Grape Muffins

At this time of the year we are scrambling to keep ahead of the produce.  The Italian prune plum tree has been dealt with.  Plums halved, pitted and frozen for future Pflaumkuchen this winter.  Onions and garlic stored away.  Bean pods for dried beans spread out on trays in the potting shed.  Tomatoes mostly harvested and turned into soup, salsa, pasta sauce - but more tomatoes still out in the garden ripening.

And now the grapes!  There are signs that the racoons have been visiting - all of the easily-reached grapes are gone, but bunches hanging from the sides of the arbour which the racoons can't reach are ripe and ready to be picked.  A quick harvesting scooped up one big basket and those were stripped from the bunches and popped into the dehydrator.  One lonely bunch was left - how about grape muffins?

The Candice grapes growing on the arbour are small, tart, seedless grapes - perfect for dehydrating.  Most recipes I found on the Internet called for halved red seedless grapes.  Our grapes are the size of large blueberries, so no halving necessary.  Using my old standard recipe, I had a go at making muffins.  Recipe at the end of the post.

It's a pretty basic recipe - dry ingredients in one bowl, wet in another.  Add the wet to the dry (and dump in the grapes!) and mix only until the dry is incorporated and no more.  Spoon into muffin tins and bake at 350F for about 30 minutes or until golden brown.  They're not as pretty as blueberry muffins, but they taste great!

Grape Muffins

Dry Ingredients
2 1/2 cups flour
2 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup sugar (these are tart grapes!)

Wet Ingredients
2 eggs well beaten
1 cup milk
1/2 cup oil
1 1/2 cup grapes

Time to Make Salsa!

I have two baskets of Health Kick tomatoes sitting on the counter and there are lots more ripening in the garden.  I don't have a lot of time to spare today because I'm a tester for a new women's shirt pattern, but these tomatoes need to be dealt with.  Vegetable gardening, cooking, sewing - I sound like the quintessential housewife, don't I?  Well don't be fooled!  But I digress.

I have all the ingredients for salsa on hand.  The recipe is on this website.  The only fresh ingredient not from the garden is bell peppers as mine aren't ripe enough yet.

The recipe calls for onions and garlic.  I showed you a quick way to peel garlic on this blog.  Now here's a quicker way to deal with onions.  First quarter the onions through the middle - skin and all.

Now cut the root from middle to skin but not all the way through the skin.  It's now easy to pull the skin off.

Trim off the dried bits from the top.  Your onion is now ready to chop.  I got through 2 cups of chopped onions in record time and not a tear to be had because it was so quick.

Onions and garlic chopped, it was added to my big Maslin pan along with the vinegar, tomato paste and spices.  The oregano was fresh so I added a tablespoon instead of the teaspoon of dried called for in the recipe.

Next, the peppers.  I didn't have quite enough jalapeño peppers as I inadvertently gave away a plant leaving me with only one, so I supplemented it half and half with Hungarian Wax peppers.  And they're hotter than jalapeño peppers.

I needed 3 cups of chopped mild peppers and I used Ancho and Anaheim.  They're the green ones in the basket picture above.  Now I just needed tomatoes.

The tomatoes needed to be peeled and coarsely chopped.  No need to seed as Health Kick has very few seeds.  The quick way to peel tomatoes is to first cut an X on the bottom.  Plunge them in boiling water until the skins come off easily.  The X makes it easier to see when the skin will come off and also makes it easier to peel them.  I dealt with the tomatoes 4 at a time.  While I was peeling one batch another was in boiling water.  The peeled tomatoes went into a bowl for chopping later.  I think that's the fastest I've dealt with tomatoes, too!

In no time I had my 8 cups chopped and into the pot with the rest of the ingredients.  The pot was set to boil and then turned down to simmer.

While I type this, the house is filled with the delicious aroma of salsa!  All that's left is to bottle it.  And think of something to do with the big basket of tomatoes that's still sitting on the counter.

Signs of a Cool Spring

We've been experiencing the kind of spring we usually had on the West Coast of Canada - cool and damp.  Summer so far hasn't been much better.  Our previous several springs and summers were hot and dry - which brought their own problems - and I think we got used to thinking that's how it should be!  Well here we are again!

