Happy Pantry

One of my favourite chores at the end of the growing season, once the hectic pace of harvesting and preserving is over, is to take stock of what we've got on our pantry shelves and create a tally of our preserves for the year. This summer was quite the challenge, balancing looking after our new girl Kate with the work of the harvest. Dave, of course, did most of the work. I won't go into totals, but here are lists of what we put together last summer and this summer.

2009 Preserves Tally

• Spiced sweet cherries - great with pork
  
• Cherry pie filling
• Cherry conserve
  
• Cherry juice - this was fabulous
• Tomatillo salsa verde
• Tomato & pepper salsa
• Pickled carrots
• Pickled dilled cucumbers
• Dilled green beans
• Preserved baby figs
• Orchard fruit chili sauce
• Pears in juice
• Pear ginger conserve - another fabulous preserve
• Spiced pickled pears - weird but good with meat
• Blackberry juice
• Blackberry pear juice blend
• Apples in blackberry juice
• Lime & ginger tomatillo marmalade
• Apple pie filling
• Tomatillo/Green tomato mincemeat
• Grape juice
• Cranberry salsa - a fantastic condiment with poultry, especially on leftover sandwiches with mayo
• Cranberry juice
• Hot pepper jam - quite a bit like sweet Thai chili sauce, and an essential condiment with pot stickers
• Chicken stock
  
• Fruit vinegar - another essential condiment with pot stickers
  

2010 Preserves Tally
No cherries this year; really unfortunate year for cherries, sigh.

• Dilled green beans
• Pickled dilled cucumbers
• Apple blackberry juice
• Blackberry juice
• Raspberry juice - check out the Basil Sorbet using raspberry juice, yumm
• Cucumber relish - we used our overabundance of cucumbers and golden zucchinis, as well as our unripe Ruffle peppers for this fabulous relish. I highly recommend this recipe!
  
• Tomato & pepper salsa
• Tomatillo salsa
• Orchard fruit chili sauce
• Ginger pear conserve
• Tomatillo ginger & tangerine marmalade - even better than with lime!
• Green tomato mincemeat
  
• Hot pepper jam
• Honey plums
• Basil raspberry syrup - was supposed to be jelly, but didn't gel. Makes great syrup for pancakes!
• Chicken stock
  
• Venison stock
• Venison chili
• Fruit vinegar

It's sure nice having a happy pantry!

Happy Tomatoes

Things are progressing very well in the greenhouse.

Earlier this week, we replaced the wooden stakes that the tomatoes were supported by with lines strung between eyehooks in the rafters and the raised bed sills. Dave ran across this idea from The Cottage Smallholder last May, and we both thought it would be a good thing to try. Last year, though, with the half wine barrels, it wasn't quite practical. This year, with the raised beds, everything lined up really well for this project. We use the Velcro ties from Lee Valley to support the tomatoes from the lines, and they're fantastic - reusable, super easy to implement, and very soft & delicate against the tomato stalks.

As you can see, everyone is really thriving - here are some images to compare to early May when we'd just transplanted all of these guys:

Plus the middle bed now has plants in it: watermelons and cucumbers, and basil in between.

We have our first tomato flowers, many even on the bigger tomatoes (not just the cherries):

Our eggplants and peppers are doing really well; both varieties of each have really caught up. The initial transplants had the Dusky eggplants and Red Ruffle peppers ahead of the Listada de Gandia eggplants and jalapeño peppers, respectively. Everyone is looking fantastic now, and all our pepper plants are putting on little tiny flowers, which should be ready within the next few weeks for pollinating.

The eggplants all look alike, but the growth pattern of the peppers are interestingly quite different; the Red Ruffle is the one on the left, the jalapeño on the right.

So, fingers crossed that our "bumbling" hand pollinating will work again this year as well as they did last year.

Bird Feeder Visitor

Mom decided to put some birdseed out as we've got a lot of black-headed grosbeak activity around lately. While there's plenty of food for them in our neighbourhood, it's nice to have them come right by the window so we can get a good look at them.

Of course, not only birds are interested in bird seed:

And other members of the family like to take advantage of the wildlife viewing opportunities presented:

Garden Update - For Dave

Dave's on the Mainland for the next week or so, so I thought I'd provide him with a visual edition to the daily summary I've been giving him over the phone in the evenings.

Rutabega flowers (no bees today - too cold)

Sunflowers are up!!

