Tomato Haircuts

After comparing my tomatoes lacking maturity to those of bloggers in the region, and the peeks I get into neighborhood gardens as I drive, I decided I needed to act. I did some research about the proper pruning of tomatoes and found a article on taunton.com.
I had to wait for the tomato plant to dry, which has been a difficult task this week, but finally Saturday we had some partly sunny weather and the plants dried off. I took a knife to them, chopping off all the tops of the growth and pruning back any suckers that did not already have fruit on them. The picture above is after the haircut. I hope this will cause the plants to ripen the fruit a little faster. They are still quite large plants. In observing others' tomato plants on a walk afterward, I noticed many have a lot less foliage than mine. Currently there are 3 paste tomatoes that are beginning to ripen, and this one is the farthest along. Maybe by the end of the week we'll have our first tomato.
While pruning, I found this guy hanging out. I know it's a tomato hornworm caterpillar but I didn't have the heart to crush him. I really couldn't see any evidince of his damage. Cabage moth caterpillars are another story. I don't have any trouble getting rid of them.
Also, as a result of the very wet weather I found that my last bunch of garlic was molding on the outer layer rather than drying. The leaves were molding too so I decided it was best not to braid them. I stripped the outer layers and chopped the stems, and the most convenient place I could find for them to continue curing was this blue vase. I think they look quite nice.

Jean Quilt

I have made at least four quilts as wedding presents for friends and in the Spring of 2007 as my wedding approached, I decided I needed to make a lap quilt for two people for my husband-to-be and I. I have a large collection of used jeans and decided to make our quilt out of these. I also chose the jeans because I enjoy the weight the lend to a quilt. I tried to vary the colors of the jeans and piece them together in a well-balanced way to create a variety of lights and darks.

Our quilt is made of 5" jean squares with a 5 inch border of strips that were remainders when I recovered the fabric from the jeans. The quilt ended up being 68 inches by 55 inches because of the number of squares I was able to cut. The quilt is backed and bound with a blue cotton print. I used Warm and Natural Cotton Batting. I tied the quilt with a cotton yarn.We keep our quilt in our living room on the couch.

Mystery Plant Identified!

While I was on vacation last week I was browsing through Shrubs and Vines of Vermont by Kate Carter. I had bought it back in the spring to go with her previous book Wildflowers of Vermont, which I heartily enjoyed as a reference. In the section on vines I came across the answer to my mystery vine. The leaves and flowers look exactly like a Wild Cucumber, also called a Balsam Apple (Latin name Echinocystis lobata) and it is on page 145. What surprised me are the fruit, described as a spiny green bladder with dry seeds when ripe. Now the plant I was nurturing is long gone, but I've noticed the distinctive blossoms of the plant winding its way over other plants in the hedge next to my garden. I'll be keeping an eye out to see these distinctive gourds. In some ways this identification is encouraging because it is a gourd which means that we weren't way off in thinking it was a squash of some sort. It's seed leaves and other clues were there because it's in the same family. Also there is a note that says it is often cultivated.
Here is a photo of the female flower with the small beginning fruit. The flowers at the top of the entry are the male flowers. You can see what a mature fruit would look like in a collection of photos of Wild Cucumber and its seeds available at Cal Photos.

Rain, Rain, Rain

I didn't post yesterday because I couldn't get out in the rain to take any pictures. I did manage to plant a few more seeds for fall, though it's already a bit late for that. I added some more carrots, radishes, and threw some old purple been seeds in too. We'll see if the beginning of August is too late for these to mature.

In the last two days, we've had another 3 inches of rain. The stream on the other side of the hedge sounds like snowmelt in spring. You'll notice water droplets on almost all the vegetables in the pictures. The garden is soaked and my spinach seeds don't want to sprout, they're so water logged. Needless to say, my tomatoes aren't ripening either. When I returned from vacation some were a slightly lighter shade of green. Today I discovered that one of the paste variety turning slightly orange.

My winter squash continued to grow while I was gone. However the two smaller pollinated buttercup female blossoms rotted away. It looks like I'll just be getting one buttercup and one delicata.

My Brussels Sprouts are beginning to develop on the stem. These are the 5 plants ones I planted in the spring. I love Brussels Sprouts so much that I've also put in another 5 plants for a later harvest. I can't wait.

Jalapenos are also doing well. I used one in making a salsa verde the other day and it was good and spicy. I can't wait to make fresh red salsa soon.

The Swiss Chard is nice and lush, as is the Kale. I saw a great recipe this week on Mark Bittman's Minimalist Column that I can't wait to try out: Chard Stuffed with Risotto and Mozzarella.

Zucchini and Corn Soup

One day during my first year teaching, we were treated to this soup for lunch made by Rosie Wilson. It's a great recipe for this time of year when the corn is fresh and the zucchini is plentiful. We made a double batch last night and still didn't use one of the monster zucchinis.

Zucchini and Corn Soup

Ingredients
2 ears corn
2 tablespoons butter
1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped
3 cups water
1 medium zucchini, diced
1 cup milk or heavy cream
salt & pepper
dried rosemary and thyme
cooked bacon or ham

Directions
Using a sharp knife, cut the corn kernels off the cob into a bowl. Scrape the cobs into the bowl as well.

In a sauce pan, melt butter and saute the onion and garlic until clear. Add the water and the corn cobs. Bring to a boil and boil for 5 minutes. Remove cobs and discard. Add corn kernels and zucchini to the pot and return to a boil. Add a pinch of dried rosemary and thyme. Boil for 5 minutes until zucchini is tender. Ladle some of the hot liquid into the milk or cream and stir to bring it to temperature. Then add the milk or cream to the pot. Season with salt & pepper. If you wish it to be thicker, puree 1 cup of the soup and then return it to the pot.

Serve topped with crumbled bacon or ham.

Return from Vacation

Despite my fears, my garden survived my week absence on vacation. If fact it did perfectly fine. We had over an inch of rain while I was gone, and I had left the bottle feeders just in case. We returned to find these gigantic zucchini. Last night we used half of one in a Corn and Zucchini Soup. Maybe I'll post the recipe later. We'll have to be creative with the rest and a batch of Zucchini Bread may be in order.
Since it's been so wet, my onions were beginning to show signs of rot. We've been slowly pulling some to use for meals, but today I pulled the rest of them. There are so few and they are tiny so there is no use drying them. We'll use them in our cooking over the next few days.
I also cleaned the two smaller types of garlic. They both show purple lines once the outer paper is pulled off. However, they are different varieties because the slightly larger of the two has 4 large cloves around the center, and the smaller variety has 6-8 small cloves around the center core. Now they're braided together to hang on my kitchen wall. I didn't think the third variety looked sufficiently dry to braid so I'm leaving it to cure another week or so.
Also today I harvested the rest of my Romano Green Beans. They were very large and there were a lot more than I expected (again!). This was the end of the crop so I pulled the plants. I decided not to can these since the Dilly Beans made with these weren't as crunchy as I like them. Instead we'll have them with dinner.