Tomato Harvest

Today I picked another 3 pounds of tomatoes and 6 more ounces tomatillos.  The heat has been pretty challenging to the tomatoes this year, however I’ve still picked more than 15 pounds so far.  Tomatillos are more or less like a tiny green tomato with a husk.  Many great Mexican salsas are made with tomatillos.  Salsa Verde is one of my favorites for pork, chips or enchiladas.  Traditionally, the husk is removed and the tomatillos are roasted in a hot oven or pan with yellow onions and jalapenos.  When I make my Salsa Verde, I plan on grilling the trio for a little twist.  

As far as the tomatoes go, Roasted Tomato Sauce is perfect for Sara and I. It’s becoming one of my favorite ways of preserving the harvest. Fresh mint and basil from the backyard are added, along with sun-dried tomatoes, balsamic, garlic and olive oil. This sauce is great with some toasted or grilled bread.  It’s delicious when tossed into some orzo as a side or whole wheat spaghetti as an entree.  I’ve frozen the Roasted Tomato Sauce in the past.  This time, I plan on canning it.  I also plan on canning the Salsa Verde.  Friends and family beware. You may see some of these sauces at Christmas!

English Cucumber Bread and Butter Pickles

The cucumbers in the garden have been producing very well this year. Who doesn’t love eating fresh cucumbers with a touch of salt or in a salad? Once the fridge drawer starts getting filled by the pound, it’s time to make some pickles! 

The variety that I have growing this year is the Telegraph Improved Cucumber.  It’s an heirloom English variety that’s very tender, crisp and mild in flavor.  They can grow to 18” long.  A couple that I’ve picked from the garden weighed in at 13 oz each.  I have a few vines growing on a trellis. Cucumber and squash growing habits are similar in a couple of ways. If your cucumber vines are happy, they’ll keep you busy come harvest time. There’s a very short timeline between a perfectly ripe cucumber and an over ripe, unusable one. They also take up a lot of precious space if allowed to run on the ground. It’s definitely a more common practice to make pickles from smaller cucumbers.  The smaller “pickling” cucumbers contain more water, making them crunchier and better able to stand up to heating and pickling.  To make these refrigerator bread and butter pickles I allowed the pickling solution to cool before adding to the cucumbers and onions. Another helpful pointer is to soak the cucumbers and onions in ice water for a couple of hours before pickling.  Following is the recipe that I’ve added my own touch to.  I love the pickled onions, so it may seem that there’s a lot. A few days in the fridge is all that’s required to infuse the cucumbers and onions.  You’ll be enjoying homemade pickles in less than a week.  

3-4 English type cucumbers

1 large yellow onion

1 C white vinegar

½ C apple cider vinegar

1 ½ C sugar

1 ½ teaspoons mustard seeds

1 teaspoon whole allspice

2 bay leaves

1 teaspoon black peppercorns

½ teaspoon tumeric

¼ teaspoon cloves

1 teaspoon salt

(1) Slice cucumbers into ¼” disks and the onions into ¼” strips.  Make an ice bath in a large mixing bowl.  Add the cucumbers and onions to the ice bath and allow to soak for 2-3 hours.  

(2) Over medium heat, meld everything for the pickling liquid together, being sure that the sugar and salt are dissolved.  Set the liquid aside and cool to room temperature.

(3) Remove the cucumbers and onions from the ice bath and drain briefly in a colander.  Pack the cucumbers and onions in a glass jar.  Once the jar is filled, add the room temperature liquid.

(4) Allow to pickle in the fridge for at least 1 full day.  Enjoy for up to 2 months. 

Rosemary Focaccia

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not a good baker.  I’ve been able to make pies from scratch from the age of 6, but breads, cookies and cakes are my weak spot in the kitchen. This is certainly an area that I plan on improving.  It’s the exact science, measurements and all of the known and unknown variables of baking that can trip up any cook.  The other day I bought a 25# bag of bread flour.  One way or another, my baking skills are going to improve!

