We've had frosts every night this week. The days have been sunny but not especially warm. All the heat-loving crops are long gone, of course, but there are still some harvests to report.
I planted some Chinese cabbage this summer. They did not get big, but still are useful. They probably would have been okay in the coming days, but I took them anyway.
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| Minuet cabbage |
Ditto the broccoli. The plants have been giving us loads of side-shoots all season, but they were looking kind of ragged, so I removed them.
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| Blue Wind broccoli side-shoots |
One of the spring-planted fennel re-grew after I cut it. It's nice to have a second harvest, even though it's small. Also shown are the last beets, or so I thought.
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| Orazio fennel second growth and beets |
I decided to take out all the Swiss chard (silverbeet), and found a few more beets (beetroot) hiding therein. I know there are some who do not like chard (looking at you Dave!), but I have ever since I was a kid. When it's been left alone by the leaf miners, I find the glossy savoyed leaves quite attractive and the stems are brilliant.
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| Swiss chard and beets |
I tried growing celery here for the first time this year. Only two of the plants survived rodent predation, and they struggled being crowded out by the bush beans and collards. But I got a little harvest anyway.
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| Ventura celery |
We love cilantro (coriander leaf), but I struggle to grow it, as it wants to bolt so quickly. I thus over-plant it. The result is more than we can use. The aromatic compounds that give it its character are very volatile, and don't preserve well. The Kitchen Goddess pureed most of this with a little olive oil and froze it. Some we gave away, and I dug up one plant to try growing indoors.
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| Cilantro |
I've been regrowing turmeric from the same root I got years ago, and also tried ginger for the first time. It was not a great year for them, especially considering I'll want to replant some of both. But once these are dried and brushed off we should get something useful.
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| Turmeric and ginger |
It actually is supposed to warm up a bit this coming week. There are still a few things to harvest, but I'm expecting the next post to be the last for the season. Thanks for reading, and thanks once again to Dave at HappyAcres.blog for hosting this forum.
That is some good looking cabbage there! Mine is usually quite eaten up by slugs and bugs. As for the chard, I have really tried to develop a taste for it. The only way I could eat it was with so much garlic I couldn't taste the greens! It's too bad, because it grew quite well here for me. It looks like it is doing well for you too.
ReplyDeleteBroccoli side shoots are such a bonus. I always reluctantly give up the plants. Hope your celery was crisp and tasty. I find it so different from purchased celery. Mine just went in the ground last week. I'd like to try growing tumeric. Maybe next year. There's always next year...
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