N&C Midwest: September 2018!

Wow!  Where does summer go?  Still hot here, and many things still producing hard!  Just spent 2 1/2 hours cleaning up, topping tomatoes, harvesting, and fertilized some container plants.  

For the first time ever, (thank you book that I can’t remember the name of at the moment) I have lettuce so that I can make a BLT samich with both L&T from my garden!

Just took the squash out, most melons, most cukes.  Will take a pic here in a bit and update my avatar!  Tons of eggplant, peppers, maters and some pecked up beans.  Dang JBs.  Squash had SVBs but was till alive and amazingly, one actually was putting on flowers and had 2 baby squash.  Too late.  

Love SFG!!!!

Bountiful harvest for the first day of September! Tomatoes, peppers, Kale, Lettuce, Mizuna, and Zucchini Squash. 

Jalapeño Peppers



Sweet Banana Peppers and Bell Peppers



A few Tomatoes


Red Russian Kale



Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce

What do you do with your kale, OG?  I have struggled mightily!  I love cabbages, radish, Brussels sprouts...why not kale?  I don’t do smoothies.

OhioGardener wrote:Bountiful harvest for the first day of September! Tomatoes, peppers, Kale, Lettuce, Mizuna, and Zucchini Squash. 

Jalapeño Peppers



Sweet Banana Peppers and Bell Peppers



A few Tomatoes


Red Russian Kale



Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce

GORGEOUS!  Love the pics!  Are you freezing the jalapeño peppers?

Scorpio Rising wrote:What do you do with your kale, OG?  I have struggled mightily!  I love cabbages, radish, Brussels sprouts...why not kale?  I don’t do smoothies.

Red Russian Kale is the sweetest kale that I have ever found, and I love it. I eat it fresh while working in the garden, and we eat it in salads along with lettuce, Mizuna, and Swiss Chard leaves. We love Garlic Kale, too:

Wash Kale and chop in 1" pieces
Heat 1 Tbsp Olive Oil in cast iron skillet
Add 2 or 3 cloves of finely chopped or minced garlic
After garlic is tender, add chopped Kale and lightly stir with tongs for about 6 minutes, until Kale is tender.


We also make Kale Chips in the air fryer - they are really delicious!

I guess we don't struggle to eat it.... 

Scorpio Rising wrote:GORGEOUS!  Love the pics!  Are you freezing the jalapeño peppers?

The bigger ones will be made into poppers with cream cheese filling, and wrapped in bacon. The rest of them will be sliced and pickled with garlic and peppercorns for winter usage.  This is a recent batch of pickled Jalapeños:

So I literally have them coming out of my ears.  Had 2 plants last year, still have multiple bags of frozen jalapeños.  Can I can them all?  I really need to do something!  That single plant out there is GANGBUSTERS!!!

All i have is hot water bath.  Cannot do pressure canning at this point...

Scorpio Rising wrote:All i have is hot water bath.  Cannot do pressure canning at this point...

The way I can them is quite simple.  In a glass or porcelain pot, bring to a rolling boil 2 parts white vinegar to 1 part water with chopped garlic, peppercorns, and non-iodized salt.  While waiting for the pot to boil, I slice the pepper about 1/4" thick, with everything but the stem.  Once the liquid is a rolling boil, add the sliced Jalapeno peppers - make sure they are totally covered in liquid and not exposed.

Sterilize pint jars & lids on a rack in a pan of hot water. When the peppers in the liquid reach a rolling boil again, turn off the heat, fill the jars with peppers, garlic, and peppercorns and enough liquid to cover. Wipe the top of the jar, put on the lid and tighten the band. Set to cool. The jar will seal as it cools.  They will keep as long as the jar remains sealed.

OhioGardener wrote:

Scorpio Rising wrote:All i have is hot water bath.  Cannot do pressure canning at this point...

The way I can them is quite simple.  In a glass or porcelain pot, bring to a rolling boil 2 parts white vinegar to 1 part water with chopped garlic, peppercorns, and non-iodized salt.  While waiting for the pot to boil, I slice the pepper about 1/4" thick, with everything but the stem.  Once the liquid is a rolling boil, add the sliced Jalapeno peppers - make sure they are totally covered in liquid and not exposed.

Sterilize pint jars & lids on a rack in a pan of hot water. When the peppers in the liquid reach a rolling boil again, turn off the heat, fill the jars with peppers, garlic, and peppercorns and enough liquid to cover. Wipe the top of the jar, put on the lid and tighten the band. Set to cool. The jar will seal as it cools.  They will keep as long as the jar remains sealed.

That is how I do canning , too, OG.  I have some cukes that I plan on making into dills.  Other than that? Maters, maybe salsa?  I have garlic and cilantro....and an onion from Krogers!

Thanks for the jalapeño pickle recipe, OG!!!!  I am leaving some on to get red.  They are so pretty when they start to turn colors, and you can’t get the red ones in the stores around here.  Do they taste milder when they are red?

Hot again here.  Watered some of the containers.  I sprayed my eggplant with the peppermint soap & Tabasco concoction yesterday, will see if it is repelling those potato beetle things.    Also hit the bush beans.  And hand picked the green worms off the radish seedlings.  Need to cover these.

Scorpio Rising wrote:Thanks for the jalapeño pickle recipe, OG!!!!  I am leaving some on to get red.  They are so pretty when they start to turn colors, and you can’t get the red ones in the stores around here.  Do they taste milder when they are red?

Hot again here.  Watered some of the containers.

They area little hotter when they ripen to red, but they add nice flavor and color to the canned jars of the Jalapeños.

