Category Archives: Garden

Garden helpers

Matthew worked on our raised bed at the community garden . . .

. . . while I photographed our furry friends.

I wielded a tool other than the camera at some point, but there is no photographic evidence.

Bed prepared and ready to plant.  It looked so pretty with the soil all turned — no gross gasoline-powered tiller required!  We planted carrot and beet seeds.  The before and after planting pictures look the same.  If all goes well, we will see evidence of life soon.

Little bit of everything

Clockwise from top left: green bean & roasted beet salad (a twist on the salad here); “Whatever,” Matthew’s name for our tossed-together sauteed summer veggie dish (eggplant, yellow squash, carrots, green zebra tomatoes, celery); grilled okra (super easy and delicious), dipped in spicy homemade catsup; and, last but not least, lentil sloppy joes, served open-face on a homemade English muffin.

This dinner was a combination of leftovers (the sloppy joes and the roasted beets) and must-go veggies from the garden and farmers’ market.  ‘Twas quite the feast!

Twisted Caprese

When Matthew suggested adding peaches to our Caprese salad last week, I reacted with a bit of skepticism.  However, having recently read Emily’s post on combining tomatoes and peaches, I was willing to give it a try.

Chopped tomatoes and peaches with fresh basil, balsamic, olive oil, mozzarella cubes, and s&p.  The verdict?  A refreshing and fun twist on a Caprese salad — we’ll still eat the traditional, non-peach, version most of the time, but we enjoyed the change.

I made a lentil and millet pilaf to round out the meal, with whatever fresh veggies struck my fancy (carrots, garlic chives, yellow squash, orange bell pepper), dressed with some garlic olive oil*, a bit of red wine vinegar, and some s&p.  I stirred in some Dijon mustard at the end, one of my new favorite ingredients.  Plus some avocado (so NOT local) for added deliciousness!

* To make garlic olive oil, simply pour some olive oil in a jar and add a couple of cloves of minced garlic (a garlic press comes in handy here, but you can also just chop it up very small).  For maximum flavor, let sit a couple of days before using.  Keep refrigerated.  A little bit goes a long way, and at a fraction of the price of buying the Garlic Gold Oil that I’ve read about on KathEats.
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Entry to Nupur’s Blog Bites 6: Potluck Edition.

No rest for the weary

Don’t get me wrong, I love all of the fabulous produce coming in from the garden and from farmers’ market purchase, but dealing with it all is A LOT of work, and it just doesn’t seem to stop.  The fridge can only hold so much, and fresh produce only stays good for so long — a demanding combination!

I spent significant portions of the last two days dealing with the influx (and more time being very stressed about it).  I’ll share just a sample of the craziness.

I chopped and blanched carrots for freezing.  We grew 10+ pounds of carrots in six square feet of garden space — not a bad yield!

I roasted eggplant to make baba ghanoush.  (By the time I finished with everything else yesterday, I didn’t have the energy to actually make the baba ghanoush, that’s on the list for today.)

An axe or circular saw would have been an appropriate tool for splitting this spaghetti squash.  Fortunately, that was the hardest part.  I transformed the squash into a dish that was a huge hit at the vegetarian potluck last night 🙂 (stay tuned for the recipe, another simple and delicious creation).

Speaking of the vegetarian potluck, our friends created some fabulous dishes —  so fun to try new things and share ideas and inspiration!  Mmm, the green chutney.  The chef intended it to top the dumplings, but I intentionally ended up with green chutney on about half the food on my plate.

Now it’s back to the kitchen for this girl.  First to scratch up some lunch, then to tackle that baba ghanoush.