eat! craft! live!

Gardening? In Texas? In July?

Well, it's still unbearably hot. It feels a lot like this:

But after a whole lot of this:

We've got some of these:

Small reward for all the mulch, water and love that goes into our garden, but what did we expect? It is summer in Texas after all...

:: photo friday :: flowers, inside and out

:: inside ::

:: outside ::

:: photo friday :: planting

:: we may have bought too many pepper plants...if such a thing is possible! ::

garden update

Last week I was struck by the sudden urge to get some of our plants in the ground. We'd had jalapeños sitting in wee pots on the porch for a couple weeks and I figured they would really love to have a chance to stretch out their roots!

Our basil is sprouting quite nicely.

The beets are just beginning, albeit a little late. The first batch was rudely dug up by some enterprising young critter so we moved the giant pot to the porch and planted anew.

The catnip we planted has taken off and is growing like crazy!

I had almost given up hope that the second set of zucchini seeds would sprout. For some reason it took several weeks...but they are up now! And so, we will have two zucchini plants. (Which, if they produce anything like I'm used to, will be more than enough for our two hungry mouths.)

One of my favorite things about our garden is the unexpected iris flower. Previous tenants planted bulbs all along the side of the house and we didn't know they were there until the first spring we lived here. That was last year, and the weather was so unseasonably hot and dry (yes, even for Texas!) that there were only a few sad little yellow blooms. This year we've had an ongoing riot of purple, white and yellow to grace our walkway! So wonderful.

I've really been enjoying reading about what everybody is looking forward to this summer! If you haven't yet, make sure to leave me a comment on this post for a chance to win some lovely (*ahem*...if I do say so myself...) yarn! I'll pull two names out of a hat on Wednesday.

:: photo friday :: warming up

Austin area farm tours

Before you go thinking that I've gone totally cabbage-crazy, let me reassure you - this post is not about cabbage. Not entirely about cabbage anyway. This lovely little cabbage was one of many growing at Boggy Creek Farm last Friday. (I've mentioned them before.) No, this post is actually about farming. Because, secretly, in the dark recesses of my imagination, I harbor a deep longing to have a bit of land and the ability to grow my own food. So when I saw that the Texas Organic Farmers & Gardeners Association was having its annual conference not too far from here...and that Joel Salatin was going to be giving the keynote address...well...I got just a little excited. Until I saw the price tag for what the weekend would cost if M and I were to both go. And until I found out that the banquet where Joel Salatin would be speaking was, in fact, already sold out. Le sigh.

Despite the fact that I was unable to attend the conference itself, there were several farm tours that were free and open to the public - two of them right here in Austin! So on Friday, I managed to drag M out of bed fairly easily, and we hopped on over to Boggy Creek Farm for a few hours. I had no idea what to expect, but the large enthusiastic crowd was not it! We pulled up a bit late but were by no means the last folks on the grounds. For those of you unfamiliar with Boggy Creek, it is a certified organic urban farm located in East Austin near, you guessed it, Boggy Creek, which at one point was probably a lovely natural creek but which now is more of a drainage ditch. They have a farm stand every Wednesday and Saturday morning and another location in Milam County that grows the main tomato crop, among other things. We used to frequent the place before we discovered Greenling and frankly it's been good for our relationship that I don't wake M up absurdly early on Saturday mornings to go get fresh eggs anymore. I still have a soft spot in my heart for Boggy Creek and if I had my own transportation, I would probably still head over every Saturday, if only for the atmosphere. (And some goat milk ice cream!)

The tour was very educational. We learned about crop rotation, composting, crop placement, water (more on that later), the benefits of growing flowers, shade cloth and more. None of it was groundbreaking, stop-the-presses sort of news to me, but it was useful and interesting nonetheless. One thing I had forgotten about is the benefit of having flowers near your crops - it attracts beneficial insects that will prey upon the "pests," keeping them out of your crops! We learned about techniques used at Boggy Creek for planting, organic weed and pest control, watering and more. The use of shade cloth on the hoop house amused me. Growing up as I did in the northeast, hoop houses were greenhouses only, used for making things warmer and getting a head start on the growing season, not to drape shade cloth over in order to protect plants from the brazen heat of summer!

After Boggy Creek, we headed over to El Chile for some delicious tacos and gaucamole before moving on to a new farm to us - Green Gate Farms. Green Gate is further out of town than Boggy Creek, but it's still not far. I had my doubts that going to two farms in one day would be anything but a repeat of information, but I was very, very wrong. Boggy Creek and Green Gate couldn't be more different. Where Boggy Creek is an established urban farm, Green Gate is a struggling, new attempt at farming in a decidedly less urban area. (You have to turn onto a street entering into a trailer park to get there.) Where Boggy Creek is relatively lush (for dry Texas), Green Gate is dry and dusty. Where Boggy Creek has chickens, Green Gate has goats, pigs, a very friendly dog and some equally friendly cats.

Green Gate is a relatively new farm - maybe three years old, if I remember correctly? And because of their location, they've got it a lot harder than some other farms. It's mostly flat where they are, and almost treeless. The wind picks up speed over the rolling landscape and by the time it smacks into the farm, it can be quite strong and carrying a not insignificant amount of trash and debris. The water is not as abundant as at Boggy Creek - and you could hardly call it abundant there to begin with! Both farms have had to dig wells in recent years because older, shallower ones had dried up for the first time. For a good look at the water crisis involving central Texas farms check out this article in the most recent Edible Austin.

