Waiting for Vegetables

Here in my third trimester of pregnancy and deadline crutch time at work preparing for maternity leave, I've gotten a bit behind the ball again as far as the blog is concerned. This does not mean I've had no content. A lot has happened. Many things have been growing, baking, cooking, and knitted. In addition, there has been home demolition and much washing of hand-me-down baby clothes in preparation for newborn, who needs both things to wear and a room in which to put them.

So, at the time that these photos were taken, these beautiful lilies were growing right beside my front door, looking ever-so-much like cartoon flowers and not really like real flowers at all:

And by now, due to drought and changes in weather from cool to hot to cool again, the petals have all fallen and the lilies are just weird stems with nothing attached to them, just standing there awkwardly to greet any visitors that happen by.

Likewise, the zucchini, which at the time this was taken had yet to sprout a stinking thing, have exploded in vegetable goodness.

We have no less than seven zukes in the crisper drawer of our fridge now, some of them too large to do anything with but spread and bake. Then, there is the lettuce, which we just planted too much of in our excitement to have a legit garden. I have gifted empty ice cream tubs full of the stuff to various loved ones and still, it grows. Which I'm not really complaining about. At least something is growing back there.

Because that sums up everything the garden has to offer right now, here in mid-August, with autumn nipping at our exposed arms in their short sleeves. There is proof that action is happening, but little fruits from our labor to show. The daikon radishes sprout these lovely flowers but are not fully grown yet.

The kohlrabi is nearing picked size but not quite there yet.

And the tomatoes, despite three tiny red ones, are just a see of green that won't ripen no matter what.

The eggplants and peppers have flowers but no fruit. The broccoli and okra are large but no veggies. Then there are the tomatillos. They have all these little husks, but when I fondle them, alas there's nothing yet growing inside.

This waiting game is has gone all summer long and I'm ready for produce.

Separating the Seedlings

Memorial day has come and gone and that can only mean one thing: it's time to plant the garden. Unfortunately, our garden isn't quite ready for planting. After a week of straight rain, plus a long weekend visiting family, there hasn't been enough time quite yet to get the sod up and the dirt tilled. It is getting there though. The space in the back yard is marked off and almost half of that space is now sodless.

(Ignore the loose piece of fence there. The backyard is a work in progress.)

So far, I can say that the whole gardening from seed idea seems to be a success. I have separated most of the seedlings. I say "most" because I ran out of little pots to put them in before I even finished with the tomatoes and I started with the tomatoes. The finally tally for tomato seedlings is as follows: 4 Bloody Butcher tomatoes, 7 Abe Lincoln tomatoes, 8 Purple Cherokee tomatoes, and 7 Big Red tomatoes. That makes for 26 tomato plants if all of them survive until the garden is ready to be planted. This, of course, does not include the additional 8 purple tomatillo seedlings.

Upon seeing what we were in for, I sent my husband out to a home improvement store to try to find more little pots, which he did not find. In lieu of those, he brought home a package of blue Solo cups. He then drilled holes into the bottom of each cup and filled them with dirt for me. With these, I managed to get the eggplant seedlings, 16 total, (a mix of Shooting Stars and Black Beauty and I can't tell how many of each because I can't tell the seedlings apart) separated, as well as the 10 Romanesco broccoli seedlings and most of the 9 kohlrabi seedlings (though I may have the two mixed up, as they look very similar as seedlings). By the 19 mixed bell pepper seedlings, I was using little starter pots from last year and doubling each plant. Finally, I just ran out and left them in their original starter containers.

(The one on the right is a lone tomato seedling.)

Those plants in the smaller containers are clearly not fairing as well as the plants in the cups or the updated pots. Since returning from Michigan after Memorial day, though, all the plants grew significantly in size.

The swiss chard and blue kale seedlings, being cold weather tolerant, I planted in the front bed with the herbs from last year, spinach, raddichio, and cold weather lettuce. There are about 5 swiss chard seedlings and roughly 7 kale seedlings at present. They aren't getting quite as tall as the seedlings still under nightly porch protection but they seem to still be alive thus far. And that's something. The raddichio, however, looks like it might not sprout for the most part, due to mole interference.

