Winter vegetables

Now that the gardening season is coming to an end, gardens are looking a little spent. Nonetheless, I can still find enough beets,leeks, Swiss chard, carrots, kohlrabi and not to mention lush parsley in the garden. I planted giant radishes at the end of August, Radiant Giant and Red Cloak daikon radishes, they are the size of softballs now.These add tremendous flavors to our winter table.

Today I harvested some Radiant Giant Radish, Red Cloak Radish and Kohlrabi. The vegetables is juicy and sweet. I made an orange dressing to go with the salad. It was delicious! The radishes were planted in late August, after clearing out the bush beans I planted in the spring. Now they are about 5" across. I would try to plant them earlier next season, so they will be larger by now. The kohlrabi were planted in the spring. I will make an orange dressing to go with the salad. If you haven't planted a fall garden before, I hope this is enough of a reason for you to start doing so...

Caponata-Put Your Extra Eggplants to Good Use

This October I visited Seattle. Naturally, I headed to Pike Place Market. At the corner of the entrance is DeLaurenti's Specialty Food and Wine. I bought a couple of sandwiches some goodies headed out to the beach to have lunch with my husband. I bought some caponata from the deli, and it was delicious. Just so happen I over-planted my eggplant this year, so I have a ton at home. I have the round Opus Eggplants and long Asian Black Dragon Eggplants. As soon as I got back from Seattle, I made my own version of caponata with ingredients on hand. Here's the basic ingredients: Ingredients: diced eggplants, onions, celery, roasted red peppers, capers, raisins, green olives, pine nuts, garlic, fresh basil, fresh oregano, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, sugar and home made tomato sauce. Place diced eggplant in a large sauce pan, add salt and weighing down with a heavy plate. Let stand for 30 minutes. Drain the liquid from the eggplant. Saute vegetables in olive oil until they turn soft. Add all other ingredients except fresh basil leaves. Cook until all blended. Add chopped fresh basil leaves. Serve with a loaf of nice crusty bread. Caponata will keep in the fridge for 2 weeks. It tastes good cold. You can free the extras in and used it for the winter.

October 2010 update:
Vegetables:
5 lb. Opus Eggplant, cut into 1/2" cubes, add 2T salt, and allow to set for 4 hr., squeeze out as much liquid as you can (this will allow the eggplants soak up flavors later).
5 large ribs of celery stalks, cut into 1/2" cubes,
2 C. carrots, cut into 1/2" cubes,
1 large onion, cut into 1/2" cubes,
Side ingredients:
3 C. Green olives, cut up (I used the Italian Antipasto from the big box store),
1 bottle of 3.5oz. capers
1-1/2 C. raisins,
1 C. pine nuts,
Herbs and seasonings:
Basil: 2 C. fresh,
Garlic: 2 heads fresh, peeled and crushed,
Oregano: 1/2 C. fresh chopped,
Hot pepper flakes, to your taste,
Olive oil,
1/2 C. Red Wine or Balsamic vinegar, (or a combination of the two)
1 C. Brown sugar,
1 C. Homemade Tomato sauce,
Salt and pepper to taste.

Saute vegetables in batches until they are soft, making sure they are all well coated with. Add other ingredients gradually, mix well, allow to cook together.

Something else eggplant

My eggplant dish turned out to be a pleasant surprise! Here's how: Slice eggplants into 1/4" thin slices, dip the eggplant slices in egg and then herb flavored bread crumbs, then pan-fry the eggplant slices, pan-fry new potato slices, layer potato and eggplant slices in a baking dish, pour home caned tomato sauce on top, sprinkle with parmesan cheese and cover with mozzarella cheese. Baked at 350 for 30 minutes, voila!

Fall Garden Inventory

October is coming and almost gone. Time to clean up and gather all the veggies at the end of their live cycle and maintaining the fall/winter harvesting veggies. Here's the list of what I have done:

1.Garlic: Planted garlic in early October. Planted them in 3-feet rows, leaving 6 in. between each garlic clove;
2. Picked all the fresh eating beans before the chilling rain that would ruin them. Beans left for harvesting seeds can still remain on the vine.
3. Harvested all the soybeans, picked all the peppers, eggplants, preserve as much as I could, giving away what I can not use...
4. Harvested all the corns (this was the second planting, sowed in July. Strip the corns off of the cob, add to corn bread, delicious!
5. Harvested all the basil leaves and dried them all before the cold rain arrived. Leaves will turn black once frosted and are no good. Parsley, on the other hand, will be fine, they are cold hardy.

Currently harvesting and eating: (Fall/Winter harvesting veggies):
1. Veggies planted in August: Cylindrical beets, Fordhook Swiss Chard, Lucallus Swiss Chard are ready to harvest. They will keep in the ground for another month or so;
2. Red Cloak Radish, Radiant Giant Radish sowed in August are about the size of softballs. Thin the rows and eating the harvested radishes;
3. Carrots planted in spring are ready to harvest and put away; carrot planted in summer are still small, they will keep growing and will be wintered over.
4. Parsley is doing great, I picked some leaves when I dried my basil leaves. They are still growing new leaves. If protected they will be good all winter.

