Vegetables

  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Recipes,  Vegan,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    Kale Chips

    Purple kale

    You may have heard about these already; they seem to be a new fad food.  Pieces of kale rubbed with oil and seasonings and dried until crispy.  Well, we love to dry things in pans on our roof in the summer, so we thought we’d try them.  Part of our mixed salad greens seed mix turned out to be this very pretty purple kale, and I figured that chips were meant to be.  So we

    Tear into pieces and rub with oil

    then left them on the roof to dry.  We were also playing around with zucchini chips, Swiss chard chips, and just about anything we could stick up there in the brilliant sunshine.

    Place on drying tray

    The chips toasted in only about three hours.  They were very crisp and dark, and had reduced in size by about a third.  The first one had a wierd taste to it.  The second one… and we were hooked!  We crunched down several trays of them and one go.  They are extremely nutritious, with calcium and folic acid among other things.  We tried a more complicated recipe as well involving nutritional yeast, but it didn’t do anything special for me.  The dried chard and zucchinis weren’t show-stoppers, either.

    I also sauteed de-stemmed kale and it came out so creamy tasting with none of the bitterness that chard has, that it is now my favorite cooked green.

    Dried kale can also be ground into a powder or flakes and used to top vegetables and grains for flavor, nutrition and color.  If you use kelp flakes at all, you can substitute dried flaked kale.

    Sun-Dried Kale Chips
    Author: 
    Recipe type: Snack
     
    This basic recipe is all over the Internet and produces the best results
    Ingredients
    • At least one bunch kale
    • Olive oil
    • Salt (optional)
    • Sunshine
    Instructions
    1. Tear kale leaves into chip-sized pieces without the midribs
    2. Put torn leaves into a bowl.
    3. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with salt.
    4. Gently work the oil into the leaves so that each leaf is covered.
    5. Place on cookie tins closely but not overlapping.
    6. Place a piece of cheesecloth or a metal cooling rack over the kale to keep it from blowing away.
    7. Place cookie sheet in full sun for about three hours or longer.
    8. Eat!

    So finally a fad that I can believe in!

  • Gardening adventures,  Humor,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Vegetables

    Zucchini

    I have four vigorous zucchini plants.  Why four?  Because in winter with a lap full of comforter and gardening catalogs, the January eye peers back at July’s garden and the plants are smaller, the harvest never enough.  What if something happens to one spindly seedling?  Then there would be no zucchini, and summer without it just wouldn’t be the same.  So four tiny sprouts went into the ground and four large plants are what I have.  The zucchini harvest began several weeks ago.  My daughter and I have happily eaten sauteed zucchini, seared zucchini, broiled zucchini and have even made sun-dried zucchini chips.  It has been too hot to make Rosemary Zucchini Soup (see my recipe section). Zucchini bread uses far too little zucchini for the amount of calories it contains.  The problem with zucchini recipes is that they use far too little zucchini!  Zucchini has many health benefits, and is low-calorie, versitile, and is the butt of many summer-harvest jokes.  I say this while considering who I know that I might unload some of the harvest upon.

    Zucchini Chips ready to sun-dry on the roof

    We’ve both been harvesting under the enormous leaves this year’s zucchini plants have produced, and have kept up with it with few surprises.  Until today.

    In summer the days can run into each other with a speed that is breathtaking.  We’d gone two days without checking.  Then this morning after a second morning of trying to teach our old dog General the new trick of not hunting the chickens, which we were allowing out of their coop, we were on our way back to the house.  It was hot already, the morning mist having burned off  as if with an acetyline torch.  My daughter carried strawberries in her hat and I was headed up to water stressed plants stranded without irrigation.  Then I caught a glimpse of something along the edge of the raised bed.  It was green.  It was wedged against the corner and pressing against the edge of the wooden end.  It was trying to break free.  Trembling and exchanging fearsome glances with my daughter, I lifted a spiny leaf:  There lay a six-pound zucchini.

    This might not impress you.  Perhaps you’ve recklessly gone on a summer vacation and forgot to mention to your neighbors that they should keep a cool eye on the big plant in the veg bed, and returned to find a green Moby Dick sucking up all the water in the garden.  Perhaps you know already that the world’s record zucchini weighed 65 pounds.  The world’s longest was 69.5 inches long, which is 6 and a half inches taller than I.  Yet to find a six pounder trying to break down my much-cherished raised bed was something of a shock, especially when there was only a two-day gap between checking.  This zucchini is only slightly less weight than my daughter at birth.  Yet, I feel strangely deprived of maternal instincts toward it.

