forward to three days of relaxation...or as close to it as I can get. Call me a homebody but when I'm not at work, I generally want to be home. The last thing I want to do this weekend is to be stuck in holiday traffic.

My garden isn't known for its flowers but I thought I'd share some photos I took of what's blooming these days:


This morning glory is HUGE! The beautiful flowers are the size of the palm of my hand.


I haven't picked any nasturtiums yet. They just look too pretty to eat.


The German chamomile is ready to be picked and dried. The flowers have a wonderful aroma...almost like melon.


Is it common for zinnias to produce different colored flowers from the same plant? Maybe it's just my imagination but I'm seeing more colors than I do plants.


I've never grown calendulas before. They are quite stunning if you ask me.


Another variation of calendula I presume.