Asian Spice Experiments

Back in late April I planted black sesame seeds. I started them indoors and then transplanted them into the cold frame in early May. For the longest time they were going now where, just stuck with four leaves or so. When we moved the walls of water off the tomatoes a few week ago, we put them around the sesame seeds. Finally they seem to be growing in height. I'm concerned I won't get a harvest from them because they take 120 days to mature. I may have to cover them to protect from the frost come fall. I think that they are growing so slowly because of all the cool and wet weather we've had. Sorry for the red tinge to the photo, it's the red light inside the wall of water.
In early April I planted some ginger root. However, the first root rotted instead of sprouting. I tried again and recently my plant spouted. Now I have two shoots growing in my pot.

Here's a photo of what mine might look like some day. This was taken at a visit to the Lyman Conservatory at Smith College last month. I'll share more photos from that visit in a future post.

Garden Pests

This week the fearsome garden pests showed up on the scene. I caught my first cucumber beetle taking a snack on one off my cucumber plants. I haven't seen any more since I squished him.

The snails and slugs seem to be everywhere with the wet weather. I've noticed a few missing seedlings, and so I've done my fair share of crunching and tossing them over the hedge.

The other pest to arrive was the cabbage moth caterpillars. I first noticed some damage to my kale this weekend. Up until now, we'd been enjoying pristine kale.
Inspection showed a few caterpillars. I've found a few for the past couple of days, but today as I took a closer look, I noticed the yellow eggs on the edge and undersides of the leaves.
So after one round of inspecting all the leaves for caterpillars I took a second look and rid the leaves of the eggs. I did buy BT this year to try on the caterpillars, but I understand you have to re-apply frequently when it rains and right now that is just about every day. My plan is to do a visual inspection for the next few days. I'm concerned what damage the caterpillars might do when I go away for a vacation, so I'll probably apply the BT before I go. At least I know I've eliminated quite a few eggs now so they won't have to start damaging the leaves before I find the caterpillars.

Garden Flowers

Today my first tomato blossoms opened. The pink heirloom and the mystery heirloom were first with their large yellow blooms.

The Sweet Chelsea Cherry isn't far behind and will be fully open tomorrow. Hopefully that means that cherry tomatoes are that far off in the future. I hope that the tomatoes will pollinate despite all the wet weather.
Also blooming in the garden is the arugula. I didn't intentionally let it go to seed, but now I don't want to tear out the beautiful flowers. I've continued to harvest the leaves and the taste doesn't seem to change.
The tatsoi will be blooming soon if I don't pull it first. I thought it was just my first planting that was going to seed, but I noticed some flower buds amongst my later planting too. I guess it didn't like the few days we had in the 80s last week.
Today I harvest an assortment of oak leaf lettuce, tatsoi, and arugula for a lunch salad. I topped it with four or five peas, a carrot thinning, and strawberries. The cheese is a home-made ricotta which was a by product of making mozzarella last week. It was a tasty salad.

Cedar Waxwings

Lately I've been hearing the high pitched "bzeee- bzeeee" of the Cedar Waxwings outside our side door. You can listen to their song at LearnBirdSongs.com. They come in groups to feed on the red berries on the bushes and to perch in the locust tree. They're a little skittish when I come out with the camera, but I managed to capture a few today, though the evening light was not great. I enjoy their striking accent colors, especially the yellow-tipped tails and red-tipped wings.

Pineapple Weed

Earlier this month we stopped in at a greenhouse to look for some annuals. I couldn't resist looking through the herb section, but I was restrained and didn't make any purchases. When we came home, I noticed a marked similarity between the Chamomile and something growing in amongst the grass in our front yard. I got down my herb book to read and compare. I convinced myself that we had Roman Chamomile (perennial) growing in the front lawn. It was about to bloom and so I hoped I could harvest some before the blossoms were mowed off. I dug up a few plants and put them in a pot on the porch, just to be sure.
I waited a few days and harvested some blossoms and put them on the windowsill to dry. However, I was a little uneasy about using them for tea since I wasn't absolutely certain that I had Roman Chamomile. I looked again at my herb book and pictures on the web and found that I must have something different because there were no white petals coming out from the yellow centers. Through persistent internet searching, I found that what I did have was Pineapple Weed (Matricaria matricarioides) and that it was also used as an herbal tea.

I've since brewed some as tea and it lives up to its name as a pineapple tasting drink. I was able to harvest a little more from the lawn before the mower chopped the rest of it off. It is a welcome weed in our yard, but it probably will loose it's spot in a pot on the porch.

Strawberry Season

Today I went to a local farm and picked 20 pounds of strawberries. It is early in the season so it was hard work finding the ripe berries. Here's what is happening to all those berries.

• I canned 9 half pints of Strawberry Jam.
• I'm in in the process of making 7 or 8 more jars of Strawberry Preserves. They are plumping overnight before being canned tomorrow.
• I set aside two quarts to make Strawberry Pie for a picnic on Friday.
• I made the strawberry syrup to mix with cream for making a batch of Strawberry Gelato.
• I put one cookie sheet full of strawberries in the freezer.
• And I made a strawberry-mango cobbler for dinner tonight. ( I added a bit of cinnamon and cardamom to the recipe. If you like your cobbler sweet, add more sugar to the fruit).

There may be a few extras left for eating, but I may have to go pick some more next week for us to snack on.
Earlier this week we were perusing my favorite canning book, The Joy of Cooking: All About Canning & Preserving, and saw a recipe for Mango Preserves. When we went to the store on Sunday, mangos were on sale. So yesterday I started Mango Preserves and did the canning of them today.
Preserves take two days because first you let the fruit and sugar sit in a cool place for 4-8 hours, then you bring the fruit to a boil and to the jellying point. Then the fruit sits overnight to plump so it won't float in the jars. Finally you return the fruit to a boil before processing it in a boiling water bath.

The summer canning season is off to a good start!