Welcome to Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. The harvests here are slowing down, with the exception of the peppers which are coming on strong and finally ripening. I got a nice picking of peppers from my container grown Cayennetta plant last week. They are now fermenting on the kitchen counter, and after a couple of weeks I plan to turn them into a Sriracha-Style Hot Sauce. I added a few Aji Golden to the mix just because I had a handful of ripe ones ready. I have some Sriracha I made a year ago with fermented Aji Angelo peppers, and I have really enjoyed using it in the kitchen. We’ll see how this version turns out.
Cayennetta peppers
Also coming in were more sweet peppers. In the below photo it’s the round Pritavit along with the orange Glow, red Cece and Lipstick in the top row along with the red Carmen in the bottom row. They’re hanging out with my candidate for the Most Productive Squash award, a Tromba d’Albenga. I’ve brought in 66 pounds of them this year, and we have been well supplied to say the least! I also harvested a few more of the Cornito Giallo and the Cornito Rosso peppers last week which were camera shy. I used the tromboncino as a base for a Kung Pao chicken stir fry, spiralizing it into ‘toodles’ and blanching them for about 5 minutes in boiling water.
Pritavit, Glow, Cece, Lipstick and Carmen peppers with tromboncino squash
The stir fry called for some greens, so I cut a Joi Choi pac choi and a Miz America mizuna from one of the cold frame beds. Slugs had eaten on the pac choi leaves but it was still all quite edible after a good rinse. I think the spicy Miz America goes well with the milder Joi Choi.
Joi Choi and Miz America
Another super productive squash is the Dickinson pumpkin. I set out two vines, in case one didn’t make it, and both wound up doing quite well, vining all over the place and making 68 pounds of pumpkins. The one on the left wasn’t quite fully mature, but I was ready to pull up the vines and plant a cover crop in that bed. It should ripen up nicely in storage. We’ll be looking to give away some of those pumpkins, or else we’ll be doing a massive pie bake-athon and giving those away.
Dickinson pumpkins with tromboncino squash
I cooked one of the Dickinson pumpkins on Saturday, and I am very pleased with the results from that first taste. I cut it in half, removed the seeds, and put the halves cut side down in a baking dish before baking uncovered in a 400°F oven for an hour. The flesh is thick inside the hard rind, and it had a rich taste after baking, mildly sweet and fairly dry with not a lot of moisture after cooking. The pumpkin weighed 7.75 pounds before cleaning out the seeds and baking, and yielded right at 4 pounds of puree, which I think is a good return. I froze 3 pints for later use and made a batch of Maple Pumpkin Custard with the rest.
inside of Dickinson Pumpkin
I got another picking of the late planted bush beans. I’ve gotten right at 5 pounds from my little 10 foot row, and we have really enjoyed them. The pole beans are mostly done for, and this late planting has given us another taste of fresh snap beans. We’ve got quite a few in the freezer, but the fresh ones are good for things like roasting which you can’t do with frozen ones.
Derby snap beans
Also coming in, I got a small but powerful harvest of horseradish. The roots didn’t get real big, but they were still quite flavorful. After peeling, I grated them by hand on a Microplane coarse grater, which gave it just the Goldilocks consistency I like – not too fine and not too chunky! I added a pinch of salt and a little white wine vinegar before putting it in a jar and refrigerating, where it should keep for several months. I got about a cup of the grated root, which will keep us supplied for a while. We most often use this mixed with mayonnaise for a horsey sauce, but I plan on using some of it to make a batch of horseradish kraut when the fall cabbage is ready. It also makes a nice addition to homemade mustard, and to a cocktail sauce.
horseradish roots
I got a couple of cuttings of lettuce from the greenhouse plantings. This is a mix of varieties I had growing in a salad box.
lettuce from greenhouse
And I got more peppers for drying and smoking. It’s the NuMex Primavera jalapenos and Biggie Chili posing with my trusty Kuhn Rikon snips in the below photo. I smoked all these peppers on Saturday, and they are dehydrating now on the front porch.
hot peppers for smoking
I also got peppers for making into paprika. The Hungarian Magyar made some lovely peppers with a dark red color. They’re on the right in the below photo. The rogues that were supposed to be Dustbowl Paprika peppers are on the left, which look and taste more like jalapenos than the mild paprika peppers I ordered. I smoked them too, where they should at least be good for chile/chipotle powder. There’s a couple of long Doux Des Landes in the middle which I’m drying up for paprika too.
peppers for paprika
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!
Our squash always have a rock hard skin are any of yours easier to cut into.
The skins are usually quite tough on ones I grow. The Dickinson wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.
Red and green, with orange too! Beautiful stuff. I really like the way the Dickinson pumpkin looks cut open. I’m just so bummed the winter squash has done so poorly here the past two years. I have a pot of horseradish that I’m planning to pull after several frosts, which I read improves it. I think we’ll preserve it just the way you suggest. But what the heck is “horsey sauce?” With mayonnaise? Oh, I get it now.
I know the experts recommend waiting for a frost before digging the horseradish, but I couldn’t wait!
It would be interesting to compare the Pritavit with the Gogosar pepper that I’m growing, although I have a hard time imagining a “tomato” pepper that is better than Gogosar. 🙂
My Aji Goldens are just starting to ripen and as you mentioned they ripen about the same time as the Aji Angelos. It’s been interesting to compare the growth habits of the various Aji’s that I’m growing this year. There’s still two that have only green peppers. It’s nice that the various varieties don’t all ripen at the same time.
The Tromba squash are super productive, my 2 plants have produced 80 pounds so far!
Well, you’re not going short on harvests yet Dave 😀
I think I might have to start tucking into my winter squashes properly soon…yours look too tempting.
All those peppers make me so jealous! I just pulled out all my plants and picked the few green peppers that were left – I’m looking forward to next year as I KNOW that my peppers will be MUCH better (fingers crossed!) The sriracha sounds amazing Do you simply store it in the refrigerator? I’m surprised that it keeps for a full year.
And two thumbs up on the tromboncino – I’ve also been swimming in squash in the past couple of months thanks to that variety. The freezer is well stocked!
The sriracha has vinegar in it, and it does keep for a year when kept refrigerated.
Thank you for the idea of maple pumpkin custard. Our winter squash harvest has been decent this year, so we have enough to use for a dessert.
Have you tried horseradish stirred lightly into steamed kale? Surprisingly delicious.
I’m always a sucker for squash updates, and it’s been fun reading back posts and seeing how amazing your winter squash haul was this year! Jumping back to a few posts prior, I’m glad to hear the Tetsukabuto ended up being quite tasty. Did any of the seeds look filled out? I had one about half ripe on the vine before I had to leave town, and am hoping that I’ll have something edible when I get back despite five weeks of no watering… fingers crossed! At the very least I’m curious to see if it possibly produced some viable seed.
Also, that interior shot of the Dickinson pumpkin is very informative — it’s so hard sometimes to find those sorts of pictures when choosing new varieties, and I really appreciate you posting them! It can really help with the decision making process. 🙂
I didn’t notice if the seeds were filled out or not! I will try and remember to check the next one I cook up. I have one on the menu soon for a lentil and squash dish.