I See Red in My Harvest Basket
The strawberries are in full swing here at Chiot’s Run. We’ve been picking them every day, getting a quart or two each time. Strawberries are one of those things that signify the beginning of summer here in NE Ohio. You know when the local strawberries are ripe summer is finally here.
I’m hoping to get a strawberry pie made next week. I may freeze a few later in the season to enjoy in muffins this winter. I think I’m one of the few people that doesn’t make strawberry jam. I prefer elderberry, blackberry or black raspberry.
Our favorite way to enjoy homegrown strawberries is in strawberry shortcake. Not those spongy sweet discs you buy at the store, we make lightly sweetened biscuits flecked with crystallized ginger for our shortcakes (recipe in comment section below). We crumble some shortcake in a bowl and top it with macerated strawberries (you know cut, sprinkled with sugar and chilled for an hour or so to produce the syrupy sweetness). Then we pour some raw milk on top and dig in. Such a wonderful meal on a hot day!
What’s your favorite way to eat strawberries?
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First Harvest of 2010 Seeds Planted
I harvest my first vegetables from the garden yesterday of seeds that I planted this spring. We’ve been eating lettuce, spinach and a few other items from the garden for a month or two, but those were all planted last year or are perennials. I sowed some ‘Pink Beauty’ radishes and arugula on March 17 in the cold frame.
I’ve been watching them bulb up and finally I decided to pick a few yesterday for an afternoon snack. It’s been six weeks since I planted them.
I have been planting radishes every 3 weeks in hopes of having a nice harvest of them constantly this spring. I’ll be harvesting the arugula soon, I’m super excited about this as it’s my favorite green.
Have you harvested any veggies from seeds you planted this spring?
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Garden Harvests
I forgot to mention a few weeks ago when I harvested my first salad from the garden. My spinach that I tried to overwinter didn’t make it so I wasn’t harvesting in February like I was last year. Last year my first harvest was in February, this year it was over a month later on March 17.
I harvested a salad of mache (corn salad), dandelion greens and garlic mustard. The funny thing is that I didn’t plant any of these. The mache seeded itself from a few plants that went to seed last spring. It’s growing around the edges of the raised beds and in the walkways around the raised beds. It overwintered without any protection whatsoever in the garden.
The garlic mustard is an invasive weed that we have lots of, good thing it’s edible! And dandelions, well we all have those, might as well eat them, they’re super healthy. We really loves salads, so we’ve been enjoying a few each week thanks to all of our “wild” plants. There’s nothing better than eating things you didn’t plant!
One of the things I really want to work on this year is winter gardening. I am currently reading Eliot Coleman’s newest book The Winter Harvest Handbook: Year Round Vegetable Production Using Deep Organic Techniques and Unheated Greenhouses. I’m hoping to use some of his techniques and have a nice harvest of greens throughout the winter.
Are you harvesting anything yet? Do you practice any cold weather techniques?
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Harvesting Yukon Gold Potatoes
On October 6, I harvested my potatoes my from raised potato bed (read this blog post to see how I planted my potatoes). When harvested the first plant, I was disappointed because I only found a few small potatoes.
There were a few medium sized potatoes at the top of the box and none in the middle. By the time I got to the bottom of the box I was imagining that I’d end up with only a few more potatoes than I had planted back in early summer. I struck gold however with the second plant I dug up, there was a nice batch of potatoes with a few fairly large ones.
I actually ended up with a decent harvest (11 pounds), especially considering that Yukon Gold potatoes aren’t supposed to be heavy producers. Only 6 of my seed potatoes produced a decent crop of potatoes, and they were all on one side of the box. I think that lack of sun on the one side was probably the reason for the absence of potatoes. I’m sure if I had great garden soil and a lot of sunshine I could do much better. But we all have to deal with the gardens we have, so I’m happy with my harvest.
We enjoyed a few of the potatoes a few nights later and were particularly delicious; we simply cut them into small bits and fried them in a little bacon grease and enjoyed them with a side of farm fresh eggs. The rest of them are in the basement in a box waiting for other delicious meals, I’m considering a hearty potato soup next.
What’s your favorite way to enjoy potatoes?
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Strawberry Popcorn Harvest
I wrote about harvesting my popcorn last week. Popcorn has to be dried to about 13%-16% moisture for the best popping. I set the little ears of corn out in the sun for a few days and on Sunday we had some time to go out and get them ready to go into the oven for their final drying.
After spending the afternoon in the sun, the ears were brought in and put in the oven set at 100 for further drying. I’ll keep drying it until the kernels start to fall off of the cobs, then I’ll pop them all off and store them in a jar. I can’t wait to pop some!!!
It is the most beautiful popcorn, the kernels are ruby red and the ears are shaped like strawberries, it’s almost too pretty to eat. The seeds are from Botanical Interests if you’d like to grow them in your garden.
I haven’t weighed the popcorn yet, I figured I’d wait until it all came off the cob (I figured it’s a more realistic total since that’s the part we’ll be eating). I’m going to save 20-30 kernels off a few of the best ears for future planting. I’m not sure if I’ll grow this kind of popcorn again next or another kind, or perhaps sweet corn to eat off the cob.
Have you grown any ornamental edibles?
Popcorn update, in 2011 we grew a different kind which was tasty as well, here’s my post about our 2011 popcorn harvest