Peas in orchard progressing (still not up in Kitchen Garden)

Garbanzos progressing

Finally, lilac open!

Grrr, the dreaded black aphids, on the currants (not the golden ones though)

Fennel transplants

Celariac transplants

Natalino transplants

Nematode originally on Grace Ward,
moved to raspberry leaf for photo op - really long (4")!!

Narcissus blooms

More asparagus up amongst the coriander

Strawberry flowers (still no berries, but so many flowers)

Rosemary flowering!

Spanish lavender blooming

Golden iris blooming (deer missed it this year, obviously!)

Sweet rocket blooms (yeah, its a weed, but so purdy!)

Greenhouse as Nursery

We also get to use the greenhouse as a transition zone for started plants before they go out into the garden. I think we're probably safe from frost now, but just in case (you never know here), we're using our greenhouse for our Cucurbitaceae seedlings. Once again, under-heat and grow lights from our friend Bob made a spectacular result for our germination rate and success. Now we just need to let them grow a little bit more before they're transplanted to their final destinations.

Squash

Last year, we had grown Blue Hubbards and Marina di Chioggia from seed, and "freebie" compost squash which turned out to be Butternuts. The hubbards were somewhat of a disappointment; however, we adore the Chioggia, and the Butternuts were also lovely, so these are what we have started this year. Since we had two C. maxima varieties last year, I had to purchase new Chioggia seed, and as Butternuts are hybrids (although are a different species, C. moschata), I needed new seed this year. We grew squash in old tires filled with horse poop last year. This year, the oak wine half-barrels have been repurposed for our Cucurbitaceae. I'm just waiting for secondary leaves to get well established on the seedlings before I move them out.

Variety	Image	Description
Marina di Chioggia		"Heirloom squash developed in Italy. Large, bumpy, dark green turban shape with sweet, orange, fairly dry flesh. Traditionally grilled at the dockside near Venice. Average 10 lbs." - Two Wings Farms
Early Butternut		"Replaces Zenith. AAS winner. Medium-sized squash are uniform on productive, semi-bush plants. Each has a small seed cavity in dark orange sweet flesh with a tender, thin skin. Matures in 110 days. (hybrid seeds)" - West Coast Seeds
Summer Squash - Gold Rush Zucchini		"This early, bright golden yellow zucchini with stunning dark green stems is produced freely on compact, easy-to-harvest plants. Its clear colour and good eating quality add interest to your summer meals. Matures in 55 days. (hybrid seeds)" - West Coast Seeds

Cucumbers

We grew Cool Breeze last year for pickling and they turned out really well. As they're self fertile without male flowers, the production rate was better than I expected. But I can't save the seeds - they're hybrids. Thought I'd get another variety to try pickling, an open pollinated one, and we'll see how they do. I'll grow the two pickling varieties in the greenhouse (to isolate the one OP variety), but the fresh eating lemon cukes grow really well outside, so that's where they'll go. I might have gone somewhat overboard on the lemon cukes, but Mom & I loved them so much last year, I wanted to make sure we had enough to nibble on all summer long.

Variety	Image	Description
Lemon Cucumber		"This heirloom was first introduced in 1894. Similar in size and appearance to a lemon, with fruits that average 2" by 3". Very easy to digest with a crisp, clear taste and an edible skin. Pick small and use them whole for snacking in the garden or as a table treat. A favourite of our local chefs. " - Full Circle Seeds
Cool Breeze		"So early it caught us by surprise! Small 10-15cm (4-6), uniform, dark green cucumbers appear well before any others because they do not need pollination; and in our wet springs, bees are not out in the rain! There are no male flowers; the plants keep producing all summer on short vines. They have no ridges and and very fine spines that rub off easily. Use for pickles or salads and sandwiches. Tolerant to powdery mildew, scab, and Mosaic virus. Matures in 45 days. (hybrid seeds)" - West Coast Seeds
Suyo Long		"Trellis these very distinctive CERTIFIED ORGANIC Chinese cucumbers for straight, dark green, 30 cm (12") long fruits. The prolific vines produce non-bitter, crisp cukes that are almost seedless and perfect for salads and pickles. The fruit has the traditional ridges with white spines that brush off easily. It can be picked at shorter lengths as well. Matures in 60-70 days. (open pollinated seeds)" - West Coast Seeds

Melon

Last year we grew "Early Dew" honeydew variety; I couldn't find seeds for them this year, and since they're a hybrid, I couldn't save the seeds last year anyway. So this year I figured we could try an open pollinated melon, and we'll see how it goes. That, and Mom's not a huge fan of honeydews anyway, but we all like watermelons. This one, too, will live in the greenhouse this summer.