So what should I start with?  Well, the rosemary bush is always ready and willing to give some product to the kitchen, so Rosemary Focaccia it is.  Focaccia is an ideal bread for me.  It’s not too crunchy or hard.  It works great to make a sandwich.  Plus it’s strong enough to slice and dip or grill and top.  I looked over several recipes and this is the one that I went with for Trial #1.  I made two batches at once.  I figured if I was going through the routine, I might as well double the product for basically the same effort.  We had a family reunion coming up and I planned on taking some to share.  I made a spinach and white cheddar dip to go with it.  I sliced the bread into 3/4” slices, making it a great size for dipping.  Focaccia is also great with a simple dipping sauce of extra virgin, balsamic, garlic and herbs.  

There are plenty of good recipes online.  It would take me many frustrating trials to put together a recipe.  Here is the recipe that I used for this batch. 

http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/focaccia_bread_with_rosemary/

Homegrown, Homemade Chipotle Peppers

I finally moved ahead with something that I've been aiming to do for a couple of years now...make homemade Chipotles.  This pepper has grown leaps and bounds in popularity over the past few years.  Besides the burrito place, you can find Chipotle this and that pretty much everywhere you look.  Even McDonald's has Chipotle on its menu.  Well, it's at least called Chipotle.  Who knows what kind of ingredients actually flavor it?  Chipotle peppers are smoked Jalapenos.  if you are a pepper lover and grower, it seems that you end up with more Jalapenos than you know what to do with by the end of summer.  Sure you can always freeze them.  Salsa is great to, but how about some homemade Chipotles!  If  you have smoker, then all ya need are some jalapenos and wood chips.

I smoked ribs and bbq for the 4th of July and it just so happened that the first dozen or so Jalapenos were mature enough to pick from the backyard.  With these two events coinciding, the perfect time to make homemade chipotles was upon me.  I placed them on a wire rack and laid the smoke to them.  They absorbed a cloud of Hickory for about 4 hours and were left in the low heat of the smoker for nearly 24 more.  As with pretty much anything else that you smoke, you want to be sure that the heat does not become an issue.  Remember  to smoke them low and slow.  If your smoker climbs above much more than 200, you'll end up cooking and possibly burning the Chipotles.  The great thing is that once the smoker is up and running, there is not any other prep work.  Traditionally the peppers are allowed to fully mature and ripen to their red color.  The Jalapenos in the backyard had reached a decent size, So into the smoke they went.  This picture shows 4 different phases of the chipotle; Green Jalapeno, Chipotle, grinding in the mortar and pestle and finally chipotle powder.  If you want to purchase Chipotles, you will most likely find them canned in a tomato sauce called Adobo.  These dried versions will work great for rehydrating and blending into bbq sauce, soup and who knows what else.

The Long Awaited Olive Tree!

I've added some really cool plants to the garden this year.  Kumquat, Blood Orange, Cape Gooseberries and even a tea plant.  It's been exciting to pick them out and to see them become established and productive in the backyard.  The newest addition to our backyard garden is a Mission Olive tree.  An olive tree is definitely new territory for me.  Until a year or two ago, I had never even seen an olive tree in person. Before receiving the Mission Olive, I had only seen a couple of tiny trees that weren't much bigger than a small twig.  The newest addition to the backyard stands a little more than 5 feet tall.   The trunk is very flimsy.  If not for the bamboo and landscaping tape for stabilization, this tree would barely stand on its own.  From what I've read, olives require well drained soil.  Aside from that, they're not real picky.  They're commonly planted on hillsides where grapes won't grow.  If all goes well it should begin producing olives in 2 years. Unfortunately, I won't be sampling out any homegrown olive oil for quite some time. approximately 40# of olives are required to produce one gallon of olive oil!

4 Carrots, 4 Basils

For at the least the first 25 years of my life, I probably never had a side dish of cooked carrots prepared with anything other than a little butter, salt and sugar.  That's simply how my mom and grandmothers made them.  Carrots are great that way.  A little butter never hurts and the fact that mom or grandmother cooked them, makes them even better.

