[gardeners] Cooking from the garden
Shirley,George (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Sat, 23 Dec 2000 15:26:36 -0600
Doing lots of baking today and have made one loaf of whole wheat bread with
wheat germ and Grapenuts (I like the crunch), and five golden fruit cakes so
far. Another loaf of bread is in the machine and I'm anxious to find out how it
turns out. I went into the garden, pulled a scallion, cut some NZ spinach
leaves, a couple of small chard leaves, a few fennel leaves and a small hot
chile. All of this got chopped well and went into the bread dough at the
appropriate time. It certainly smells good and I hope it tastes good too.
I've seen all these commercial bread mixes in the stores with all sorts of
ingredients so I thought I would try my hand. What the hey, if it doesn't work
we can make dressing out of the bread.
The chiles, hot and sweet, are gone. I think the Thai Hots may pull through but
I covered them. We've had four mild morning freezes of 31F or lower so far this
week. The chiles along the west fence, the majority of my plants, are exposed to
the north wind as it whistles between our house and the neighbors. Even slowed
way down by azaleas and other plantings the wind did the ol' chiles in. Picked
the last of them today, green or ripe, regardless. Chopped them in the food
processor and added them to the last gallon crock of fermenting chiles for the
year 2000. So far our chiles have produced 3 gallons of hot sauce, another two
gallons of chiles are fermenting, a couple of gallons were pickled, and at least
four gallons were given away to be eaten fresh or cooked with. Since all of the
seed for the plants was given, traded for, or home grown, I reckon we got our
moneys worth of time out of them.
The fall green beans have also bitten the dust but the brassicas are doing fine.
We're growing Savoy Express cabbage for the first time this year and I like it.
Makes a head that runs 1.5 to 2 lbs, about right for two people to eat at one
sitting, has a nice taste and crunch when lightly steamed, and makes an
excellent slaw. The broccoli and cauliflower haven't headed up yet but I thought
I saw some florets of broccoli when I was out there today.
Gotta go check on my baking, still have a mince pie to make. Tomorrow we load
the old car up to the roof and head for our daughters place in Texas, returning
on Tuesday in time for our personal fortieth anniversary celebration. Friends
sent us some Alaskan alder smoked salmon and we've got it hidden along with some
nice crackers for our anniversary dinner snacks, that along with a standing rib
beef roast, baked potatoes, and other veggies will make a nice repast for a
couple who ate hot dogs on their first anniversary because that's all they could
afford at the time. We may have hot dogs for lunch that day in memory of our
first anniversary.
Happy holidays to all and I will still be reading my mail as my ISP has just
added a web mail section to their site.
George