Variety	Image	Description
Blacktail Mountain Watermelon		"Blacktail Mountain is an extremely early, certified organic watermelon, with flowers appearing weeks before other varieties. This cold-tolerant melon is perfect for the cool springs here on the Coast, although it may perform better under a cloche or in a greenhouse. The vines are compact and bear several 23cm (9"), melons with very dark green skin and scarlet flesh that is sweet, crunchy and full of flavour. Matures in 75 days. (open pollinated seeds)" - Full Circle Seeds

Most of these cucurbits require some help with pollination: we take the male flowers off the vine and squish them into the female flowers. Seems to work, as we had pretty good pollination rate last year. And with a new little addition to the family on the way very soon, having lots of squash for the winter will be a boon, so fingers crossed I started enough plants to meet our needs!

We also started some basil, lupines and hollyhocks, which are sitting happily in our greenhouse nursery:



We have to figure out where the perennial flowers are going to get transplanted, but the basil will get interspersed amongst the greenhouse plants, and make our tomato cucumber salads this summer that much better!

Progress of Garden

When Mom first moved back to Cobble Hill a few years ago, the property hadn't had any active gardening, at least not from the vegetable raising perspective, for a number of years.

In the first summer when Mom first arrived, we didn't get much done other than a patch of potatoes dug. It looked like a couple of graves in the lawn! And, somewhat surprisingly, the deer had chewed the new potato leaves to the ground. But we did manage to get potatoes that year, and we figured that in order for any edible food to be grown, we needed a deer fence.

So we had lawn to remove, and fencing to put up to keep the deer out. I realized recently that I haven't got any posts showing the progress from grass to garden, so I'd like to remedy that now.

The start of the deer fencing for the Kitchen Garden

Deer fencing up! - Early spring 2006

The first planting - spring 2006

We moved our dwarf heritage apple trees and some blueberries from Burnaby over to Cobble Hill and installed them in the Kitchen Garden, and built some raised beds in the next year:


In 2008 the "little mule" arrived: Dave's two-wheeled tractor, a Grillo made in Italy, which has hugely helped the conversion from raw land to garden. We decided that once we had the tractor, the raised beds were more work than they were worth, so now we just have dirt.

Dave's "little mule" set up to rototill the Kitchen Garden

And while it wasn't the first year we grew tomatillos, it was certainly a bumper crop year (which has been repeated pretty regularly since):

Tomatillos

So we keep getting a little better every year, and try new things to grow. In 2009 we had pretty much all of the Kitchen Garden under production, with chick peas (garbanzo beans), shelling and snap peas, tomatillos, brocolli, kohlrabi, carrots, beets, Chinese greens, and of course the odd left over spud from years before poking through.

Kitchen Garden 2009

Our tomatoes, peppers and ground cherries were moved out to the new greenhouse and we tried our hand at "Early Dew" melons and pickling cucumbers there, too.


And we grew a number of squash varieties and some lemon cucumbers, along with dried beans, out in the newly enclosed Orchard, which I don't seem to have photos of right now.

This year, we've done even more - I'll post photos in a while!

Greenhouse Update - Raised Beds

Last year we constructed the greenhouse, then earlier this spring Dave put in some more windows, and then last month, Dave changed the planting arrangements inside by building some wonderful raised beds to replace the half wine-barrels that we used last year:


We bought these nifty metal connectors from Lee Valley for converting concrete paving stones into the sides for raised beds. All that was needed further was to purchase the paving stones and some pressure-treated lumber from the local building supplies store. And some sand. And then lots of labour.

Dave spread some landscape fabric on top of the gravel foundation of our greenhouse, then laid some sand to level the areas where the raised beds were going to be built. On top of this went the footing for the raised beds (which are the connectors attached to the lumber). Then the pavers go upright between the brackets on top of the lumber footings.

Aligning the pavers between brackets

Tightening the brackets

Next wall of pavers

Construction complete

The raised beds are 2' deep, 2' wide, and I can't remember how long altogether, but we'll fit an awful lot of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, and ground cherries in there this year!