    Big Zucchini

     

    How luxurious it is to complain about too much food.  I’ll make steaks out of this big one, and perhaps donate the smaller ones to the Fallbrook Food Pantry.  And begin to harvest the squash blossoms more vigorously!

     

  • Humor,  Recipes,  Vegan,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    Roasted Radishes, or What Not to Bring to a Party

    Radishes About to be Roasted

    I don’t have much luck bringing food to events.  When I need to bring food to a party, I seem to have some strong internal drive to fix the most inappropriate thing, and go through agonies to make it.  Some mischievous elf in my head sends down strange images to my consciousness telling me what to make as soon as I volunteer.  The food is good…. it is usually a recipe that I’ve made before and think is interesting and different.  I’ve brought cornbread made with blue cornmeal to picnics, and people have shunned it thinking it was blueberry flavored, or an ugly homemade unfrosted cake, and gone on to the easily recognizable chain-store brand cookies lined up in a clamshell container.

    When asked to bring a cake, I make some complicated thing that never looks as good as the picture in my head.   My cakes are very tasty, but my decorating skills are, shall we say, possible candidates for cakewrecks.com. I’ve done a cake  for a grand opening of a park where I simulated a pond with cattails made of broken pretzel sticks, or that is what it was supposed to look like.   I made not one but three types of jelly roll cake with three different fillings for a bridal shower, and the day was so hot that the cakes kept sticking and sliding and I had to keep running up and down the stairs to the garage refrigerator to chill them.  I actually sat down and cried because I was so frustrated and had spent the entire day baking in a heat wave with a mess to show for it.  I ended up arranging the individual cakes in a flower shape and sprinkled dried rose buds and edible glitter around.  It looked pretty, if amateurish, but I knew they’d taste wonderful.  It was so hot in the car I thought I would be redecorating my Prius with homemade lemon curd and chocolate filling.  I had to stick the large pan in the surprised hostess’s refrigerator, which took up a lot of space.  Then when it was cake time, I found that the jelly rolls had already been sliced up and plated so that you couldn’t tell the flavors apart and all the rosebuds thrown out, without the bride-to-be or anyone else even seeing it.  I could have just made a sheet cake and everyone would have been happy.

    I’ve brought vegetarian main dishes that no one but my children and I seem to want to eat, even though they aren’t creepy tofu-y mock turkeys or anything.  Labeling a dish ‘vegetarian’ is like putting a curse on it, although many dishes other people bring don’t have meat in them either.  To be ‘vegetarian’ means scary, weird food of unknown origin that probably tastes like sprouts or tofu or whole wheat.

    I know when my offerings are rejected, it isn’t really the food… the food tastes good.  That is, if anyone dares eat it.  It is just out of place, just as I am at most parties.  My food and I belong at small gatherings of friends who are expecting a new experience.  Who want to try something different and talk about it.  Who enjoy subtleties of flavor and the goodness of fresh herbs and spices.  Who don’t judge on how good a dish appears, but how it tastes. Who are forgiving and especially have a good sense of  humor.

    Which brings me to another example of something not to bring to most parties: roasted radishes.  Especially to one where there is a lot of drinking going on.  Everyone will wonder what they are and no one will touch them because there is perfectly predictable Albertsons layered nacho dip and bagged chips right next to them.  Since roasted radishes aren’t the prettiest looking things, they will be the last edible thing on the buffet table besides the really, really cheap half-finished bag of corn chips, and when everyone is really, really drunk, some unpleasant personal comments might be said about their appearance. The radishes will be cold and soggy by that time, too, and not the best thing for someone with a lot of alcohol in his or her system to put into his or her mouth at that point.  However, if served at home as an interesting appetizer along with something less scary-looking, these are just great.  No, really, they are.  You should try them.  I was impressed enough to try to force them on strangers at someone’s home, so you should be, too.

    Roasted Radishes dressed up for a party

    Growing radishes is very easy and quick, and roasting them gives you something to do with them.  Radishes only take a few weeks to mature, so they are often the first thing up and ready in the garden.  Give this recipe a try the next time you roast veggies; many people who don’t really like radishes enjoy them this way.