Yes, it is still hot here and supposed to stay that way for the rest of the week. I had to turn on the drip irrigation for the beds.  We have had rain forecast for the past 3 days, but it has all gone around us.  Two weeks of 90°F weather is drying out the beds.

The beds are transitioning from summer to fall vegetables.  Last evening one section was cleaned out and 3" of compost was added to the top.  I didn't have the heart to pull out the Marigold plant, though...

OhioGardener wrote:The beds are transitioning from summer to fall vegetables.  Last evening one section was cleaned out and 3" of compost was added to the top.  I didn't have the heart to pull out the Marigold plant, though...

Marigolds go strong into Fall, so do nasturtiums and geraniums—very pretty!  The rain is pretty scattered and hit or miss here.  We got a downpour night before last, but who knows how much that does really...slow and steady is better.  I think the heat is going to break here in the next day or so.  Fingers crossed!

There's nothing prettier than a bed topped with more compost.

I agree, Sanderson, and I love the smell of that rich black compost - so sweet!

Just processed 7 quarts of bread and butter pickles made with Persian Baby Cucumbers (seed from Renee's Garden)...even though it was a tough year (heat with no rain), and the cukes looked pretty rough, they kept cranking out little cukes every day.  Other bigger cuke types were a total fail...and when things looked the worst I ripped them out and planted another round with plenty of time before first frost.  I have great luck with an English Cucumber - Chelsea Prize - also from Renee's Garden...picked these this morning.  So maybe I'll be making a tahini salad, raita, cucumber and onion salad...or a nice little appetizer served at a local favorite Chinese cafe (big cucumber pieces big enough to easily pick up with chop sticks with a dressing of rice vinegar, soy, ginger, sugar, sesame oil, and sesame seeds.


Cukes were riddled at one point by thousands of pests (aphids, flea beetles, tiny white thrips, etc)...then they all disappeared...then noticed about 50 or so of these ladybug larva...I think they cleaned off every leaf.

Bad year for tomatoes...had a few Carbon that turned out well.

Had better luck with cherry tomatoes...Black Cherry and Sungold.

Giant Marconi - with heat and no rain, the peppers really suffered this year.  I could water in the morning and the raised beds would be dry by the time I got home after work and I would water again...lots of blossom end rot which I've never really had with my peppers before.  Recent cooler weather and rain has saved the day and late peppers look decent.

spent more time in the shade garden this year...found this gal hanging out.


Had to buy a pickle mix this year as the monarch cats took down our small dill patch...at one point we had 13...some on butterfly milkweed.

Glad to hear your Monarch cats were so numerous!  I had not seen any, but there were 3 chrysalises on my house, one has fledged, other two still cookin’.  

All in all, it looks like you had some successes, Landarch!  Interested about the late cukes you planted, so they are fresh-eating type?  Can you make pickles out of the English cuke?  

Today I am going to start my 2 day dills with gifted cukes.  Also need to go pick stuff and tidy.  Need to show the compost pile some love, too.  

Cooled off here, raining lightly now, and apparently all weekend.  Grass is as green as spring.  

Yes, the English cuke I use is Chelsea Prize from Renee's Garden...they grow long and straight when trellised, sweet, relatively seed-free, thin-skinned, etc...I use them for everything.  I seeded these in May but they did poorly, so I seeded again in early August and they are rockin' right now.

Last year the monarch cats were on the butterfly and swamp milkweeds...this year dill...sometimes they're on the carrots but I skipped planting those this year.

Earlier I did about 5 gallons of pickled beets...starting to like pickled onions on hamburgers as well.

I rented an lawn aerator over labor day and overseeded...then had a steady drizzle about all week...nice germination in about 4 days...ready for fall, garlic, maybe some asian greens.

landarch wrote:Last year the monarch cats were on the butterfly and swamp milkweeds...this year dill...sometimes they're on the carrots but I skipped planting those this year.

Those are Black Swallowtail cats on the Dill, Carrots, Fennel, etc. (all plants of the Carrot family).   The Monarch cats eat only Milkweed (Butterfly Weed, Common Milkweed, Swamp Milkweed, etc.). 

I have both milkweeds and dill, lovage, parsley.  I love my cats!  I put pictures on Monarch Supporter thread!

The third day of solid, non-stop rain, and I look out the window to see the tomato plants covered with bright red & yellow tomatoes just waiting to be picked..... 

OhioGardener wrote:The third day of solid, non-stop rain, and I look out the window to see the tomato plants covered with bright red & yellow tomatoes just waiting to be picked..... 

Same here....so many things need picked.  Will need a canoe to get to the SFG. 

A canoe would have really been helpful.  Bummed out, most of my “good” tomatoes were invaded by bugs due to not being able to get things picked over the weeken, plus lots of radial crack.  

Beans over.  Will evacuate and try some late late radish seeding, maybe turnips.  And spinach, mache.  Melons rotted on the vine.  

Well, peppers are good.  Pretty.  Think I might pickle some, or make jelly or something...lots!  Lettuces are good, need to get that picked but the mosquitoes are HORRIBLE!  Wet.  

What’s going on, Midwest?

Scorpio Rising wrote:A canoe would have really been helpful.

What’s going on, Midwest?

They are telling us now that we are going to get the remnants of Hurricane Florence by this weekend. 

Finally got the tomatoes picked today and a lot of them had split open from all of the moisture. Most of them went into the VitaMix to make Marinara Sauce for dinner this evening.

Picked lots of Jalapeno Peppers, Sweet Banana Peppers, and Bell Peppers. Also got a good batch of Brussels Sprouts.