First, Peel the Garlic

This morning I'm going to be making tomato soup.  A friend gave me a terrific recipe and it's on the blog here.  All the main ingredients come from my garden - tomatoes, onions, carrots - and a few spices.  Now the recipe doesn't actually call for garlic, but I'm adding it to this batch.

But first you have to peel the garlic.  And this year, with my garlic getting rust, the bulbs are small which makes peeling a royal pain!  But there's a solution.

To do it the quick and easy way, you need 2 metal or ceramic bowls.  I just had one metal bowl and a lid.

Next, separate the cloves.  The easy way do do this is to smack the bulb with the heel of your hand.

Now place the cloves in the bowl and cover with the other bowl (or in my case, the lid!)

Shake vigorously for 10 to 15 seconds and voila!  Peeled garlic ready to go!

Be sure to check out the tomato soup recipe - it's a winner!

Early Apples

It's going to be a tremendous year for tree fruits!  Before we realized what was happening, early Gravenstein apples were starting to drop off the trees!  We have an espaliered apple tree with 6 varieties grafted on it.  Apples on this tree seem to ripen earlier than on our other trees, and to my surprise, I was finding apples on the ground.  Time to do something with them!  It was easy to get my husband to gather apples for me when the reward was apple crisp for dessert.  I have a recipe that has to be one of the best apple crisps ever.  It's on the blog HERE.

Since there were so many apples, I made 2 crisps - one for the oven and one for the freezer.  I peeled, cored and sliced the apples, dropping them into water which had lemon juice in it to keep them from turning brown.

The topping is a sort of shortbread-like mixture with walnuts added at the end and roughly chopped.

When I had enough sliced, I drained the apples and mixed them with a sugar/cinnamon/cloves combination.

Topping is added to the apples and gently smoothed over the top.

Then into a 350F oven until golden brown and oozing juice.  The kitchen smells wonderful!  Now to get some vanilla ice cream and dessert is covered.  And there's another unbaked apple crisp in the freezer!

Raccoon Invasion!

Every year we have some invasion by the raccoons.  Usually it's the grapes and we have a race to see who gets them first.  If I'm not quick off the mark, I get none at all.  Greedy little raccoons!

One year it was the hazelnuts.  I usually harvest them when they start turning colour just to beat out the raccoons.  A few years ago I was a bit slow and there were none to be had.  Plus broken branches.

Devastation in the corn bed!

This year it's the corn, which is the first time they've ventured into this crop.  One morning I went out to find 4 stalks brought down and cobs ripped off.  The next morning, many more plants were brought low.

Downed corn stalks

I decided to leave the plants on the ground in the hopes that they'd leave the rest of the crop and just work on the cobs that were easy to get.

Fortex beans growing in the corn

This morning there are no new plants on the ground, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.  If I lose the corn, I'll also lose the Fortex beans that I have growing on them.  I'm growing these beans in the corn because they tie the plants together and provide strength from the wind.  One year I grew the heritage Italian beans in the corn, but it's so vigorous that they broke the stalks!  Fortex beans are much more courteous!

Heritage Italian beans striking out on ropes strung to the fence

I didn't want to give up on the delicious heritage Italian beans though.  We've built a special sturdy frame for them.  These beans don't like to be confined, however, and I've even strung rope to the fence.  The beans have taken over 2 of the 3 ropes and are heading into the grapevines - which are set to meet them halfway.  This will certainly make picking the beans easier!

Swiss Chard growing beside the beans

Elsewhere in the garden, things are coming along nicely.  We've had quite a few meals of Swiss Chard which is such an attractive plant.

Gypsy peppers

And the Gypsy sweet peppers will soon be turning colour.  Growing them in a proper bed has resulted in a much better crop.  They share this bed with Sweet Million and Indigo Rose cherry tomatoes.  The hot peppers are growing in a bed with the Health Kick tomatoes.  You don't grow sweets and hots together or the sweets get hotter and the hots get sweeter!