Harvest Monday September 30, 2019

Once again it’s time for Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. I got a nice haul of pole beans last week. I let some of them get big for ‘shelly’ beans, since we like the mix of pods and beans and the seeds add a lot of protein to the mix.

Turkey Craw is an exceptionally tasty bean. There are lots of different beans with this name, all having reportedly been found in the craw of a wild turkey. I got these seeds from Sustainable Mountain Agriculture Center, where I get many of my heirloom bean seeds. The pods turn pinkish as the seeds inside swell, and I shelled out quite a few of these.

I harvested a few more squashes too, mostly winter types but also Centercut which we use like a summer squash. The mini butternut called 898 from Row 7 Seed is truly a mini, and some have even been more like appetizer size. It and Festival Acorn have been very productive for me this year. The Festival is an acorn/sweet dumpling type that is more of a typical size for those classes of squash. It has a sweet, buttery taste when roasted, and is a new favorite around here.

The sweet peppers are continuing to ripen with the hot weather we’ve been having. Carmen and Escamillo are two Italian bull’s horn types that do well for me here.

I’m growing a new baccatum pepper called Aji Delight which promised the fruity flavor of the baccatums but with zero heat. It delivered, and my one plant is loaded with these sweet and juicy peppers. We’ve enjoyed them on salads, and I put a few in a salsa I made last week. I find they make for tasty snacking as well.

The drying peppers are in their prime now. I dehydrated the ones in the below photo which included Kimchi and the paprika peppers Dulce Rojo and Nora.

I got enough hot peppers to start another batch of fermented hot sauce. This batch included Emerald Fire, Honeypeno, Red Ember, Senorita and Flaming Flare.

And I got a nice harvest of the Aji Rico baccatum peppers for ferment for hot sauce. These 2017 AAS Winners have a mild heat and a fruity flavor, and make for great fresh use as well as for turning into hot sauce.

The last batch of jalapenos I fermented were ready to turn into hot sauce. Three pints of fermented peppers yielded three five-ounce bottles of thin Tabasco style sauce. It has a mild heat and a depth of flavor that the fermenting gives to the peppers. The basic process I use to ferment the peppers is here: Fermented Pepper Mash. The peppers have been productive enough this year that I’ve had plenty of hot sauce to share with friends, since I surely couldn’t eat it all myself! It’s pretty easy to find a home for the extras.

I made a cutting of collard greens last week to cook up. I’m trialing several varieties this year, and this one is called Ellen Felton Dark. It’s an heirloom variety dating back to at least the 1930s, and I got the seed from the Seed Savers Exchange. All these came from one plant, and the nine leaves weighed almost a pound! These are sturdy greens that need a long slow braising. I’m also hoping to make some collard kraut later this year.

Last but not least, I got another head of the Purple Peacock broccoli. It looks much like purple sprouting broccoli to me, though the leaves are frilly like a curly kale. I’m leaving the leaves for now and only cutting the small heads.

This week promises to be a busy one as we start putting up the new greenhouse. I’ve got someone to help me with the heavy work of that job, but I will be doing the finishing work inside with the benches, beds and shelving. I am looking forward to getting this done so I can start using it for the crops I overwinter in there.

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!