Weighing In The Taters

I coerced Papa Pea into helping me dig up two rows of the potato patch this morning. These were the two rows that had gotten hit especially hard with blight and had virtually no vines left so I knew the potatoes in the soil weren't going to be doing any more growing.

I had dug up a portion of one of these rows a week or so ago to get some potatoes to eat because we haven't had any for ever so long, and I had a real hankering for some potato salad, plus my dear hubby had been dropping hints about how long it had been since we had had mashed potatoes and gravy. Potatoes have been selling at our organic co-op in town for $1.99 a pound and knowing I had some in the garden kept me from paying that. (I did get my potato salad after he got a meal of Swiss Steak, Mashed Potatoes and Gravy and Green Beans.)

I had taken 2-1/2 pounds when I raided the patch the other day and this morning we harvested another 9-1/2 pounds. So we got a total of 12 pounds from two rows each approximately 15 feet long. Admittedly, not a very good harvest.

The potatoes we sampled last week were solid, crisp and good flavored so these should be the same. The size has been disappointing though. I have a LOT of golf ball sized ones and only maybe three that I would call big. The rest are small to medium.

Now it'll be interesting to see what the other four rows in the patch yield. They will be our main crop of keepers for the winter . . . or as far into the winter as they will take us, so I'll leave them in the soil for a while yet.

A Short Garden Walk

Short because the skeeters were bitin' like crazy!

Have you ever seen so many green tomatoes? I really hope these don't all ripen at once. Heck, what am I saying? I just hope they ripen!

We be growin' some BIG pumpkins. So far, we be growin' some big, GREEN pumpkins. Not much orange showing on this one yet, huh?

This is my fall broccoli. Just barely reaches 5" tall. Not nearly as hale and hardy looking as Sue's fall broccoli. (Waaah!) Oh well. If we have a long fall, it just might make it yet. I only have sixteen servings (for two) of broccoli in the freezer from our main crop so I'd like to bump that number up a bit, if possible.

Not harvesting anything from the garden in the last couple of days except stealing a few onions for cooking. I'm giving beans away to anyone who will take them. I planted one fifteen foot row of green beans and one fifteen foot row of yellow wax beans and I cannot believe how prolific they have been this year. If nothing else, we can for sure chalk this up to a good bean year.

A Switcheroonie

After recently proclaiming that fall weather energizes me, today I was hit smack in the noggin with all that needs to be done around ye ol' homestead, both inside and out, before fall is plumb gone and Old Man Winter comes roaring onto the scene.

This has led to the disappearance of even a smidgeon of energy in my entire body and the appearance of something close to paralysis in the ability to do anything.

So what's the real problem here?

Seem to be in the summer, I'm perpetually trying to finish up chores I should have accomplished in spring.

Fall finds me scrambling to tie together a boatload of tasks I was sure I would get done in the summer.

Then winter . . .

Well, you see the pattern here.

Not intentionally meaning to sound ouchy and grouchy, just thinking out loud of changes I'd like to (need to) make because when I'm feeling that the hurrier I go, the behinder I get it doesn't leave much time for enjoying the here and now. (Wow, so insightful, Mama Pea, she says with eye roll.)

Well, there is no one who can make the changes but me. So I'm off to get ready for bed early, sit down with a glass of wine, paper and pencil and see if I can rearrange my less than satisfying modus operandi in order to regain some of that crisp, autumnal energy.

What's A Girl To Do With A Ton Of Fresh Cucs?

Since we're currently luxuriating in an abundance of lovely, crisp, crunchy, fresh cucs, I went looking for a new recipe in which to use them with dinner last night. And I found a real winner.

Have you ever come across that one special cook book in which you find a kajillion recipes that are so, so good? Well, this one is like that for me. Seems that reaching for this blue and white check book can't help but yield another great tasting recipe. It's put out by Taste of Home books and I took the following recipe for Sesame Cucumber Salad directly from it. Didn't make many any changes at all except that I didn't have green onions so substituted red onion rings instead.


SESAME CUCUMBER SALAD

8 cups thinly sliced cucumbers
1 tablespoon salt
2 green onions, sliced
1 garlic clove, minced
2 to 3 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons vinegar
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon sesame seeds, toasted
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Place cucumbers in a colander. Set the colander on a plate; sprinkle cucumbers with salt and toss. Let stand for 30 minutes. Rinse and drain well. In a bowl, combine the onions, garlic, soy sauce, vinegar, oil, sesame seeds and cayenne. Add cucumbers and toss to coat. Cover and refrigerate until serving. Yield: 8-10 servings.

I did toss and stir the cuc slices in the marinade a couple/few times in the four hours I had it in the refrigerator before dinner.

What to do with more cucs today? Today's going to be an easy day on the cook. Leftovers from last night and lots of fresh veggies from the garden (including cucs, of course) with a good dip.

Happy Sunday to you all!

It Was A Dark and Stormy Night . . .

Okay, it was dark but not really stormy . . . unless 40 mph winds qualify as a storm. Well, yeah, I guess it WAS a windstorm!

At any rate, we were kept awake tossing and turning for most of last night. Hubby finally gave it up and got out of bed at 4 a.m. I think knowing he was up and "on watch" enabled me to fall into a deep slumber from which I didn't awaken until almost 7.

Although we had no real damage from the wind, my poor row of cosmos in the field garden did not fare well. I even had some of them that looked a little vulnerable staked but most of the row is laid low and broken today. No great loss, I suppose, since they weren't blooming very well anyway.

I was most worried about the sunflowers that are getting close to ten feet tall . . . without showing any sign of blossoming yet, I have to add. None of them got blown over, but you can tell from which direction the wind was blowing by looking at them now!

We have definitely had a shift away from summer weather and are experiencing a fall-like feeling in the air. A few weeks ago, I thought I'd never utter the words, "It's a little chilly in here this morning, isn't it?" but that's how I felt when I finally got out of bed this morning. Although it's hard to define, there is just that "feel" to the air that says autumn is rushing in and pushing summer out.

Our temperatures for this week are forecast to only get to the high 60s or low 70s during the day with night temps dipping down to the low 50s and high 40s. Such perfect weather for being outside doing what needs to be done OR doing something (wild and crazy) like actually taking off on a hike or canoe paddle.

I do love fall. It energizes me in the same way spring affects most people. I'm more than ready to have the cooler temperatures. Even if they did come in on 40 mph winds.

Can You Believe This?

We knew there was one of our little red pine squirrels who had gotten into our feed room. Papa Pea set a live trap in there, but we've had no luck catching him.

This is what hubby just discovered. That dang little rodent chewed this hole in the solid wood frame of the window to make his escape. (I hope he got splinters in his gums.)

That may be a bit of a challenge to patch.

I think open season on squirrels has just begun on this little homestead.