Welcome to Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. We finally got our first frost on Saturday morning, though it was a light one. There was frost on the grass in the yard, but not on any of the garden plants, so it looks like the warm weather veggies will keep on going for a bit longer. I found a few more slicing tomatoes and eggplants last week, which we put to good use in the kitchen. The slicers include Garden Treasure and Better Boy, and the eggplants are Nadia and Dancer.
slicing tomatoes and eggplant
I got my first taste of the 2015 AAS winner Sandy lettuce. It’s an oak leaf type, and the first AAS winning lettuce since 1985. These leaves wound up on some bean tacos, and I look forward to growing this lettuce again next year.
Sandy lettuce
And what would that 1985 AAS winning lettuce be? That would be Red Sails, and I have been growing it ever since it was released. There may be lettuces with redder leaves, but Red Sails has been one of my favorites for a long time. I did a Variety Spotlight on it last year, and it is joined by Simpson Elite in the below photo. Together those lettuces made for a nice wilted lettuce salad.
Red Sails and Simpson Elite lettuce
I also made a cutting of Speedy Arugula I had growing in a salad box in the greenhouse. I have more arugula planted and it was time to replant the box, so I harvested all of the Speedy. It is destined to have a starring role on a pizza this week.
Speedy arugula
And speaking of winners, the Cornito Giallo peppers have certainly proven to be a winner in our garden this year. And don’t they look good in the natural indigo-dyed bowl my wife made? I’ve gotten over two pounds of peppers from my one plant this year, and the ripe yellow peppers are as flavorful as their larger cousin Escamillo, which has given us even more peppers.
Cornito Giallo peppers
I cut the last head of flathead cabbage last week. It’s a variety called Tendersweet, and the one in the below photo weighed a bit over three pounds. Some of it was cooked for a side dish, and some got fermented.
Tendersweet cabbage
The cabbage went in something new I tried, a Latin American style fermented salad called Curtido (or Cortido). In addition to the cabbage, it has shredded carrots, sliced onions, garlic, jalapeno pepper, and fresh oregano. All ingredients but the carrots came from our garden. I let this one ferment on the kitchen counter for about five days, and the flavor is much like a tangy slaw. This recipe is a keeper, and I will be making it again for sure. Some recipes call for using red cabbage, or adding ground cumin, but this combo turned out very tasty. I need to start another jar, because this one won’t last very long.
jar of curtido
I got another harvest of Minero peppers for drying to make into chile powder. This a hydrid Guajillo type pepper with mild heat, and has been very productive for me this year.
Minero peppers
I don’t normally weigh the herbs I harvest, but I wanted to mention this cutting of the Georgian Flatleaf parsley. It came from a plant I dug up and replanted in the greenhouse bed to replace a plant I lost. I actually moved two large plants into there, and both survived the move just fine. Conventional wisdom says you can’t transplant parsley, but apparently these plants didn’t get that memo! It’s a great tasting parsley too, and this batch went into a bean salad.
Georgian Flatleaf parsley
Some of my 2016 pumpkins got their 15 seconds of fame last Friday when I took them for a TV appearance on the WEHT Local Lifestyles show. Since Thanksgiving is only a few weeks away, I thought pumpkins would be a good topic. You can watch the segment here: Homemade Pumpkin Pie from Our Happy Acres. Don’t worry, no pumpkins were harmed in the process! I did bake up a butternut squash I got from the grocery, to show how it makes a tasty pie. My wife turned the butternut puree into a pie, and though we left the pie for folks at the station to eat, she made one for us a few days earlier.
before the show
Harvest Monday is a day to show off your harvests, how you are saving your harvest, or how you are using your harvest. If you have a harvest you want to share, add your name and blog link to Mr Linky below. And be sure and check out what everyone is harvesting!
Before we tried pumpkin pie I imagined something completely different. I think of pies as having a pastry lid like apple pie. I do enjoy it though.
Dave, do you follow Patricia’s blog “La Chatte Gitane”? This week she made sauerkraut in a vintage pot that I think would appeal greatly to you, with your love of fermented veg: https://lachattegitane.blogspot.co.uk/2016/11/making-sauerkraut.html
Bravo for spreading the word about pumpkin pie! Pumpkins (and squashes) are not just for carving at Halloween.
Thanks Mark, I will check out Patricia’s blog. I thought about you when I made the curtido, because the cabbage I used was wonky to say the least!
Once again I find something you are growing that I’m probably going to try myself! The Cornito Giallo peppers look like they might do well in my garden. They sure are doing great for you. I wish I had some parsley going right now, I couldn’t get it to germinate well this year. Now that we’ve had some rain though I’m spotting some volunteers coming up, so perhaps it’s time to get some going.
I also want to try the red version, Cornito Rosso. I think Johnny’s has given gardeners some great hybrid peppers (Carmen, Escamillo, and the two Cornitos), and I plan on growing lots of them next year!
Red ones too! Ok, I’m game.
Some lovely harvests still and that bowl of peppers is gorgeous! I don’t think many people would consider making pumpkin pie with anything other than pumpkin so I’m sure you educated a lot of folks on that front. We should really start calling it squash pie.
I was actually quite surprised when our tomato plants kept going after we had several frosts. I suppose that most years, my plants are goners by that point so I just assumed that frost would have gotten them if they had survived into October.
I wanted to make the pie with butternut from the grocery to show that it makes a tasty pie, and you don’t need to be a gardener to do it!
Nice peppers. Do you have any advice for pruning those to bring inside? That might be something we could do to get an “early” head start next year.
I left mine fairly large after pruning (2 feet maybe), but Mark (Mark’s Veg Plot) prunes his way back. I’m not sure it makes a lot of difference.
That’s a brilliant variety of harvests Dave, very inspiring…particularly the lettuce and rocket / arugula, yummy. Nice to see you on TV again too 🙂
That’s great that your summer veggies survived the first frost. Our first one is supposed to happen this weekend. Your yellow peppers do look quite lovely in the blue bowl. And it looks like you have a nice lettuce harvest this week. For some reason I had terrible lettuce germination for my fall crop. I’m sure your pumpkins were very excited to have their moment of fame!
We have frost likely this weekend too, so I’m scurrying to get everything done this week! Your Dickinson would have fit in nicely too, and based on your growing experiences I will give it a try here next year.
Once again you have inspired me to try something new — curtido. As we have all the ingredients either in the ground or in store I shall be giving it a go. So thank you Dave!