Garlic rust

My first clue that things weren't going the way I wanted them was the rust on the garlic plants.  At first I thought it was pollen - but I was wrong!  It's resulted in tiny bulbs of garlic - definitely not what I've come to expect.

Tomato leaf curl

Then there was the tomato leaf curl.  This has affected mainly the cherry tomatoes.  The Health Kick tomatoes haven't been bothered at all.  Indigo Rose, a cherry tomato given me by a friend, has been the most affected.

Blighted leaves

Some tomatoes also are showing signs of what I think might be blight.  I actually had to discard Yellow Pear.  Sweet Million has lots of yellowing leaves but is still soldiering on.

6 Kick Tomatoes

Good old Health Kick is looking as wonderful as it always has.  The first year I found a tiny Health Kick plant in a nursery was a bad year for blight.  Only at the very end of the season did I find blight on my Health Kick.  No wonder it's my "go-to" tomato!  In the picture above you can see how bushy they are - and I really did space them out.

Ripening Health Kick Tomatoes

They are covered with fruit and some is now ripening.  I look forward to lots of roasted tomato pasta sauce, tomato soup base and salsa!

Seed head on Copra Onions

This is the first year in a few that the onions have developed seed heads.  So far I've picked off 4.  That's actually not bad.  One cold, wet spring 3/4 of the plants developed seed heads.  This doesn't really affect the onions except that you get smaller bulbs which don't keep as well.

Copra Onions starting to fall over

Another strange thing happening with the onions is that they've decided they've had enough!  Most of the plants have now fallen over which is a sign that they've matured and are ready to be cured.  I'm not sure why this is happening.  This early maturing means that the bulbs aren't as big I we usually see but there's nothing for it but to go along with what the plant has decided.  When they've all fallen over and have had a bit of time to sit, I'll pull the plants and let them cure in the sun for a bit.  Then they'll go in the potting shed to completely cure so that I can remove the dried tops and nip the roots, then store them away.

Heritage Italian beans in flower

However, it's not all doom and gloom.  The beans are in flower and this year promises to yield a bumper crop of the heritage Italian and Fortex beans.  Luckily a relative has given me a recipe for her delicious dilly beans which will help use up some of them.

Liberty apple tree

This will also be a stellar year for the apples.  Every tree is loaded in spite of thinning.  The poor little Liberty is dragging on the ground - as it is every year.  Liberty is a tremendous producer of tart-sweet small beautiful red apples.  One of our favourites!  And to look at it, you'd never believe that I've removed 3/4 of the apples in thinning!

With vegetable gardening, every year is an adventure.  Things are never the same from one year to the next.  You just have to ride it out and hope for the best.  And every gardener thinks, "Next year....."

April Chores

Today my husband got going on building the compost bin and I got some transplanting chores done.  More on the compost bin when it's complete!

As I said in a previous post, our house is on the market.  There was an initial flurry of activity and showings resulted in offers 4:3.  Unfortunately, all of the deals collapsed and things are currently pretty quiet.  It seems that we will probably be staying here.  Time to get going on the garden!

Transplanted tomatoes

I started off today's chores with transplanting some of the tomato seedlings into larger pots.  6 of the Health Kick tomatoes were moved to bigger homes as well as the mixed up Gold Nugget and Sweet Million tomatoes.  Those two varieties are starting to make their identities known!

Then on to the outside transplanting.  I've been wanting to get the Copra onions in the ground but had to wait until the irrigation pond pumps were up and running.  Then of course, life got in the way with family lunches and appointments.  Today is warm but cloudy - a perfect day for transplanting.  The final 3 Lacinato kale plants found a home and I tucked 91 onion seedlings into one of the raised beds.

Onions planted

The Copra seedlings were a little larger than I usually allow them to get, but a thorough watering of the pot allowed me to gently tease them apart.  I marked out 13 rows on the bed and watered it well.  7 onions went into each row including one little guy with a not very strong root system.  We'll see how he gets on.  The rest of the seedlings were pretty robust and I firmed them into the wet soil.

Tomato cages provide protection for the seedlings

The final step was laying tomato cages over the seedlings.  This prevents neighbourhood cats (which just might include our own!) from digging and uprooting the little plants.