Basically, the deciding factor here is water. It is vitally important and without it...nothing. Sure, there's city water for some folks but the cost of watering an entire farm with city water? Outrageous. Green Gate has a potentially ingenious system involving a high water storage tank and solar powered pump, but it's not currently up and running.

I'm genuinely glad we went to both farm tours. There were similarities, sure, but the differences were the most educational. Go visit a farm sometime...it really makes you think about where your food comes from!

For more photos from the farm tours, head over to my Flickr set. You may have already met the pigs. ;)

:: photo friday :: scenes from a neglected garden

at least it's not *just* me!

We had high hopes for our garden this year.  I went to the nursery at the end of our street, we went to Home Depot, we went to the farmer's market, we found pots and soil and watering cans and a gutter to protect our tomato babies.  And what have we to show for all our hard work and money spent?  Some dried basil. Let me tell you what we planted:

• zucchini (4)
• tomatoes (4)
• basil (4)
• eggplant (1)
• peppers (7)
• tomatillo (1)
• rosemary (1)
• dill (1)
• tarragon (1)

One poor zucchini got dug up by some wily suburban forest creature.  The other zucchinis can't take the heat and droop sadly every afternoon, their floppy leaves brushing the dirt forlornly.  The rosemary and dill died. The tarragon is doing fine, only I've discovered I'm not actually very fond of it. The tomatillo is happy but small and fruitless. Almost all the peppers are losing their now-yellowed leaves, leaving sad little stalks poking out of the soil with maybe a tiny jalapeño holding on for dear life.  The tomatoes are big and lush, but the flowers are not setting fruit.  (Not a single one!)  The eggplant is the only thing that seems to be doing well (except the basil, which has really taken off) and is the size of a small bushy tree.  But even it only just decided to grace us with a baby!

Such high hopes we had!  Last summer we had a patio garden and an eggplant that never did anything.  But we did harvest tomatoes and a plethora of peppers!  Last summer was cool.  Wet.  Completely unlike any Texas summer I'd ever seen.  And so, naturally, we thought that if we got that many peppers last year, imagine how well they would do this year, since peppers aren't exactly known for their intrinsic love of cool, wet environments.  But.  No.  Turns out that this year has been just too damn hot and dry for them!  We do have a little cherry red pepper, and a teeny bell pepper and a couple of itsy bitsy jalapeños that haven't grown any in a month. But it's so sad!  We're smart people, we know how to garden.  But it just goes to show how even the best of us can get foiled by Mother Nature.  Because, honestly, I was starting to think I had lost my green thumb, until I was reading a local farm update discussing the unusually hot, dry weather and how the tomatoes were setting less fruit than usual.  Which of course makes me feel bad for the farmers but also happy that I'm not just a complete horticultural moron.  It's not just me!

So I'm going to keep watering those thirsty tomatoes and zucchinis and try to encourage my peppers and watch my lone baby eggplant like a hawk.  And hopefully, hopefully, we'll end up with more than just pots full of sticks and pretty yellow tomato flowers.

happiness is a warm tomato

Nothing makes me happier on a Saturday morning than going out to the farm.  (Except maybe going out to the farm and not having all the eggs be gone already!)  I love to wander around in the fields and through the yard, drinking in all the sights and sounds of the luscious summer morning.  There's always chickens scattering underfoot, little kidlets wandering around and adults looking particularly benevolent in the early summer sun. 

My trip to the farm was intended to result in some nice fresh eggs (for quiche) and some little cukes (for pickling) but sadly I was denied on both fronts.  Nothing beats those farm fresh eggs!  Disappointed as I was, I still managed to find a good amount of food to fill my bag - local tofu, an armful of ripe tomatoes, eight perfect little jalapeños and a few nice onions.  Since my hopes of making pickles were dashed upon the rocky shores of reality, I decided on the spot to make salsa instead!  (I just had to make something to fill the pantry!)  Luckily, I managed to get exactly the right amount of everything, without having looked at a recipe beforehand.  How's that for good luck?

I'll be posting the salsa recipe I used a little bit later, probably tomorrow because tonight is a busy night filled with exciting happenings!

yes, the basil is done!

Ah...what a wonderful day...

So the basil is finally dried! I used a combination of common sense and information from this website. It all started a couple days ago when I realized that the basil was getting enormous in its delicate little pots on the front stoop, so I decided to prune it. (The above photo was taken a few weeks ago, back when it was little!) For those of you who have never grown basil - it grows fast! And whenever you prune it, it just makes it bushier. What you do is clip it through the stem right above a pair of leaves and it will form two new stalks where before there was one. Marvelous! And you can cut off a hefty sized portion of the plant and it will be happier than ever. Isn't nature great?

I gathered my fragrant leaves, washed and dried them gently but thoroughly, pulled the leaves off their stems and put them on paper towels without touching.

I stacked them gently on top of one another, probably 5 or 6 layers, put them on a small baking sheet and stuck them in the (turned off) oven.

We have a gas stove, so the oven is always a little warm from the pilot light. That was enough heat to do the trick over the course of about three days! Every day I checked them and plucked off the ones that were dry already. The littlest ones finished first. They now all live in a little baggy in the freezer to keep fragrant and fresh. I very gently squeezed the air out of the baggy so they would stay fresher, but make sure not to squeeze them too much or you'll release their delicious aromatic oils too soon!

I was going to tell you all about the wonderful evening I had today, but I think I've gone on long enough... I'll just leave you with one last photo that epitomized my glorious evening...

I may or may not have a chance to post tomorrow...I'm unexpectedly going to be an extra for a movie tomorrow evening, so we'll see! Have a beautiful night!