Over the past few years, some of my favorite ways to cook carrots range from roasted with coriander or tossed in chopped rosemary and grilled.  Recently, I've come to enjoy the combination of fresh basil and carrot.  The heirloom carrots that I pulled from the garden the other day were perfect for this preparation.  After the carrots were cleaned,  I cut the larger ones in half.  I boiled those about 3 minutes, then added the baby carrots for a couple more minutes until all were al dente.  I drained them, then tossed them with extra virgin olive oil, basil, honey, white pepper and kosher salt.  The white pepper has a milder, less spicy flavor, than black pepper.  Did you know that black peppercorns are ripened white peppercorns?  We have 4 different types of basil in the backyard, so a couple of leaves from each were all that was needed.  I think the purple basil looks great in contrast to the carrots. 4 fresh pulled heirloom carrot varieties and 4 fresh basils...Isn't summer great!

Underground Rainbow

About a month ago I was curious to see how the carrots were growing in the garden.  I yanked up a few to quickly realize that it would still be awhile before they would be big enough to use.  Today I decided to give it another whirl and I found some pretty nice looking carrots. Some of the smaller ones came from thinning out the rows.  No problem though, they're the true baby carrot and taste great!

I purchased these seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.  Some of the names are Atomic Red, Amarillo and Tonda di Paragi. There's even a white variety from Holland that looks a lot like  a parsnip.  I bought several different varieties.  They remind me of tomatoes in that, once you start looking into the heirloom varieties there's a world of carrots to be enjoyed.  The carrot is believed to have originated in Afghanistan or Iran.  It seems to be the consensus that carrots were originally purple or yellow.  The orange version that we know today only emerged a few hundred years ago in the Netherlands.

Another 6 oz towards my goal of 100# of food grown for the year!

Rosemary Lemonade

We've all heard of raspberry lemonade, maybe strawberry lemonade, but Rosemary lemonade?  Yep, that's right!  Rosemary and lemon work great together to flavor poultry and pork dishes.  With that thought in mind, the idea doesn't seem so far fetched.  Rosemary is one of the first plants that I suggest to have in your garden.  It's an evergreen that provides fresh herbs year round.  Once established, you'll be cutting pounds of fresh rosemary every year.

Don't be scared by my track record with this plant! I tried growing it in the mountains. I later figured out, after a couple of failed attempts, that the winter is just too cold for it.  The bush that I have in the backyard has been great.  A few years ago, somebody gave me a Christmas tree shaped rosemary bush.  After Christmas and New Years had passed, I dug a hole outside my sister's condo and set the little guy out into the January cold.  I wasn't so sure that it would survive.  After all, i was planting it in January! When spring rolled around, the little rosemary Christmas tree wasn't only surviving, but thriving. When my wife and I moved into our house, one of the first orders of business for the backyard was to transplant the young rosemary.  It became the inaugural member and anchor of my little herb garden.  I've cut it year round since then, for roasted potatoes, lamb dishes, chicken pot pie and now lemonade!

This is a recipe that you can put as much or little effort into and it will still turn out delicious.  I kept it very simple the other day by buying Simply Lemonade.  I only had to  add the rosemary to it.  You may have a homemade lemonade recipe that will work great as well.

2 quarts lemonade

4 sprigs of rosemary

1. Bruise the rosemary sprigs. This allows them to infuse the lemonade much better. I like to use a mortar from our mortar and pestle set. 
2. After bruising the rosemary sprigs, place them into the lemonade. 
3. Allow to infuse for at least 4 hours in the refrigerator.  
4. Serve over ice.  Use a rosemary sprig and lemon wedge as a garnish if you would like. 

Good, Better and Best!

Last week, the first 3 tomatoes of the season were picked from the backyard.  I initially thought that I would slice them up and drizzle a bit of olive oil and toss some fresh basil their way.  Maybe a dash of balsamic?  What a quick, fresh and simple way to enjoy ripe tomatoes from the garden!  I let our niece pick them a couple of days early, which was no problem.  They only needed a little more time in the kitchen window to finish ripening.  I later realized I shouldn't do anything except run them to Huntersville to share them with the person who would appreciate them most, my Granny.

Granny has always loved fresh tomatoes.  No recipe, aged balsamic or extra virgin olive oil is required.  Ripe tomato, salt and pepper are all that she needs.  She was really tired when Sara and I stopped by, but when I sliced them up and sprinkled on salt and pepper, I had her attention.  I fed her a few slices and asked her how they were.  She answered, "good, better and best."  You don't need to know much about "good, better and best" except that when she uses it, all is good.  This is one of her many, many sayings that she still has at the tip of her tongue at the age of 94.  Even though I had a simple idea in mind to enjoy the first homegrown tomatoes, there was one even simpler.  It  required half the ingredients and preparation, but I'm absolutely sure it produced 10 times the joy.  Keep in mind that sometimes for "good, better and best" moments, no recipe is required.

