Quote of the Day: Solon Robinson
Everyone who is so happy as to live in the country, and can gather vegetables from his own garden, knows the difference between them when gathered thus and properly cooked, and those which has been picked and kept for the market even one night.
Solon Robinson, Facts for Farmers, 1866
found in This Organic Life: Confessions of a Suburban Homesteader
Exactly the reason I’m growing more and more winter hardy vegetables each year! This is my first year with a good harvest of leeks and scallions for the long winter months and I’m certainly enjoying them to the fullest. The scallions are being used in batches of kimchi and the leeks I’m using in all sorts of recipes, most recently leek and potato soup made with ham stock (adapted from this recipe).
What’s your favorite food that’s in season in your area right now?
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Give Me Your Thoughts
This blog was started many years ago as a place to keep track of what I was doing in the garden, my garden journal of sorts. It has grown into so much more, a narrative of my journey towards the simple life and a community of friends. There are a lot of you that stop by each day to read about my life and a few take the time to comment (which if you write a blog you know what a joy those comments are). You’ve journeyed with me through the expansion of the gardens along with its successes and failures. You know what I eat, my favorite things, and the things I’m passionate about. You have become my friends and I thank you for that.
We’re currently in the process of redesigning Chiot’s Run. Mr Chiots has been spending some time in the evenings coding the new website with new features.
I wanted to extend the invitation to you for your thoughts and ideas. Part of the reason I post each day is because I know there are thousands of people that stop by; you are an integral part of this blog. Those of you who read and those of you who take the time to share your knowledge and thoughts in the comments.
How can I make it better?
What would you like to see? a better search tool, more resources, bigger images, more links…
What topics are you interested in hearing more about?
Some people have been requesting greeting cards, postcards and prints – anyone interested in seeing those or other items available?
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Grow Your Own: Be Sure Giveaway
A few weeks ago I showed you the fabulous vintage victory garden poster I received for Christmas from a friend. After many people asked where she got it, I found out: Zazzle. There is also a great collection of Victory Garden Poster Collection over at Amazon.
You can also find find hi-res copies of these posters at the Library on Congress website which you can have printed out yourself since they’re in the public domain. Here are a few I’ve found over the years.
Lucky for you, my friend happened to receive an extra copy of the Grow Your Own: Be Sure Poster because of a shipping problem. She gave it to me to give away here on the blog (everyone thank Missy). So my friends, all you have to do to have a chance to win is to comment below. If you want extra chances to win: like Chiot’s Run on facebook, Share this contest on your facebook page, or Tweet this contest. We have a winner – see image below – congrats to Chicago Mike.
Which poster shown above is your favorite?
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It’s Official – the 2012 Edible Garden
”If you’ve never experienced the joy of accomplishing more than you can imagine, plant a garden.”
~ Robert Brault
The 2012 edible garden is officially started. On Tuesday I spent some time starting the first seeds of the season.
Two flats of ‘Copra’ onions are now resting on the heating mat in the basement seed starting area (seed source: Johnny’s Selected Seeds).
Copra onions are described like this: Uniform, “rock-hard” storage onion with early maturity. These medium-sized, dark yellow-skinned storage onions have the preferred blocky round shape with thin necks that dry quickly. Firmness and skin are superior. Copra remains one of the absolute best in our yearly storage trials, staying firm and flavorful after most other varieties have sprouted. Highest in sugar (13°-14°) of the storage onions.
This variety has been recommended to me by a lot of people, so I decided to give them a go this year. I’d like to do an experiment to see which method works best for good growth and storage so I’m also planning on direct seeding some in the garden in a month or two, along with buying a few plants. Should be interesting to see which method produces the best onions (I’m kind of hoping direct seeding works best as it would be the easiest and least expensive method).
Has your 2012 gardening season officially started yet?
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The Basement Seed Starting Area
This past weekend I spent some time cleaning up the basement seed starting area. Last year, a few of you asked about seeing it, so here it is. My seed starting area always starts out neat and tidy in January, but slowly descends into chaos as more and more seeds get started and as the gardening season ramps up. Add to that all the plants that get hurriedly carried in when the weather turns cold in the fall and it can get to be quite a mess. It remains that way until January, when I head down with my mop to clean it all up for the new season. I’ve always got a furry helper by my side “helping” me with the chores so it’s not so bad (this time it was Dexter).
My seed starting area consists of a collection of random items that have been given to me throughout the years. The table I use is an old enameled top table that was left in the first house my parents purchased, it’s much older and I am (probably by 2 or maybe 3). It’s quirky and interesting, I’ve loved it since I was a kid. This table used to sit under our laundry shoot in our old house with a basket on top.
My light shelf was given to me a few years ago by my mom when she got a new one. One tray has been removed and replaced with a piece of plywood topped by a heating mat for those seeds that appreciate some warmth, like: peppers, tomatoes, onions, etc. Head on over to the Your Day Blog to read my post about how this seed table recently taught me a valuable lesson.
After sweeping, mopping, dusting and cleaning up, everything was back in order and ready for the coming season, which officially started on Tuesday (more on that tomorrow). It’s nice to have this little corner of the basement set up as a seed starting area, it’s quite cold down there since our basement in unheated, but with a heating mat for the warm loving crops everything does just fine!
Do you have a dedicated seed starting area?
A seedling heating mat seedling heating mat is money well spent if your seed starting area is in a cold area of the house. I have this 20-3/4-Inch by 48-Inch which accommodates 4 flats of seeds, you only need to keep the trays on the mat until the majority of the seeds germinate.