    Roasted Radishes
    Author: 
    Recipe type: Side Dish
    Prep time: 
    Cook time: 
    Total time: 
     
    Roasting radishes changes their flavor and texture to something new and delightful.
    Ingredients
    • Three bunches radishes, preferable different colors if you can find them
    • Three tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
    • ½ teaspoon dried thyme leaves
    • ⅛th teaspoon cayenne
    • Freshly ground black pepper
    • Coarse salt
    Instructions
    1. Preheat oven to 425 F.
    2. Wash radishes and cut all but a little tuft of radish leaves off of each radish. Don't cut off the roots.
    3. In a medium bowl whisk oil, thyme, cayenne and black pepper.
    4. Add radishes and toss to coat.
    5. Pour radishes onto a flat baking pan and drizzle with any remaining oil mixture.
    6. Roast 40 - 50 minutes, turning once midway through roasting, until a knife easily slides into a radish and they are lightly browned.
    7. Sprinkle or grind coarse salt over the tops.
    8. Serve immediately.

     

  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Ponds,  Rain Catching,  Vegetables

    Yesterday in the Garden

    Yesterday was the solstice, the formal beginning of summer.  The longest day of the year.  (Only six months to Christmas!)  With months of growing season already behind us here in San Diego County, and the threat of drought and fire ahead of us, it is a time to enjoy the bounty that we already have.  This is my year for gardening: I have the best vegetable garden I’ve ever had, after years of building raised beds and lining with aviary wire against gophers, improving the soil with compost, and buying organic seeds and fertilizers.  I also have incredible freedom in my yard to plant whatever I like, wherever I like (within the constraints of tolerance by the plants).  I’ve always had to cluster plants around where I’ve slapped together irrigation on the few stolen weekend hours I could devote to my yard.  No more!  With the permaculture gardens, the well and the drip irrigation, I am excited about my yard for the first time in the twelve years I’ve lived here.  With the incredible job that Roger Boddaert and his team of Juan and Francisco, and also Aquascape’s Aart DeVos with his manager Jacob who has spent thirteen hour days on my property and is back early the next morning, the permaculture project is nearing completion and is spectacular.  As a habitat it is succeeding, attracting more wildlife every day.  As a food forest it has is off to a good start, with extra going to go to the Fallbrook Food Pantry.  As an interesting, decorative garden it is unique and full of surprises.   I’ll show you some photos; you can click on any of them to enlarge, but it will open in this window and you’ll have to use the back arrow to return to this page:

  • Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Recipes,  Soups,  Vegan,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    Savory Carrot Soup

    Freshly Pulled Carrots

    Carrots are a gardening miracle.  From such a minuscule seed, out pops a root strong enough to plow through tough soil and soak up minerals.

    Little Sprouts

    The carrots shoot those minerals up to the ferny leaves, and when they die, leave the minerals to enhance the topsoil.  Carrots fill the roll as one of nature’s miner plants.  They are also terrific to eat and very good for you.

    I’m sure you’ve heard about how high in beta-carotene carrots are, and how they help eyesight.  If you haven’t there are hundreds of Internet references to look up. Carrots are a very versatile vegetable, tasty raw as well as cooked.

    Nantes and Chantenays

    There are many carrot varieties.  Nantes, Chantenay, Danvers… these are the common varieties you’ll see sold in most seed stores.  However there are white carrots, purple carrots, deep red carrots, and carrots of many sizes and shapes.  Some are woody, some very sweet, some tender and some strongly flavored.

    Feel around the carrots to see if they are ready to pull
    Garden carrots need only scrubbing, not peeling

    If you grow your own organic carrots, feel around the roots to see if they are large enough to pull.  Don’t leave them in the ground for too long or they’ll become less sweet and woody in texture.  Also, if you use your own organically grown carrots, you don’t need to peel them.  Just use a brush to scrub off the dirt.

    Carrots are wonderful to eat when simply steamed until tender, then buttered or drizzled with olive oil and chopped herbs.  Dill is particularly good, as are chives.  I’ve found many carrot recipes, but most of them are sweet not savory.  Honey-glazed carrots, carrot soup with curry and sweet coconut milk, brown sugar carrots… I don’t care for them.  Carrots are naturally sweet, and to slop more sweet stuff on top is overdoing it.  Sweetened carrots belong in carrot cake, and there is only one recipe for it that I find not cloying and heavy (I’ll share that recipe with you another time).  I also like carrots in a savory soup.

    Here is an unusual recipe that is tasty, easy, low in calories, and has protein from an unusual source: vegetarian sausage patties. Celery adds dimension to the flavor as does minced fresh rosemary.