Forbidden Rice and Orzo Salad with Herb Garden Vinaigrette

I picked up a bag of forbidden rice a few weeks ago and have been wondering what to do with it every since then.  This black rice is often called "Forbidden Rice" because at one point it was considered the emperor's rice and forbidden to anyone else.  The great news is that it's not a glutinous rice.  I am definitely not the one to call on when it comes to cooking rice!  I actually bought a rice cooker awhile back just for that reason.  With the Forbidden Rice not being glutinous, you're much less likely to end up with a sticky mess when cooking it.  Orzo is a small rice shaped pasta.  I think that the pasta texture of the orzo and the firmer, grainy texture of the Forbidden Rice are great together.

As the title suggests, the vinaigrette gets the whole herb garden thrown at it.  I made this salad last night and used a mixture of purple basil, basil, oregano, thyme, chives and mint.  The great thing with an herb vinaigrette is that you can pick and choose the herbs based off of what's available.  This doesn't quite mean that all herbs will work together.  When picking herbs for this recipe stick with the sweeter, less polarizing flavors such as the basils, thymes, mints and parsleys.  A touch of  oregano or chives mixed in will add a little extra depth to the vinaigrette.  Those stronger flavors to keep aside for other recipes include, rosemary, dill and sage.

This salad mixes fresh and dried in the herbs, onion and bell peppers against the raisins and pecans.  There's also the contrasts of sweet and acidic, and the differences in texture that I mentioned early with the rice and orzo.  It keeps well in the refrigerator for 4 or 5 days and tastes better on the day after making it.  Enjoy!

1 cup Orzo
3/4 cup Forbidden Rice (black Rice)
1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
1/2 red bell pepper
1/2 yellow bell pepper, finely chopped
1/4 cup chopped pecans, finely chopped
1/2 cup raisins, your choice

For The Vinaigrette

1/2 cup red wine vinegar
3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/4 cup lightly packed mixed herbs of your choice, finely chopped

(1) Whisk all ingredients together for the vinaigrette in a mixing bowl.

(2) Cook orzo and forbidden rice in separate pots according to cooking instructions.  When each are cooked, drain and rinse with cold water to cool.  Not cooling quickly will cause both to overcook and soak up the vinaigrette too quickly.

(3) Drain the rice and orzo well. Mix with the onion, bell peppers, raisins and pecans.  Add vinaigrette and fold together with a spatula.  Refrigerate and enjoy.

The Reliable Swiss Chard

Swiss Chard was a new addition to the garden this year and I have to say I'm glad that I discovered it! Swiss Chard is a member of the beet family.  Beets are one of the few foods that I do not enjoy eating, however swiss chard is great.  If you like other greens, you will probably like it as well.  It's a very good source of Vitamin K, which is often called the clotting vitamin.  WIthout Vitamin K our blood would not clot.

Three different types of chard are growing happily in the backyard; "bright Lights",  "Fordhook", and "Rhubard Chard."  I picked up the plants at the farmer's market in early April. After getting established, they've been very reliable and productive.  When I eat the red stemmed and veined "Rhubarb Chard" I taste a hint of beet.  When all varieties are cooked together, that slight beet flavor is no problem at all.  I take cuttings about once every 10 days.  So far, i've harvested just over 3 pounds.  The plants are also decorative with their rich green leaves and a rainbow of stalks.

Swiss Chard can be used in a variety of preparations, but I've only tried sauteing it so far.  Here is a quick and easy 2 serving recipe that I've put together for you to try.   It's very similar to a classic broccoli raab saute. A lot of recipes call for the stalks to be cooked separately since they are much thicker and stronger.  I usually cook stalks and leaves together, which cuts out the step of adding them separately.  Slicing the stalks 1/4" or so allows them to cook evenly with the greens.  By growing swiss chard in the backyard, you can cut it before grows as large as found in the grocery store.  This also helps with the tenderness of the stems.  Let me know what you think!

