Harvest Monday - 19 September 2022

Hello again from Eight Gate Farm! This week we felt a noticeable transition to fall conditions, with cool nights. Harvests are slowing down, but still strong. As if to prove it, we cut most of the winter squash, 211 pounds worth. How do I know this? Because The Kitchen Goddess somewhat obsessively weighed each one and added them up!

211 lbs of winter squash

Allow me to unload the cart. These are "Neck Pumpkins," actually a squash. They don't look too impressive when shot from a distance.

Neck pumpkins

But up close, a different story.

17.4 pound neck pumpkin

These are Yokohama squash, an heirloom moschata variety. I've grown them before, and found that while they are not productive, what you get is really tasty, and attractive too. They weighed 4 to 5 pounds.

Yokohama squash

"Sugaretti" is a hybrid spaghetti squash that looks like a delicata. It has always been productive for me, and stores forever.

'Sugaretti' spaghetti squash

A first-time-growing moschata squash is this hybrid called "Autumn Frost." I'm impressed with its output and appearance, and look forward to tasting it.

'Autumn Frost' squash

And then there's a mystery squash. My label said "Chirimen," which is another Japanese moschata that looks a lot like Yokohama, but that's certainly not what grew.

Mystery squash

Yes, this is far more squash than we can possibly use, and there's still a few more on the way. But it illustrates the productivity coming from the "lasagna" (no dig, no till) plot I extended last fall, where everything grew in pure compost. Amazing!

Now on to "general harvests"; those crops I have already featured in individual references. Here was Monday's tomato harvest.

Monday tomato harvest

And Monday's "everything else."

Monday harvest

More tomatoes on Wednesday.

Wednesday tomato harvest

And Wednesday's "everything else."

Wednesday harvest

Thursday's harvest was only hot peppers, but a lot of them. Looking north to south in this picture, they range from mildly hot, to moderate, to intense, to fuggetaboudit.

Thursday Parade O' Peppers

Friday's harvest was much lighter. There were also tomatoes, of course, but I didn't photograph them.

Friday harvest

Now on to Preserving the Harvest. I had enough accumulated paprika peppers to dehydrate and grind. They got a little dark in the drying process, but though not bright red, still smelled wonderful.

Paprika

I also had enough guajillo peppers to finally make chile powder. I tasted a few pieces prior to drying, and was surprised to find none of the heat I was expecting. But after grinding, the aroma was intoxicating. We definitely need to grow more of these next year.

Guajillo chile powder

And TKG canned 14 pints of thick tomato sauce. We truly have reached our limit of canned tomato products now. Any more sauce tomatoes we harvest will be given to friends.

Canned tomato sauce

That's all for this week. Thanks for visiting, and thanks once again to Dave at HappyAcres.blog for hosting Harvest Monday.