    Minced Fresh Rosemary
    Savory Carrot Soup
    Author: 
    Recipe type: Soup
    Prep time: 
    Cook time: 
    Total time: 
    Serves: 2
     
    This golden, low-fat soup brings out the savory goodness of carrots.
    Ingredients
    • About two cups sliced carrots
    • One shallot, diced
    • One celery stalk, diced
    • Two vegetarian sausage patties (such as Morningstar Farms)
    • 1 tablespoon olive oil
    • ½ teaspoon fresh rosemary, minced
    • One large potato, peeled and chopped
    • Four cups vegetable broth
    • Cilantro leaves for garnish (optional)
    Instructions
    1. In medium saucepan, heat olive oil over medium-high heat. Add shallot and cook for two minutes.
    2. Add celery and stir occasionally for about three minutes.
    3. Move the vegetables to one side and add two vegetarian sausage patties. Flip when cooked on one side.
    4. Add potato, carrots and rosemary.
    5. Stir, breaking up sausage patties with spatula.
    6. Add vegetable broth
    7. Bring to boil then lower temperature to a simmer and partially cover with the pot lid.
    8. Cook for about twenty minutes, until carrots are just tender.
    9. Cool, then blend soup until smooth.
    10. Return soup to pot and reheat.
    11. Serve hot, topped with cilantro leaves if used.
    Serve this golden orange soup in bowls that compliment it’s color.
    Serve in Bowls that Compliment the Rich Soup Color
  • Recipes,  Soups,  Vegan,  Vegetables

    Locro de Papas (Ecuadorian Potato Soup)

    Locro de Papas

    A couple of years ago my daughter and I went on a birdwatching ecotour of the cloud forests in Ecuador, and then to the Galapagos islands.

    Me and Galapagos Sea Lions

    The flights ended and began in Quito, the capital city, which holds about 75% of the entire population of Ecuador.  Eating wasn’t as much a challenge as we had anticipated; often in lower economic areas there are better non-meat choices.  We stayed at a hotel in Quito at the beginning, middle and end of our journey.  Room service was the same price as eating in the restaurant, so we indulged in our room for most meals because we were exhausted.  One of the three separate nights we stayed there we watched Lord of the Rings in Spanish. Neither of us really speaks  Spanish, but I understand enough to get the gist of what is being said. On our last day the streets were blocked off because the president of Ecuador came to stay in the adjacent hotel and we saw his party board a plane as ours was taking off the next day.

    The hotel menu offered interesting side dishes made with interesting ingredients such as yucca and plantain.  Our absolute favorite, though, was Locro de Papas.  Literally this translates as Potato Stew, but it wasn’t a stew.  Locro de Papas is one of the most popular dishes in Ecuador and the Andes.  It is wholesome peasant food that has as many variations as Americans have chili recipes.  At home I managed to reproduce the version that we fell in love with as best as I could.  A few ingredients make the soup special.  One ingredient which you may not have on your pantry shelves, but is easily obtained in the Mexican food isle, is annatto, also called ground anchiote.  It has a slight flavor and is used to color foods.  It is not essential for the success of this soup, but it is a nice addition. They use an oil that is colored with the anchiote seeds, but using the ground spice with olive oil works just fine.

    Cumin, annatto and cheese

    What is essential is ground cumin.  Some people can’t stand the smell of cumin, which is slightly reminiscent of dirty socks.  However the flavor carries this soup perfectly.  Another addition is sliced avocado.  Warm avocado is melt-in-your-mouth delicious.  Living in Fallbrook, the Avocado Capital of the United States, I have ready access to the many forms avocados can take.  Avocado fudge, ice cream and fried avocado slices are all standards of the yearly Avocado Festival.  Another addition to this soup which creates a wonderful texture as well as adding protein and calcium, is cubed non-melty cheese.  If you are non-dairy, then substitute with cubed firm tofu (which can be added even with the cheese).  The textures of the potatoes, cheese and avocado are heavenly.

    One of the standards of an Ecuadorian lunch or dinner is an introductory soup, usually vegetarian.  We ate some fantastic soups.  Instead of bread on one occasion, we were given a bowl of popcorn to sprinkle on our soup.  It was great!  I’ve included it here.

    Be sure to slice the potatoes no less than 1/4 inch thick; if any thinner they will fall apart when cooking.

    Thick potato slices won't fall apart

    The version in the hotel had lots of butter in it; I’ve replaced half of it with olive oil, but if you don’t do butter then use all olive oil.  The butter’s fat content makes the soup satisfying to the palate.