6 oz swiss chard, washed, rough chopped, stems sliced 1/4"
2 tablespoons, extra virgin olive oil
2-3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1/8 cup, Marcona Almonds OR 2 tablespoons pine nuts
pinch (the size depending on how spicy you like it) crushed red pepper
pinch kosher salt
pinch black pepper
2 tablespoons, red wine vinegar

(1) Over medium heat, cook extra virgin, sliced garlic and nuts.

(2) Once the garlic begins to brown, add the swiss chard, kosher salt, black pepper and crushed red pepper.  Toss together or stir with tongs, mixing well.

(3) Cover and allow to cook until the leaves have wilted and the stems have softened.  This usually takes about 5 minutes.  Be sure to stir a couple of times while it cooks.

(4) Add red wine vinegar and evaporate most of the liquid.  That's it!  Serve and enjoy!

I found it!

A few weeks ago when browsing over some gardening and nursery websites, a light went off in my head.  Why not grow our own tea?  I remembered reading awhile back about a tea plantation in Charleston, SC.  If it can grow in Charleston, why not Charlotte?  I couldn't remember ever hearing about or running across this "tea plant." I found out that it was a type of Camellia; Camellia Senensis to be exact.  This single plant is pretty much responsible for all of the common teas! Young leaves are plucked and the treatment and curing from there determines the type of tea.  Steeping just after picking produces white tea.  Drying and steeping produces green tea.  Bruising the leaves causes oxidation to take place.  When these bruised leaves are dried and steeped, black tea is produced.

After looking over a few websites that specialize in Camellias, I was tempted to order a couple, but I had some reservations.  It's the middle of June, so how would it survive the shipping?  How mature and what size would it be?  And the question I have with all my purchases, how long are we talking before it starts producing?

With all of those questions on my mind, I decided to search for a plant at a local garden center.  I would know the size of the plant, that the plant was healthy and I could talk to an employee regarding best practices for caring for it.  The search was on. Well, let's say the search might have been on, but it wasn't a very productive one. Garden Center after garden center knew nothing about it.  Some did, but had none in stock and didn't know where to find it. I lost count of how many nurseries I called, stopped by and looked at on-line.  I honestly think that it was over 30!  This morning I continued calling Charlotte area nurseries and the first try was a winner!  The employee told me that they had one left.  I asked him to stick it to the side and I would be right down to pick it up.

Just as I had hoped, he was able to tell me quite a bit about my newest addition to the garden.  It should be placed in a well drained area.  "Don't think that you're doing it any favors by watering too often", he told me. When it blooms, it produces small berries.  If you have ever heard of Teaberry gum, the flavor is from these same tea berries.  The Camellia will survive the winter, however it should be placed in a somewhat protected area.

Excited with this new information, I gladly paid for my "Tea Plant" and some Holly Tone fertilizer to make it happy since it likes acidic soil.  I can't wait to provide future updates on my latest backyard addition and my tea making adventures!

Romas beginning to ripen...

At last count, this Roma Tomato plant had 47 tomatoes set on it! I usually don't buy more mature plants, because I find $5 plus for a single plant to be a head scratcher.  At some home improvement centers, I've even seen single plants over the $10 threshold.  I purchased this plant at the farmers market for $3, so the value was there.  Some of the best advice that I would give to anyone, would be to check out your local Farmers Market first.  For some, it may be a routine. but for others, you may have never thought about it.  I have admit that it was only 4 or 5 years ago when I started visiting the Farmers Markets.  Believe me when I say that I have definitely made up for lost time since then! We have a couple of outstanding markets in North Carolina.  I especially enjoy conversing with the older farmers. These are true professionals who have seen 40, 50 or even 60 growing seasons.  Just imagine the wealth of information that they have to share!

This plant seems to be 3-4 weeks ahead of the smaller plants that I bought in 4 and 6 pack trays.  I gave in and let our niece pick a few even though they weren't quite ripe enough yet.  Those 5 year olds are tricky!  What will I make first? I believe these 3 are destined to be paired with a few leaves of the neighboring basil, some balsamic and extra virgin olive oil.  When cooking gets too complicated, getting back to the simple, pure and fresh ingredients is all it takes.  So for the first tomatoes from the backyard this year, that is where I will begin.