What are you eating from your garden today?

AWESOME haul, FG!!! What a beautiful bounty!!! And those itty bitty carrots look so yummy I bet they'll be SO sweet!!!

I am proud to announce my first harvest ever!!!

Nothing too exciting, but my basil was definitely ready to be cut back:



And from it, I made creamy pesto sauce for dinner tonight. It was soooooooo good!!!



What's really sad is I'm so used to buying frest basil from the supermarket, that I didn't realize basil wasn't supposed to have wrinkly leaves. You simply cannot beat fresh from your garden.

A big huge THANK YOU to everyone who has assisted me in my first garden. I'm hoping in the next couple weeks I'll be able to pull some beets and yellow squash. Thanks again, you guys are awesome and this site is the BEST!!!! SFG RULES!!!

Congrats! That very first harvest is best

Belle, that looks delish! You are a successful gardener, congrats!

Looks Delicious!!!! Congratulations!

Belle that looks sooo yummy! I love pesto sauce!

I made broccoli cheese soup for dinner tonight, just the onions were from the garden. I also made some salsa for me and the kids with a bunch of cherry tomatoes we picked today! It's amazing how much more they have started eating since they help grow it. Much more adventurous than they used to be!

Today has been clearing up /out up in readiness for sowing the last few squares with winter , overwintering veg & spring greens .

So we had to use up all sorts .
Alison made a rattoulie with onions. courgetes ,aubergene and a can of chopped toms ( toms still grossly green )

I cleared all the remaining peas both mange tout and full filled pods , all the broad bean , took out a square of parsnips that were planted in freshly manured ground and transplanted out of plant pots .... (never again see picture) .

Cleared most of the bigger courgettes all the caulies over three inches in diameter, all the developed dwarf french beans, some carrots that were sown way back in late march , all the onions both red and white & several stalks of dark green cellery from the cellery stump planting experiments.

We now have our massive 24 pint slow cooker on the go that will make a pure vegetable soup & stock batch by this time tomorrow .

In it from the garden is onion, celery, parsnips, potatoes, carrots, leeks , salad onions & courgettes . We added half of a shop brought Swede , some shop tomatoes , a bit of salt and a good dose of ground white pepper .

Tea tonight from the veg gardens was runner beans , some of the rattoulie , pan fried roundels of courgette , roast potatoes carrot , some rosemary to foil wrap up with a chunk of shop brought roasted turkey breast and a cup of the veg stock liquid to make the gravey with .

it's great when a long term plan succeeds and gives outstanding results.

I now have to go and help finish shelling the peas , beans etc ready for freezing up tomorrow .

Those transplanted parsnips that went into freshly added compost in the MM




they did scrub up well , gave us about 2 1/4 pound of parsnips for the veg sopup in the end

Awww m Man, Plantoid I wish I was at your house to eat today!

Belle....congrats on your basil!!!....your right nothing beats fresh basil....i love the smell in our house after we harvest some

plantoid ....glad to hear the pasrnips still tasted well ....even if they are crazy looking....your vegetable soup sounds amazing its so exciting to grow, harvest, eat and put some away for winter congrats!!

cheyannarach ....so happy to hear the children are enjoying gardening and are more adventurous than they used to be i believe gardening is one of the best tools we have in teaching our children.....our kids are learning so much and they are out in fresh air having a good time

hugs
rose

Rose, it is so true, the fresh air and veggies does them wonders. It is amazing how much they learn and help. They love the garden.

Tonight we ate steaks with grilled taters, turnips, kohlrabi, and peas. It was amazing and delicious!

Nothing from my garden, but I did find a little veggie market not far from the hotel/apt. Look at what I got for about $2. Mostly local produce. Orange and tangerines from Tanzania.



So glad I found it as this would have cost triple in the supermarket.

3 bananas. 3 onions, 2 mangos, 1 avocado, 1 butternut squash, 4 tomatos, 1 orange, 2 cukes, 4 tangerines, 6 limes and 1/2 kilo of baby potatos. Total price Ksh 180 @82KSH/$

Kay

Last night I harvested about 20 cups of basil, added 3 full heads of garlic, olive oil and food processes and froze 3/4 of it, then added cheese and hemp hearts and had it with pasta, brandywine and alicante tomatoes and green beans
YUM
Last year I had tons of basil too, but did not freeze any because I told myself it JUST was not as good frozen.
HOWEVER in the middle of winter when it costs 2.50 for a teensy little sprig of basil, IF I CAN GET IT, it WILL taste great I am sure..
After I harvested each of the basil plants I spread a tablespoon of guano around each plant and so likely I will be picking lots more in 3 days.
We had raspberries and strawberries for dessert.
MANOMAN I LOVE this time of year.
OH KAY how much is that in dollars, LOOKS GREAT

and a can of chopped toms ( toms still grossly green )

Plantoid, why not bring a few inside.
My toms are all basically green, but we have been eating tomatoes daily for a few weeks now with the ones I have put inside a dark cupboard.
I know when mine ripen I will be inundated, so trying to stretch things out a bit now.