    Saute shallots in oil and butter

    This is a quick and easy soup.  Don’t cheat yourself out of a great meal by not making Locro de Papas!

    4.0 from 1 reviews
    Locro de Papas (Ecuadorian Potato Soup)
    Author: 
    Recipe type: Soup
    Prep time: 
    Cook time: 
    Total time: 
    Serves: 4
     
    This version of the favorite soup of South America is quick to make and very filling.
    Ingredients
    • 1 tablespoon olive oil
    • 1 tablespoon butter
    • 1 shallot, diced
    • 1 pound potatoes, peeled and sliced no less than ¼ inch thick
    • ½ tablespoon ground cumin
    • ½ tablespoon ground annatto
    • 6 cups vegetable broth
    • 1 avocado
    • 1 cup cubed non-melty mild cheese, such as Queso Fresco
    • 1 block firm tofu, cubed (optional)
    • Cilantro leaves for garnish (optional)
    • 1 cup freshly popped popcorn (optional)
    Instructions
    1. In a medium saucepan, heat olive oil and butter over medium-high heat.
    2. Add diced shallots and cook until translucent, about three minutes.
    3. Cut potato slices in half and add to pot.
    4. Stir in cumin and annatto.
    5. Pour in vegetable broth.
    6. Bring soup to a simmer and cook, uncovered, for about twenty minutes, until potatoes are just tender enough to part when pressed. Don't overcook!
    7. Ladle soup into wide shallow soup bowls.
    8. Add chunks of cheese and tofu (if using).
    9. Top with sliced avocado.
    10. Garnish with cilantro leaves and serve immediately.
    11. Provide bowls of popcorn alongside soup to add as topping (don't add it ahead of time, they become soggy instantly).

     

     

  • Animals,  Gardening adventures,  Humor,  Ponds,  Travel,  Vegetables

    Until Next Week….

    I’m about to do the drive from Fallbrook, CA (in San Diego County) to Corvallis, OR again.  Almost exactly a thousand miles.  I’ll be back home in six days (I’ll be blogging as I go, though!).  However, the day before a trip I get a little crazy.  I whip myself into a cleaning and organizing fury.  Part of it is that I like to come back to a clean house.  Part of it is that I have a lot of animals and I want to make sure that they are all as set up as possible with food, water and clean bedding, even though they’ll be taken care of on a daily basis while I’m gone.  Part of it is that I get a kick out of multi-tasking and coordinating, and I burn off a lot of pre-travel worry this way.  I shop and stock up on animal food, I do laundry, hauling wet sheets and rugs out to the clothes line and back in again. I cook, take out recyclables and trash, pack and blog. I soak and scrub cat and dog dishes, I sweep the walkway (why?  I don’t know.  It will be gunky by the time I get back), I clean out the last of the honey that is dripping from crushed comb and give the bucket to the bees to clean up.  (Straw on the bottom keeps the bees from becoming stuck in the honey and drowning.)

    Bees cleaning up honey

    I water everything. I wash the dogs and their bedding. I leave unnecessary notes.

    It is wise to keep out of my way on the day before a trip.

    Work will go on in the yard while I’m away.  I’ll tune in next week to find out the answers for….

    Will the lower pond be filled, and not look like green tea?

    Pond algae

    Will these palm trunks become a bridge?

    Bridge pilons

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Will these fancy new stairs made from cement chunks lead to something?

    New Steps

    Will the jasmine hedge still be blooming?

    Jasmine Hedge

     

     

     

     

     

    Will the giant sunflower ever look up?  Will the vining vegetables take over the property?

    Garden Growing

    Will whatever is eating the stairs leave any to walk on?

    Chewed Steps

     

    Will the subterranean irrigation lines be buried?

    Irrigation lines

     

    Will the kumquats ever get cuter? (Impossible.  Too fun a name, to say and to spell.  Go ahead, say it: “Kumquat, kumquat, kumquat.”  See?  Cute name for cute fruit.)

    Kumquats

     

     

     

     

    These and other questions will (in all probability) be answered next week.  Stay tuned for the answers… same bat time, same bat station.

     

  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Photos,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    “Who’s That Chewing on MY Step?” or, Garden Update June 1

    Hidden Treasure

    Many of the steps that were created out of the Washingtonia palm trees are doing just fine.  However, there are some that were squared off with a chainsaw and their whiteness and neatness really stood out on the hillside.  They stood out a little too well, apparently, because something is gnawing away at them!

