Oven Roasted Caramelized Leeks
We had another abundant harvest of leeks. A full garden bed of 300 leeks is a bit much for just the two of us but it forces me to be more creative in my storage and cooking. They do store fresh for 3 to 4 weeks, washed and bagged in the refrigerator. I also slice...
Leek Harvest
It was 19 degrees today with a low of 2 predicted for tonight. I knew it was time to harvest the leeks before they froze into the ground. We've had a lot of below freezing temperatures, but I had the leeks well covered with a layer of agricultural fabric topped over...
Comfrey for Compost
Comfrey and Compost PilesI can't remember how comfrey (Symphytum officinale L.) got introduced into my garden, but it probably came from Geoff when he worked at Nokomis Gardens in East Troy, Wisconsin, about sixteen years ago. It's now firmly established just north...
Sweet Potato Peanut Stew With Herbed Dumplings
Noel harvested almost 80 pounds of sweet potatoes last month – another record crop for us from 18 starts. And guess what? We’re still eating sweet potatoes from last year’s harvest. I haven’t been cooking them often enough so we’re scrambling to find new ways to...
Giant Puffball Mushrooms
I found these puffballs in the grass along the edge of the woods two days ago. Giant puffballs, Calvatia gigantea, are edible but they have to be harvested and used while quite fresh. Once they start to dry and turn yellow and brown, they not only lose their...
Beet Green and Fruit Smoothie
I planted beets the last week of August for a late fall harvest. I had used old seed so I planted them thickly, but they still germinated heavily. So we're now thinning them and using the baby beets in salads, as a vegetable side, and in drinks. The greens are...
Fall Planting with Old Seeds and an Old Book
Last year I had a harvest of carrots and beets that continued into December. I used a low hoop tunnel to protect the crop from frosts and freezes and the results were great. (You can read about it here). I hope to do the same this year, but I took some big chances...
White Wine Vinegar Marinated Cucumbers
The cucumbers are prolific this year. Some of them hide themselves well under the nearby zucchini plant leaves so they tend to get bigger than the ideal size before they’re found. The larger cukes can get a little bitter so a pre-salting will draw that bitterness...
Pureed Zucchini Ginger Soup
As they say – a prolific zucchini plant is the mother of invention! We have just 2 zucchini plants. It’s hard to tell with the tangle of vines and leaves but you’d think there were a dozen plants in the garden. I’ve been sautéing them in various ways with different...
CobraHead Weeder and Cultivator Featured in New York Times
CobraHead garden tools received their most important single piece of publicity recently with an excellent mention in the New York Times. The article by Bob Tedeschi, who writes for the Times under the byline "The Pragmatist", was titled "Ergonomic Tools that Prune...
Making Native Bee Nesting Logs
Today I finally built some nesting logs for native bees. I got inspired by the frequent postings of Gail Eichelberger about native plants and native polinators on her blog Clay and Limestone. I then used some instructions from the Xerces Society (PDF), grabbed some...
Zesty Lime Grilled Zucchini
Ortolana di Faenza and Raven ZucchiniThis year we are growing two new (to us) varieties of zucchini compliments of Renee’s Garden. One is a dark green zucchini ‘Raven’ and the other is a pale green heirloom Italian zucchini ‘Ortolana di Faenza’. Both are delicious in...
Common Weeds in Strawberries
The strawberry harvest is over for this year. There are still a few small berries in the beds, but the days of having to go out morning and night to keep up, and being able to pick quarts at a time are finished. This year's harvest was good. I've done a reasonable...
Baked Sweet Potatoes and Asparagus Stir Fry
We still have asparagus coming up and lots of volunteer salad greens. While it’s great to have the greens they don’t quite fill you up by themselves. But wait, there’s more . . . sweet potatoes from the 2012 fall harvest. We still have half our last year’s harvest...
Hurray for the Volunteers!
Volunteer Salad Greens We're getting lots of volunteer lettuces and other salad greens this year. I'm transplanting some to the pea bed and elsewhere, but most we are just harvesting the whole plant where they are growing. I talked about letting salad greens bolt and...
Transplanting Strawberries
I try to keep three beds of strawberries in rotation and moving through the garden. Bed one contains the newly transplanted plants. Bed two holds one year old plants, and the third bed, two year old plants. New plants yield little, but the one and two year old...
Master Rosarian Endorses CobraHead
Dan Keil is the President of the Stephen Decatur Rose Society in Decatur, Illinois. He has let us know several times that he really likes the Cobrahead Weeder and Cultivator for weeding and maintaining his 460 roses. I'm not a rosarian, but I've learned that keeping...
Plenty of Compost
Compost solves everything! Well, not quite, but one can garden in compost alone and you cannot have too much. This year I'm way ahead. I've got a pile of ready to apply material (the smaller pile in the picture). And even though it's still too wet in the garden...
Braised Salmon with Mushrooms and Rice with Leeks
Here’s a quick salmon meal using leeks and corn frozen from last year's harvest. It's a great way to use up chopped and frozen leeks, but of course fresh leeks will work just as well. Start the rice first and it will be cooked and ready to go by the time everything...
Starting Seeds – Better Late Than Never
Were I growing vegetables for money, I'd make sure I got my seeds started on a very specific schedule. But as a casual home gardener, I don't have to worry much about getting everything exactly right. I'm just getting most of my seeds started now, and by the rules,...