Onion seedling

By the time the tomatoes need their cages, the onions will be well established and not need protection.

Apple blossoms

Spring is certainly roaring on with a vengeance.  All the apple trees are bursting into blossom and the mason bees are working hard at pollinating the flowers.  As long as the weather holds, it looks like we might have a good apple crop!

Invasive Cedar Roots!

One of the reasons for gardening in concrete raised beds is that we have nearby cedar trees.  They are thirsty trees and the roots are continually seeking out moisture and nutrients.  Before we put our compost bin on a concrete base, the cedar roots were in there immediately!  Concrete raised beds with concrete bottoms and drainage hoses solved out gardening problems.  Well, at least we thought so!

Unfortunately,  the cedar trees managed to find tiny cracks in the bases of two beds.  This means that each year before planting, I have to dig out the areas of the beds they've managed to broach and cut out the roots.  They do manage to re-establish themselves, but at least I've minimized the damage.

Today I tackled the first bed.  This one grew a super tomato crop last year and this year I'll be planting onions in it.  The roots are all coming up the one side of the bed, so I dig all the soil away from that side and expose the roots.

Soil pulled from the side of the bed to expose the roots

Once the roots are visible, I cut them off with a knife.  Then I can shovel all the soil back in place and the bed is ready for another year.

Sneaky cedar roots creeping in!

A pile of cedar roots removed from the raised bed

In the next day or so, I'll do the second bed.  This is the last one we built, but the cedar roots got into it right away.  It's been a very wet winter so far, but when I turned over some of the soil a couple of weeks ago, it was quite dry underneath the top - that's the cedar roots!

And now on a happy note!  A number of years ago, I brought home some camas lily seeds.  I scattered them on the rocky hillside below the garden plateau.  The first year I saw a few brave green spikes but forgot all about them.  I've never seen flowers yet, but this year there are lots of camas lily leaves.  Maybe this will be the year we see flowers.

Camas Lily leaves

This hillside is wild and we just cut down the weeds and grass when it gets too high.  It never gets watered.  But there are the camas lilies just below the top!

In Transition

I haven't written in a while - partly because life has kept us busy - but mostly because we have decided that it was time to move.  After dealing with my Father's estate my husband and I realized we didn't want to leave our children with the problems associated with sorting out and selling a property that required ferry trips.  We would also like to downsize the amount of land we have to upkeep.  Moving seemed like the obvious answer.  And we wanted to make the move while we were still healthy and strong enough to organize our own move.

Coral bark maple and King Edward currant

This has not been an easy decision.  We are very happy here.  It's a private, secure oasis in a busy world that is increasingly unsafe.  We put our property on the market with the thought that it might take some time to sell - and that would be fine with us.  Therefore, the garden must go on.

Our priorities for a move will sound strange to many people.  My husband needs somewhere for his woodworking tools - somewhere big!  I need a level, sun-filled yard for my vegetables with no near-by cedar trees.  Oh, yes!  And a house!

I have already started a number of seeds under lights in the house - Copra onions and Bandit leeks - and they have been moved out to the unheated potting shed to join lettuce - Black Seeded Simpson, Drunken Woman and Red Sails, Kale - Improved Siberian and Lacinato, and Santee sprouting broccoli.  I also started my tomato and pepper seeds.

In the tomato line this year I'm growing my Health Kick plus a variety of cherry tomatoes - Yellow Pear is new at my house but comes with high recommendations,  Principe Borghese, Sweet Millions and Gold Nugget.  Unfortunately, in my haste to get the tomatoes planted, I double planted the Sweet Millions and Gold Nugget seeds!  However, once they get growing I know I won't have any trouble telling them apart.

Starting transplanting

Today the tomato seedlings were getting leggy enough that it was time to get them out to the potting shed.  Tomato seeds need heat to germinate, but once they're up, they can take cooler environments.

Plant tomato seedlings deep - almost up to the seed leaves

As always, when transplanting tomatoes, I plant them deep.  That gets rid of the legginess and provides more rooting area which makes for a stronger plant.  I put a small amount of potting mixture in the bottom of the containers and then insert the seedling as far into it as I can so that just a small length of stem is above the soil.