    Chew Marks

    It can be either rats or bunnies, and I’ve only found bunny scat in the straw.  In defense of my nice stairs, I’ve sprayed them with Bitter Apple, which is a product used to spray on doctored pets to keep them from licking or chewing on bandages.

    Heart of Palm

    I spread the straw over the steps again.  I’ll see tomorrow what has happened.

    Cherries!

    Other finds around the garden are my first (and probably only) two cherries!  Cherries are not known to grow in our Zone 10 climate; however, there are a few hybrids that are supposed to be ‘low chill’.  Cherries are one of my favorite fruits, so I’m thrilled that this tree is giving it a go.

    Magnolia

    The magnolia trees are blooming, and a transplanted Blue Girl rose is much happier in the Blue Garden, which is also the Bee Garden.

    Blue Girl

    A vegetable garden is a stern taskmaster.  After all that waiting at the beginning of the year, plants are flourishing.  This is the best garden I’ve ever had.  After all that work building raised beds, lining them with aviary wire and filling them with good soil, it had better be good!

    Last Two Beds

    I have two more raised beds to level, line and fill.  I have more pumpkin seedlings up and I need the beds ready to plant.  I can’t believe it is June first already.

    Today I put up strings for the pickling cucumbers and the pinto beans to climb on.  Those two beds, which are the newest and which have the least amended soil, are still doing very well.

    Strung Up

    I also staked the three yellow tomato plants, and three ‘soup bean’ plants, as well as planting more of those beans by more stakes.

    Bean and Tomato Stakes

    I had no idea that fava beans grew up!  I mean, the beans don’t dangle like other beans do, but grow straight up, like huge fat caterpillars.  Crazy!  I also read where the young leaves are tasty so I tried one… then I ate several.  They are much more flavorful than pea shoots.

    Fava Beans

    Scarlet runner beans grow down, but are slightly fuzzy, which is a little creepy.  They can be eaten young, or let dry on the vine.

    Runner Beans are Fuzzy

    I planted a white and yellow sweet corn, now that the popcorn is well up.  I’ll wait a month to plant the full yellow sweet corn, not only to stagger harvests but because corn will cross-pollinate.  Meanwhile, I have my trusted rubber snake watching the bed.

    Corn snake

    This package contains carrots of various colors, so I planted some just for fun.  I’ve heard that some of the darker colored carrots aren’t that sweet, but I want proof.

    Crazy Carrots

     

     

     

     

     

     

    When spacing seeds for corn or other plants which need room, use your trowel as a guide.  It is about a foot long, and corn needs to be a foot by two feet apart.  Plant corn in blocks so that they can pollinate better; the pollen will drift off the tassels onto the silk of the neighboring corn.

    Trowel Ruler

    I also planted cinnamon basil, which has the most wonderful aroma.  You can use it in cooking, especially for sweets, but I just let it go to bloom, then cut some and set them in water in the house for the perfume.

    Cinnamon Basil

     

     

     

     

     

     

    This bed contains garlic, shallots, bush beans, tomatoes and basil, all of which are contending for sunlight.  The bed receives sun all day and the rows are planted south to north, so the plants won’t shade each other for any length of time.

    Full Bed

     

    The sunflower that was pouting last week has trouble staying awake this week.  Her heavy head just can’t be lifted.  Lesser goldfinches love to eat the leaves, leaving them skeletonized.

    Heavy Head

    Of course, the best thing that is growing in my garden is this volunteer melon, which appeared under the peas I just cut out, and now that it has found the light, so to speak, it has grown one and a half feet long and going strong, and has a flower!  But what is it?  A remnant from melons I planted in the past?  Seeds from the compost from melons I have eaten?  There’s nothing like a mystery!

    Volunteer Melon

     

     

  • Gardening adventures,  Permaculture and Edible Forest Gardening Adventures,  Vegetables

    Drip

    Lines layed out up the property

    The key to any garden is the availability of water.  Today I signed a contract to have a well drilled on my property to furnish irrigation and pond water.  The irrigation for the permaculture project, and for most of my other gardens, will be subterranean drip.  Yep, this is expensive.  However, it will pay off in long-term water bills, plant loss due to drought or the heavy salt that is found in our water (the well should pull from beneath the salt penetration), and the replacement of sprinkler heads, broken PVC pipe and connectors for which my dogs and tortoise seem to aim.

    Drip lines uncoiling

    As the plant guilds mature and roots and loam deepen, the less water I’ll need to provide for the gardens.  The system will be there for the drought months, and for future unknown circumstances.