**Other business in the garden:
1. Grapes are turning color and ready to harvest. Made grape jellies with the Concord grapes
2. Asian pears are ready to be harvested and put away for the winter.
3. This year apples did not do well, except the Fuji, which always does well.

Tomato Sauce the Easy Way-My Secret

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With the tomatoes maturing all at once one could feel overwhelmed. No worries, this is the perfect time to pack away some delicious tomato sauce for the winter. I learned this trick from my friend Maegan, it sure made tomato sauce making a lot easier. I hope it helps you too...
Gather 15 lb. assorted tomatoes from the garden. They don't have to be perfect, just remove any blemishes and the stem ends. Cook in a large stainless steel stock pot until the tomatoes are soft and easy to break down. Run the tomatoes through a colander to remove the seeds and skin.

Transfer the tomato sauce (at this stage very runny) in two oval shaped crock pots (5Q), add garlic, herbs (I use oregano and basil from my garden), lemon juice and salt. Let it cook overnight. The next morning, it should reduced by half. Pack the tomato sauce in clean jars, put lids on and process in hot water bath for 15 minutes. This will be the best tomato sauce you will ever eat! Great for making pizza.

Green Bean Southern Style

Years ago my family and I visited Philadelphia. By the time we got to the city it was already dark, we decided for dinner we would order something and take it back to our hotel. My husband is a big rib lover, so we found a southern soul rib joint, a typical "hole in a wall" place. The food, was incredible! We ordered smoked ribs and chicken. For side dish I ordered some kind of bean stew with corns, tomatoes, peppers and a whole bunch other stuff. The meats were good, but what stuck to my ribs was that side dish. Now I've got abundance of green beans, corns and other veggies from the garden, I attempted to recreate the side dish I've been craving for all these years. I know it was not the same as what I had, nonetheless delicious! It's especially good serving with corn bread.
6 C. garden fresh beans, wash, trim and break into pieces;
1 large tomato, cubed;
1/2 onion, cubed;
1 small zucchini, cubed;
1 ear of corn, striped;
1 jalapeno pepper, seeds removed, thinly sliced
2 cloves of garlic;
1/4 C. vegetable oil;
1 t. onion powder;
Ms. Dash, salt and pepper to taste.
Place beans in a pot, add enough water to cover. Bring it to a boil and cook for 5 minutes. Add all other ingredients, cook until beans are tender (5-10 minutes). Serve with corn bread.

Heirloom Tomatoes: Make it easier by selecting the right varieties

To say gardening is hard work is an understatement, but there are things you can do to minimize the efforts and maximize the return.
First and foremost is the variety selection. After years of testing vegetable verities in my own garden, I know that all tomatoes, cucumbers and beans are not created equal.
Select the varieties that matures early in your area; select the varieties that are more productive for the size of the plant; next, select the varieties taste good to you. Keep in mind no matter how tasty it may be, if it doesn't mature in time, you will not taste it. If you insisting on growing these varieties, be prepared to start them early and baby sit them longer. This year, I grew an assorted heirloom tomatoes. Some I really liked and will grow again.

The winners are:
1. PICK RED:An early, determinant plant, produces large slicing tomatoes with great taste.
2. PERON:An early, indeterminant plant,produces large slicing tomatoes with great taste. Very productive.
3. SUN GOLD: An early golden cherry tomato. Indeterminate, thick foliage. Produces golden cherry tomatoes with exceptional taste, sweet and tangy. Plant tend to get big.
4. PINEAPPLE: An mid maturing large yellow tomato that is very tasty. indeterminant,lots of foliage.
5. JET STAR: A hybridized early maturing variety. Produce LARGE sized tomatoes with great taste. Indeterminant.
6. SUPER MARZANO: A great Roma type tomato,indeterminant, very productive.
7. OLD GERMAN: An mid maturing yellow-orange tomato with red stripes. Great flavor.

The ones came in second include:
1. EARLY GIRL: Very early, hard fruit. The taste resembles super market tomatoes (the best kind)
2. OREGON SPRING: Very early, determinant. Hugs the ground. Produce one wave of tomatoes and then quits. Taste is good.
3. CHEROKEE PURPLE: Mid maturing. Good flavor, soft fruit.

Ones I didn't like:
1. RED PEAR: Late, indeterminant, lots of foliage for the amount of fruit you get. Taste blend.
2. ISIS CANDY: I had high hope for this one, but it was mid mature. Somewhat soft fruit and taste plain to me. Update: 9-5-09: Isis tomato finally ripened up. It was quite sweet with very little acidity. I guess they were not ripe when I tasted them back in August. It sure takes a long time to mature, but it was worth it.

Trim away the foliage at the bottom of the tomatoes, remove suckers. This will reduce the moisture, nutrient consumption by the plant and allow air to flow through and reduce the chance of rotting.