Transplanting finished the seedlings can enjoy a sunny spring day

Transplants finished, everyone gets a good watering with 20-20-20 dissolved in the water.  Later this afternoon when the potting shed is no longer in the sun, I'll put a plastic cap over the tomato seedlings.  This year, with a possible move in mind, I've put all my seedlings in 6-pack planters.  This takes up less space and I can easily transplant again into larger pots if necessary.  Spring gets going into high gear once again!

Zippy Salsa 2015

The last time I made salsa it was a hit - hot without being too hot and full of flavour.  Since each time I make it, there are slight variations in the ingredients, it seems smart to document exactly what I put in each batch to arrive at the ultimate recipe.

This year nearly all the ingredients are from the garden.  I had to purchase a red and a yellow bell pepper as my Gypsy peppers weren't ripe yet, but other than that small portion, all the fresh ingredients are ours.  To the mild peppers - Anaheim and Poblano, I added a Garden Salsa and a Hungarian Hot Wax as last time I made this, I didn't realize that Garden Salsa were actually hotter than  Jalapeño and the last batch had a LOT of Garden Salsa!  Hungarian Hot Wax are even hotter....

Zippy Salsa 2015

8 cups coarsely chopped tomatoes peeled and seeded - all Health Kick
1 cup Jalapeno peppers seeded, cored and chopped fine.
3 cups mild peppers chopped and seeded
1 cup sweet red pepper chopped and seeded
1 cup sweet yellow pepper chopped and seeded
2 cups chopped onions
1 small bulb garlic minced
2 cups apple cider vinegar
1 can tomato paste
2 Tbsp sugar
1 Tbsp salt
1 Tbsp fresh oregano minced
2 tsp paprika

Wearing rubber gloves for all the peppers, core, seed and chop.

Make a cross on the blossom end of the tomatoes and immerse them in boiling water to loosen the skin.  Seed and chop.

In a large non-aluminum pot (I used my new Maslin pan!) combine all ingredients.  Bring to a boil, stirring often.  Reduce the heat to medium low, simmer, stirring often until thickened enough that a Tbsp dropped onto a plate flows slowly in one stream when the plate is tilted.  Takes about an hour.

Using a funnel and ladle, fill hot pint canning jars leaving 1/2" headspace.  Cover with prepared lids.  Screw on bands until resistance is met; increase to fingertip tight.

Process in boiling water canner for 20 minutes.

Storing Onions

When you spend a lot of time and energy producing a top-quality product, you want to ensure that it's properly looked after.  How you store onions is important.

This year's Copra onions have been harvested.  As described in an earlier post this summer, when the tops started to fall over, the plants were signalling that they were reaching maturity.  When all the tops had come down (a couple were helped by me!) I pulled the onions up and left them on the top of the bed to continue curing in the sun.

Onions drying on wire racks

After a few days, rain was predicted and so it was time to bring the onions under cover.  I placed them on big wire racks we have for sifting soil and left them in the potting shed to finish.

Trimmed onions

Today the tops looked quite sere, so I cut the dried tops off with scissors, being careful to leave a long top in case any onions still had moisture in their stems.

A number of years ago, my husband made me a vegetable bin.  It has 3 storage sections, 2 of which I store onions in.  These sections have wire fronts to allow air flow.  The bottom section I use for potatoes and this one has a solid front to keep the potatoes in the dark.  The bin sits in our unheated garage and the onions last very nicely in their storage bins until spring.  This year's crop was more than the bins could handle, so the remaining onions will stay in their wooden crate  and sit in our cool dry crawl space until needed.

If you'd like to braid your onions, keep the dried tops on.  There are lots of good videos on the Internet to tell you how to do it.  I wasn't very proficient, so this is how I store my onions!  Hang braided onions in a cool, dry place and just snip off an onion as you need it.

I'm very disappointed with the yellow onions I grew from sets this year.  They are quite a bit smaller than the Copra and have flat bottoms.  This means a lot of digging to get out the root end.  And much to my dismay, I discovered they're already going soft!  Obviously not good storage onions at all!  Thank goodness for Copra!  These onions are large, have good flavour and store extremely well into the spring.  In fact, when cleaning out the bottom bin this morning I discovered some forgotten onions from last year and while most had started sprouting, 3 were still nice and firm!  What a great onion!