    Where future plants will be

    I have the luxury of having a little inheiritance to spend on having others install this garden for me.  That is because I do not have the luxury of having available labor in the form of willing, available and capable family members, nor do I have the physical strength in my back or hands that I once had to do it all myself.  And I want it done NOW, so that I can play with it, enjoy it, plant and replant it, watch the habitat fill with animals, and show others what a success permaculture can be so they can practice it themselves.

    Irrigating the beans and vines

    My real thrill is in my veggie garden.  As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve had a garden most of the twelve years I’ve lived here, and have been foiled by bermuda grass and gophers.  I finally was able to nail together boards from an old bookshelf to make raised beds, then buy on sale some pre-made raised beds.  I’ve stapled aviary wire into the bottom, leveled them, filled them with a mixture of dirt, compost and whatever else that could fill those babies up.  I’ve used natural fertilizers and microbes this year to energize the soil, and ran PVC pipe to each bed with a riser and a split hose bib on each one.

    Double hose bibs

     

     

    Finally today I finished the drip system in each bed.  (Yey! Hurray! Whoopee!).  I’ve used drip irrigation before in the beds, with the long black soaker hoses perforated all over so that they ooze water.  They say that they can be buried, but the mud cakes onto the tubing and gums it up.  Also, to connect pieces you have to ram ends onto the cut ends which I have found really hard to do.  Then you have one configuration of the hose with not many options for change.  Ick!

    Old soaker hoses

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    I found another kind of drip hose (at WalMart) which is 75 feet of thin plastic tubing sheathed in a permiable nylon casing.

    Plastic tube inside a nylon sheath

    The hose is fitted with a male and a female hose end, and the whole thing rolls up.  Perfect!

    Flexible drip hose!

    What I wanted was to be able to lay out drip from each hose bib on each bed that could be rolled up without a fuss when I’m working on the bed.  I also wanted individual controls in the beds so that I’m not watering a bed that isn’t planted, or I can water half a bed and not the other half, or allow more water for crops such as melons and little water to crops such as quinoa… all at the same time!  Complete control!  Ease of use!  Water savings!  Ha!

    Instead of using both sides of the divided hose bib for each bed, at this time, I ran one line in each bed.  I can and probably will change that later which won’t be a problem, but I wanted to get these babies going!  Since my beds don’t need 75 feet of hose, I lay down the amount needed then cut the end, tying a knot in it to stop the flow of water.

    Tying off the end

    On the next section of hose I attached a female hose end, and moved onto the next bed.

    Attaching female hose ends

    It worked!  I had to adjust two of the hose bibs that leaked, but with my trusty Phillips screwdriver all went well.  I have two more raised bed frames that I bought to install, and I have hose enough for both of them left over.  I still have a sprained wrist (I’m really trying not to use it much, and wear a brace, but there is just so much to do!) so digging and leveling the ground for the beds is probably not a good thing for me to do right now, and I sure have a lot of weeding to do in the front yard (left handedly!), so the beds might wait.

    Quinoa doesn't want much water

    So I’ve conquered the gophers, and I’ve conquered the hand-watering and bad drip hose, but I am seeing bits of that darn Bermuda grass coming up in some of the beds.  I swear that that stuff could come up through anything.  I’ve seen it break apart asphalt, and also come out the top of a six-foot pipe.  Horrible, nasty stuff.  Fortunately the soil is so much better in my beds now, it is easier to root around and pull the stuff out from way down low.

    Anyway, that’s my drippy story for the day.  I’m immensely happy about my veggie garden, and slightly less panicky about the dry days cooking all the new plants in the permaculture garden if I’m not out there dragging hoses around with my bum wrist watering for several days.  And I didn’t talk about peas once.  Oops!

  • Recipes,  Soups,  Vegan,  Vegetables,  Vegetarian

    Taking the “Ew!” out of Tofu

    Working Tofu Magic

    I’ve been an ethical vegetarian for seventeen years, raising both my children without animal protein as well.  Believe you me, packaged vegetarian foods have come a looonng way in palatability.   There is a whole new world of packaging rife with misspellings and quotation marks, such as “chickn” and “bakon”, just to make sure that no hen or pig will sue the company for false representation.  Many vegetarian options were simply god-awful to eat; some still are.  It is still hard to find products that aren’t filled with pieces of red and green peppers (ick!), whose flavor permeate the rest of the food making it disgusting if it had been palatable at all in the beginning.

