Planting for Next Year
I love garlic because you plant it in the fall and harvest the following summer. It’s in the ground for quite a while, but it’s nice to know it’s there in the deepest part of winter. As soon as spring arrives it pops out of the ground and gives you hope that the garden will flourish for another year.
The past couple years I’ve been able to save my own seed garlic, which can really save you a bundle! Out of the 10 or so varieties I used to grow, I’ve narrowed it down to five of my favorites. ‘Music’ is a real winner in my garden, I keep thinking of only planting that variety. It produces HUGE heads with giant cloves. I like that you only have to peel one instead of a few when you’re cooking.
Yesterday, I planted about 100 garlic cloves and a small amount of potato onions. My garlic is planted 6 inches apart in a big row with 12 inches between the individual rows. I plant four rows wide with walkways on either side. I have found this to be perfect spacing for garlic, they produce very well and I have less area to weed.
Do you grow garlic in your garden? Do you have a favorite variety?
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Quote of the Day: Pantry
“Winter was nearly here; the foraging was over, the garden harvested, the preserving done. The pantry shelves bulged with sacks of nuts, heaps of squash, rows of potatoes, jars of dried tomatoes, peaches, and apricot, bowls of dried mushrooms, wheels of cheese, and baskets of apples. Braids of onions and garlic and strings of dried fish hung from the ceiling; bags of flour and beans, barrels of salt cured beef and salt fish, ands tone jars of sauerkraut stood on the floor. I counted over my hoard like a squirrel reckoning nuts, and felt soothed by our abundance. No matter what else happened, we would neither starve nor go hungry.”
Diana Gabaldon in Drums of Autumn (Outlander)
I’ve been reading the ‘Outlander’ series. This weekend I happened to be reading while canning applesauce and I read this passage. I had to smile to myself, because it’s so true!
My root cellar is filled with onions and potatoes, there’s garlic in the basement, the freezer is filled with fruit, vegetables and meat, the pantry is filled with onion braids, dried apples, maple syrup, and all manner of food tucked into jars. It’s a wonderful feeling being soothed by abundance because of the hard work you put in over the summer.
Do you manage to grow enough to preserve or just enough to eat fresh in season?
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Friday Favorite: Preserving the Harvest
Our apple trees are loaded with fruit this year, there are so many we could never eat/use/preserve them all. Luckily, we have friends that can use some and they have been. We’ve been eating them out of hand and I’ve been making applesauce and dried apple slices. We’re hoping to make cider next weekend as well.
One of the things I love about dried apples is that they store in the pantry, there’s not much work involved in prepping them. I simply core and slice each apple into 8 sections, yes I leave the peels on. They are layered onto racks in my oven and set to dry at 150 degrees until dry and leather, usually 6-8 hours depending on how full the oven is.
I love using my oven as to dry things because it fits so much more than a dehydrator. A few years ago, I purchased extra racks so I could fill it completely. This batch produced 3 half gallon jars filled with dried apple slices. Mr Chiots will certainly appreciate them for delicious and healthy treats during the winter. I’m not a huge fan of dried apples, well of apples in general. I do love dried pears however, which reminds me I need to read up on pears this winter because I’ll be planting pear trees in the spring.
Do you dehydrate any fruit? What’s your favorite.
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Good Morning
Our front door isn’t very becoming, in fact, I’m always trying to think of ways to kind of hide it or cover it up. This year, I decided a climbing vine would be perfect. I had a pack of morning glory seeds and they were perfect, though they are a heat loving vine so they took a LONG time to get going. Perhaps something that can take the cold would be a better option. Something perennial would be even better, but I don’t want to make that much of a commitment yet.
I quite like having something scrambling up over the door and providing some color and distraction. I’m thinking that next year I’m going to try the Firecracker vine (Ipomoea lobata), I even picked up seed recently. There’s a native wisteria in a pot that I got earlier this summer that I’ve also been contemplating planting there. It’s definitely something I want to do now that I’ve tried.
What’s your favorite flowering vine?
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Beating the Rain
We have rain in the forecast, lots of rain. Today we’re supposed to get 3-4 inches and then it’s supposed to rain every day for the next 10 days at least. That’s good, we really need the rain because it’s a super dry summer/fall so far. That means however that I spent yesterday madly harvesting everything from the garden. Ten days of rain is not good for crops right before harvest, especially things like popcorn!
The popcorn wasn’t really ready, technically you should wait until the husks have dried. With all the rain coming, I knew the risk of mold was high. As a result, it’s all laid out on shelves in the top of the garage with a fan on it. Along with the popcorn, I have loads of sunflowers drying in the top of the garage as well. These are grown for the flock.
I also grow loads of pumpkins and squash for both us and the birds. Not only do we eat lots of pumpkin and butternut squash, the birds love them. It’s nice to be able to give the birds healthy treats in the middle of winter. This year I grew ‘Connecticut Field Pumpkin’ for the flock. They produced very well, I’m very pleased with this variety. They are a carving and decorative pumpkin, pretty much your typical pumpkin.
This is about 2/3 of the pumpkin harvest. It looks like I have 30 pumpkins for the birds and 8 large ‘Rouge Vif D’ Etampes’ pumpkins for us. This variety is my all-time favorite pumpkin because it makes the most wonderful pumpkin puree for pies and other goodies.
The tomatoes also came in, anything that was ripe or slightly blushed was put in my basket. The photo below is about a fourth of what I harvested, I’m guessing I got about 2 bushels of tomatoes. I have plans to make another batch of soup and probably a batch or two of canned crushed tomatoes. The harvest was very good this year and that makes me very thankful. Last year I got the late blight and didn’t have much of a harvest to speak of. I like tucking as much as I can into the pantry during the good years. That way we can still enjoy tomato soup during the years of blight.
This has probably been my most productive garden ever. I still have loads of things coming on, more on those tomorrow.
Do you grow pumpkins in your garden? What’s your favorite variety?
