Eggplants in Bloom

I started some eggplant seeds this year. They are finicky plants for sure. Mine languished in the cool of the spring and finally took hold. I noticed the other day that it’s blooming. What beautiful blooms it has. Mr Chiot’s and I don’t really like eggplant, but we eat some at least once a year, I figured I would try to grow some this year (perhaps we’ll like it more).


Anyone out there have a good eggplant recipe for non-eggplant lovers? I’m thinking veggie lasagne.

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Sunbathing: Curing Onions

I harvested all of my onions. They aren’t very big, that seems to be the theme of my vegetables this year. Oh well, we’ll call them shallots (more hoity-toity). This year I started red onions from seeds (they did the best, the biggest nicest onions). I also started yellow onions from sets. They’re all pretty small, I’m wondering if I can save some for sets next year?


So how do you know when to pick your onions? When the tops flop over, simple as that. When you notice they’ve flopped leave them in the ground for about 10 days. Then pull them and leave them in the sun for a day or two. Next, move them to a sheltered spot for a week or two to finish drying (turn them once a day to make sure all parts dry). Make sure you give them room to breath, I dry mine on my compost sifter in the garage, works perfectly. When they’re fully dry, pick out any thick-necked or soft bulbs and use them first. They are ready to store when the skins rattle and the roots are dry and wiry.
Anyone else have onion curing tips?

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Making the Bed

This past Thursday I cleaned out one of my raised beds. I harvested the carrots and cabbage and gave up on the broccoli that was growing in it. The carrots were teeny-tiny, which means I need to add more compost to the bed.

Since I plan on growing some Napoli carrots in this bed for over-wintering, I added several inches of compost and some Dr Earth Starter Fertlizer.

After smoothing out the soil I planting seeds late into the night (until I could no longer see the seeds or the holes in which to put them). So far I have planted 192 carrot seeds and I still have at least twice that many more to plant (I’ll be busy this evening). I’m looking forward to the sweet crunchy carrots this winter. I’m optimistic since this is my first time planting for winter harvest. I’m also growing kale and spinach for the winter. Wish me luck!

Have you planted anything for winter before?

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Great Gardening Books: Front Yard Gardens

Lately I’ve been thinking about my front flowerbeds. I would like to make them bigger and includes few more bushes for structure.  I can’t really decide what to do, so I checked around to find a few books for inspiration.  I came across Front Yard Gardens: Growing More Than Grassby Liz Primeau. This book is about taking back your lawn to make more room for plants, which are more environmentally friendly for many reasons.

Liz starts off with a history of the lawn as we know it in the U.S., I was fascinated with the history.  She then shows many different front yard gardens and shows tons of photos of each.  I’m a HUGE fan of tons of photos in gardening book, so I loved this book.  She has examples of all different kinds of gardens: cottage, minimalist, woodland, prairie and more. She also shows her own garden and has photos throughout the years and explains all the steps she went through during her transition from lawn to gardens.  It is nice when garden authors show their own gardens, I’m always curious as to what their gardens look like and if they are as nice is they the ones they are featuring in their books/magazines.

This is a great resource for anyone wanting to expand the flowerbeds and take back your lawn.  I would highly recommend this book for the photos as well! It’s definitely an interesting read.

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Is it Worth It?

It’s interesting to me that we all want to receive fair pay for the things we do, yet we want to buy things as cheaply as possible. We complain that food costs are rising and yet we don’t care that the people harvesting the food can’t afford to buy what they’re harvesting for their families.

I came across a great article on Slow Food Nation about the plight of the farm worker. Here’s a short quote from the article, to read it in full visit Slow Food Nation. The photos with the article are very moving, check it out. You can also see more of his images and more information at: The Farm Worker Project.

Rick Nahmias doesn’t equivocate when he talks about our cultural response to farm workers. “There’s something about our society…we don’t value or respect the people who are harvesting our food,” Nahmias told me over the phone recently from his studio in Los Angeles. “It’s not just that they’re sleeping on uncomfortable beds. These are people sleeping on cardboard mats under overpasses for three months at a go, and that’s so we can buy our grapes for 98 cents a pound. What are those grapes worth if that person has had to do that? I can’t see that. It doesn’t add up for me.”

This is one reason I try to buy a farmer’s markets, where I can talk to the people that grow & harvest the food. I’ll have to look into more fair trade items while shopping.

Are you willing to spend more on food so the farm workers can get better wages?

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