Tomato Soup

Knowing that my garden is swamping me with tomatoes at the moment my friend, Laila, sent me a recipe for tomato soup.  It looked simple and tasty, so today I gave it a try.  It's a winner!

It's a basic recipe and I can see many additions to change it up.  You could add rice or sausage chunks - the possibilities are endless.

To the tomatoes, onions and carrots, I added celery - all ingredients from the garden.  The Health Kick tomatoes are perfect for this soup as there are relatively few seeds.  These tomatoes have 50% more lycopene than regular varieties and the plants are loaded.  I also threw in some Principe Borghese tomatoes as I used a package of turkey stock that was 4 cups instead of the 3 mentioned in the recipe.

Onions, celery and carrots were chopped and then sautéed in butter until the onions had started to soften.

I quartered the Health Kick tomatoes, but left the Principe Borghese whole.

Seasoning was a strip of lemon rind, bay leaf, salt, pepper and sugar.

When the onions had softened, I put them in a large pot with the tomatoes, stock and seasonings and brought it to a boil, then simmered it for 30 minutes.   I pureed it in my food processor, but it's times like these that I wish I hadn't given away my blender which does a better job of it.

I garnished my bowl of soup with a dollop of sour cream and a chiffonade of basil leaves.  Delicious! Thanks, Laila!

Here's the recipe - I added celery and changed the peppercorns to fresh-ground pepper.  I didn't bother with the cream, but garnished it with sour cream and thinly sliced basil leaves.  And of course, I didn't peel the carrots!

Basic Tomato Soup

2 Tbsp butter
1 onion, chopped
1 carrot, peeled and chopped
2 lb tomatoes, quartered
3 cups chicken stock
1 1" strip of lemon rind
1 bay leaf
6 peppercorns
1 tsp granulated sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup cream (optional)

In a heavy pot, heat the butter on medium-high heat.  Add onion, carrot and lemon rind.  Cook, stirring until the vegetables are slightly softened - about 2 minutes

Add the tomatoes, stock, bay leaf, peppercorns, sugar and salt.  Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer gently for 30 minutes.  Remove the bay leaf and lemon rind.

Puree in a food processor.  Return to the pot, add 1/4 cup cream (optional) and simmer for 5 minutes.

Pickled Jalapeño Peppers, Carrots and Onions

It's amazing how many peppers 2 Jalapeño plants can produce!  I do have plans for making the Zippy Salsa, but that won't use very many and I needed to find some more things to make with them.  For Christmas, my daughter-in-law and son gave me Alice Waters' book, "The Art of Simple Food II" and in it I found a recipe to pickle jalapeño peppers, carrots and onions.  Since I had so many peppers, I doubled the recipe and still have plenty of peppers to give away!  And lots more on the plants.....

I started by slicing the peppers in 1/4" rounds.  Then I rinsed them under hot water to tone down the heat a little.  Since this is my first time making this recipe and many of my peppers had striations on them indicating they'd be a little hotter, I thought this was a good plan!  The carrots were also cut in 1/4" rounds and the onions were sliced into thin wedges.

The veggies were sautéed with oil and salt.  Then apple cider vinegar, water, sugar and a couple of bay leaves were added and the whole shebang simmered for 10 minutes.

I got 6 half-pint jars and since I had doubled the recipe, they were processed in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes.

Of course I opened one jar - it will sit in the fridge and probably won't be there for long.  The pickles are delicious!

Pickled Jalapeños and Carrots

1/2 pound jalapeños
1/2 pound carrots
1 yellow onion
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup water
1 Tbsp sugar
2 bay leaves

Slice jalapeños and carrots into 1/4" rounds.  To reduce the heat of the jalapeños, rinse them in hot water.  Slice the onions into slender wedges.

Heat a large skillet and pour in the olive oil.  Add the peppers, carrots, onions and salt.  Cook over medium high heat, stirring occasionally for 5 minutes.

Add the vinegar, water, sugar and bay leaves.  Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes.  Pour into a nonreactive bowl and cool before serving.