My wife found an excellent recepie for grilling green tomatoes directly on the grill. They were awesome!!!!

Now I have several ripe tomatoes; Brandywine, WV 63, and Mr. Stripey and do enjoy the Mr. Stripey but any fresh tomatoe is better than what I will get this winter from the store.....

Pink eye purple hull peas, corn on the cob, potatoes and pork tenderloin. All the veggies were from the garden of course. One too many starches, but who cares when it is so fresh.

yolos wrote:Pink eye purple hull peas, corn on the cob, potatoes and pork tenderloin. All the veggies were from the garden of course. One too many starches, but who cares when it is so fresh.

I would count the peas as protein .... Sounds like a YUMMY supper!

It took forever but I actually have Sungolds and Sweet 100's ripening right now!
Todays lunch salad - cabbage, pole & bush beans, beet greens, maters.


CC

GWN wrote:

and a can of chopped toms ( toms still grossly green )

Plantoid, why not bring a few inside.
My toms are all basically green, but we have been eating tomatoes daily for a few weeks now with the ones I have put inside a dark cupboard.
I know when mine ripen I will be inundated, so trying to stretch things out a bit now.

I am aiming to do just that , will have to store them in the awning of the caravan though as I'm away on 15 days holiday styaerting Friday morning.
At present most of the toms are still light green except for a couple of cherry sized ones whichb have a tinge of orange .
I'll stripp the plants of these but I'll be leaving my big beef steak ones on the vine now that the auto watering is up and running well .
I may even have something to put up in the giant veg threads when I come back

to night we had soft ( ground ) minced beef with our own carrots & onions chopped up in it & nicely liquid with a thick gravy . ( left overs ....It was used last night for a sort of spag bol and reheated tonight it has time to develop flavours and soften up even more)

One very nice five inch across broccoli head .... first of the season , three carrots sown in mid march ....2 x 3 inches and one seven inches long with a 1 1/2 thick top end , 6 ounces of dwarf french beans & , Shop brought new potatoes

After I'd cut off the head of broccoli I noticed that there were four tiny growing points still on the plant. So I've cut an inch down the stalk down in a cross to see if each new stalk will produce more crops like most cabbages and lettuces do .

Yesterday my friend came over and we made a large dish of eggplant Parmigiana. I have lots of leftovers. I don't cook much on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday because of my schedule, so I love leftovers.
Saturday I am going to Pittston, Pennsylvania which is about 30 minutes away. I want to go to the annual Pittston Tomato Festival, and see the tomato parade, and the tomato fights. (People actually have a fight where two teams pelt each other with rotten tomatoes!) Not exactly my idea of fun. I'll try to get some pics if I can.

I am loving growing root crops! I've gardened forever (well nearly) and this is the first year root crops have grown. I planted lots of different kinds to "test" my MM. We had carrots, beets, rutabaga, and some bush bean all boiled up together with some fresh cilantro for a late night snack last night. The cherry tomatoes are coming in now and we just grab those off the counter like candy. Pulling up a carrot, that looks like a real carrot, is a great joy to me! And fresh beets taste wonderful!

Ate the last of my sweet corn and 1 entire Brandywine. That was a full meal all by itself. The sweet corn was not good this year. I know my mistake so for next year I hope to have a better one so I can freeze some for the winter months.

For the most part, I've been getting mostly tomatoes and beans from my garden right now. I love these pole beans I planted! They're an heirloom called purple podded pole beans.



They're really really long, at least compared to what I've planted in the past. Maybe 7 or 8 inches long, but they're also flat!



I was trying to save enough to make a batch of dilly beans, but I read the recipe in the canning book and it said I needed almost 5 pounds So instead, I found a recipe for refrigerator dilly beans, and what didn't get pickled got boiled and eaten with butter



The beans lost almost all of their purpleness after being blanched, but oddly enough, after just a few hours in the vinegar, they started turning a little purple again.

Tonight I made fresh salsa - cherry tomatoes, cucumber, Thai pepper, and cilantro with some non-garden onion, garlic and lime juice thrown in for extra flavor. I LOVE my SF garden! Mmmmm...

Beets and roasted aubergine.

littlesapphire wrote:For the most part, I've been getting mostly tomatoes and beans from my garden right now. I love these pole beans I planted! They're an heirloom called purple podded pole beans.



They're really really long, at least compared to what I've planted in the past. Maybe 7 or 8 inches long, but they're also flat!



I was trying to save enough to make a batch of dilly beans, but I read the recipe in the canning book and it said I needed almost 5 pounds So instead, I found a recipe for refrigerator dilly beans, and what didn't get pickled got boiled and eaten with butter



The beans lost almost all of their purpleness after being blanched, but oddly enough, after just a few hours in the vinegar, they started turning a little purple again.

I LOVE pickled beans oddly enough, I've got the same salad spinner and purple beans...bush variety
Your beans look great purple, pickled and green!