Neither the lavender nor the rosemary sprouted at all. We have since purchased four nice-sized pots for the various herbs, so, unlike last year, I can bring them in when the weather turns cold. The  sage and half of the thyme seedlings went in one pot, while the rest of the thyme went in a pot with the rest of the rosemary seeds I'm really hoping at least one takes off this time. If not, I guess I'll have to go buy a starter plant from the local greenhouse. In the other two pots, I put seeds for the parsley and basil in one and seeds for oregano and lemon balm in another. Some green is starting to come up from the seeds in the herb pots but I can't tell what yet. I do know that there is no luck with the rosemary seeds yet. I gather it is not an easy herb to grow in a pot, let alone grow from seed. Time shall tell.

The lavender, as well as the other seeds, including beets, carrots, parsnips, daikon radish, zucchini, butternut squash, chamomile, red lettuce, Black Seeded Simpson lettuce, okra, two varieties of burpless cucumbers, and Early White Bush Scallop squash, will have to wait for the weekend. Hopefully the back garden is ready by then and I'll finally have time to plant the lavender and chamomile in the front somewhere.

And if all those tomato plants live, I might be looking for new homes for some of them. Twenty six tomato plants seems like a few too many for one small family garden. Also this columbine is totally out of control:

Kohlrabi and Kale, the K Vegetables

The boy got Scattergories for Christmas. It's a board game I used to play with my siblings all the time when we were kids. There is a list of items and a 20-sided die filled with the letters of the alphabet. Then, you roll the dice, it lands on a letter, and everyone has to think of a word for each list item that starts with that given letter. We've been playing it all week, and it's just as fun as I remembered it.

Well, the last few weeks of food in this house could easily fill up a list of words for vegetables that start with the letter K. The weekend before Christmas, my husband and I happened upon a lovely purple ornamental kale at the supermarket. It was bright and crisp and looking at it, I knew what I needed to do. I bought the kale and delightedly took it home to make some delicious, homemade lentil soup.

Lentil soup is one of my favorite things, especially with some french fried onions floating on the top and a handful of shredded cheese melting into the broth. Thus, while I was working my last day before my work winter break (which lasts from Christmas Eve to New Years Day), the husband took my recipe and made lentil soup with a bag of dried lentils and the purple kale. Or rather, he was supposed to make soup.

Having left the soup to boil down too long (the man is just not a soup fan), he created something slightly more dense than a stew, but it still tasted lovely. Thus, it went into a big Tupperware container and I served it to myself as gravy on my Christmas whipped potatoes, for the much needed protein I, as a veggie, don't get from the Christmas turkey (my family doesn't have Christmas ham, as my sister, having puked up ham with a case of childhood flu, refuses to eat most pork products).

Sorry I was too busy eating it to take a Lentil soup picture. Besides, it was so thick, it didn't really look like soup anyway.

Lentil Soup with Purple Kale
What you need:
olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 stalk of celery, chopped
1 large carrot, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 1/4 c dried lentils
6 c worth of vegetable stock
1 T soy sauce
One bunch of purple kale, minus the stems, chopped

1. Stir fry the onion, celery, carrot, and garlic for about 10 minutes in the bottom of a large pot.
2. Add the lentils, stock, and soy sauce to the pot and bring to boil. Then, cover and simmer for an hour or two.
3. When the lentils are thoroughly cooked, bring back to boil and add kale to pot. Let boil for several minutes until the kale is soft.

When the dog bites, when the bee stings, when I'm feeling sad, I just need some lentil soup. And really, it only gets cheerier with those flashes of purple. The lentil soup was pretty to look at, but it's also packed with flavor from the garlic, lentils, and stock. Of course, I,  being the lentil soup lover I am, knew it wouldn't disappoint.

The big shock of the pre-Christmas season was the Kohlrabi Risotto recipe the husband found on the New York Times website. The ten-year-old scarfed this stuff down, even after hearing the word "Kohlrabi," which is a miracle in itself. We subbed in apple cider vinegar for the wine and brown rice for the arborio, but stayed fairly faithful to the original recipe otherwise.

Kohlrabi is a rather mild root vegetable, with a slight tang to it that really contrasted nicely with the slightly sweet taste of the Parmesan cheese. It made for a complex meal that didn't feel overbearing. Both meals were a big success and left us with plenty of leftovers to skimp on meal-planning for the rest of their respective weeks (Kohlrabi, the week before Christmas and lentil soup, the week of). This left more time for such things as Scattergories and reading the new Russell Banks and George Saunders.

There were just no downsides, really.