    There are wonderful meat substitutes that can vary a menu and add protein, and the ability to create mock meat has become an art and can be found in many restaurants, especially Thai or Chinese.   I order several times a year from May Wah in New York, who sells mock meats created in Taiwan.  Morningstar Farms makes wonderful standards such as fake bacon, sausage links and patties, chicken strips and meatless crumbles (like ground beef).

    A host of good pseudo-meat products

    When my daughter and I toured England four years ago, the popular vegetarian option on all the menus that year was mushroom risotto.  We ate quite a lot of mushroom risotto, as well as some very strange stuffed onions which were stuffed… with more onions.

    Although there are many interesting varieties of fake meats, the least expensive and easiest way to provide extra protein to your diet (other than beans, kale and dairy products, etc.) is to learn how to prepare tofu.

    Tofu is prepared soybean curd.  It comes either in a water bath tub which must be refrigerated or in asceptic pouches which can be stored at room temperature.  On the label you’ll see that it comes in ‘soft’, ‘firm’ and ‘extra firm’ for different uses.  Most beginners at eating tofu say that it has no flavor and it just soaks up the gravy and seasonings it is cooked with.  Not so.  Fresh tofu has a delicate, fresh flavor that is available to a palate that is not overly spoiled by too much salt and seasonings.

    Types of tofu

    I’ve grown to like the soft tofu as much as the firm, cooking it so that the outside has a crisp texture and the inside is smooth, and that is the recipe I’ll give to you shortly.  For those who want something chewier, there is a great trick to make tofu more meat-like.  Freeze it!  This works best with firm or extra-firm tofu that is in a water bath tub.  Freeze it, then thaw it out, press out the water, slice it however you want and throw it into whatever you are making.  It is much more like a sponge and has more texture.

    For fresh or thawed tofu, you should drain it.  Pressing it is easy and can be done while you are gathering the rest of the ingredients for your meal.  Just put a plate on top of a cake of tofu, which is on a cutting board or plate by a sink, and set a heavy can or two on top.

    Nice hat

    You’ll be amazed at how much water runs off.  If you happen to own a Japanese pickle press (you don’t?  Oh, you should!) it is really easy to press tofu.

    Say 'Pickle Press' ten times fast. Go!

    I bought mine at Green Apple Japanese Market in Oceanside for about five dollars.  The screw press holds the vegetables down into the brine, or acts as a torture device for tofu.  If you press thawed tofu, it’s texture becomes so spongy that it doesn’t easily fall apart and you can squish it down pretty far!  It’s fun!

    A simple way to prepare tofu is to press it for no less than five minutes, slice it, and pan fry it.

    Sliced tofu

    I use a combination of olive oil (because it is one of the most recommended foods that you can eat, and you should have about two tablespoons a day!), sesame oil for flavor, and a product called Bragg’s Amino Acids.  It is similar to soy sauce or tahini sauce, but is far less salty and very healthy, providing extra amino acids to your diet.  I buy it at health food stores such as Henry’s Marketplace.

    Tofu and his cooking buddies

    If you aren’t going to go run out and buy some right now (whyever not?  Pick up a pickle press while you’re out!) use a little tahini sauce, or very lite soy sauce.  As these sauces cook, the salt condenses and overpowers the flavor of the foods.  So, to one cake of sliced tofu, I put about two tablespoons olive oil, half a tablespoon sesame oil and one tablespoon Bragg’s Amino Acids in a frying pan and heat it to medium-high.  I mix them together to cover the bottom of the pan and set in the tofu slices.  The more moisture in the tofu, the more it will splatter, so I turn up the heat a little more after setting the slices in the pan.  I also use a splatter guard.

    Cook slices in pan with splatter screen

    The slices should sizzle.  Cook for about ten minutes, then turn them for another five.  They should be light brown.  Add them to vegetables, serve them seperately or top a bowl of noodle soup with them.  A varient on this recipe is to use extra-firm tofu, well drained, sliced into smaller pieces and cooked at a higher temperature for a little longer.  The pieces become crispy… mmmmm!

    You can add soft tofu into smoothies or puddings, or scramble them to make something that really doesn’t taste at all like eggs but can be very tasty as well as nutritious with the right seasonings.

    So don’t be afraid of your tofu.  Buy it as fresh as you can (there is a tofu maker in San Diego!) and play around with it.  Look for tofu that specifies non-GMO soybeans.  There are so many ways to prepare it, but this method is quick and simple for busy people, and very tasty, too!