From faithful garden correspondent Marvel:
Late harvest activities around here are always interesting, often bountiful and sometimes tres photographic.
A couple of weeks ago I pulled up the last of the cauliflower and boy-o-boy did it benefit from a few extra weeks in the ground. I had cleared out a couple of crispers for the yellow beauties, but still had to quarter ’em before I could stow them all away.
Two of my friends and I get to glean squash from a farmer friend’s field after he’s finished his big harvest. We always start out with reasonable expectations, but as we walk the acres, we get more & more excited; more & more greedy [top pic]. We wind up filling our trucks & homes with a lovely assortment. After wrangling them home, I wash ’em with a weak bleach solution & stash ’em under the nearest guest bed. (The cool thing about storing Winter squash is that they have no special temperature or humidity requirements. If we’re comfortable, THEY’re comfortable.)
A friend with whom I trade apples & the loan of a steamer/juicer contraption keeps me up-to-here in fragrant quinces. (They smell so good, after I pick them up, I leave ’em in the car for a day — the car smells TERRIFIC for weeks after!) This year, in addition to processing a gallon on ruby-colored juice (for jelly), I made quince paste (“membrillo”) — a thick, sweet spread that tastes grand served in slices over a salty cheese.
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What — if anything — is going on in your garden(s) this week?
NotMax
Intermittent rain, so lots of snails out there on
walkcreepabout. Walking around the yard can get a bit crunchy.raven
Very nice! Here’s the boss planting greens, the pic is taken from the news bedroom window.
And here are her giant plants in the new space in the basement .
currants
Marvel, your garden threads are always incredible, and your photos gorgeous. I realize some of the above is from a farmer’s field, but how much physical space do you garden? Have you come to the rotation/seasonal timing (for organizing when you plant and when you till in whatever’s left) by hard experience only, or do you have some sort of metric or guide? I’m impressed by how much you grow (and how much you seem to have time to put up, too). I find I have all I can manage right now, and thank goodness we don’t (yet) have to depend on what I grow.
Elizabelle
@raven: Beautiful garden, and Mrs. raven looks spry. The bicycle on the fence is a great touch.
@ Marvel: enjoy those winter squash, and the quince.
What are some good salty cheeses with which to enjoy membrillo? Trader Joe’s sells quince paste, and am always tempted.
Zinsky
Gardening season is over here in Minnesota and the flower beds are ready for their winter nap. Still nice here, though. It may hit 60 degrees F today, which is very rare for Minnesota in November!
Zinsky
By the way, those cauliflowers are epic! Most beautiful I have ever seen!
OzarkHillbilly
Very nice MarveI. I got a wheelbarrow+ load of winter squash and pumpkin out of my garden this year. I better enjoy them because I’m not planting any squash next year due to the infestation of squash bugs I got this year. I’m still finding them crawling about in search of someplace to wait out the winter. Add to that, NOAA says we are going to have a mild wet winter this year do to the El Nino. So do the Wooly Bear caterpillars, so it is probably going to be a very buggy summer next year..
And oh yes, let me echo Zinsky’s comment about the cauliflower. Very jealous for my part as the few times I have attempted cauliflower, all I have gotten for my efforts are whitish blue mildewy balls of vegetable matter.
JPL
The pictures are great and such a treat to wake up to. Raven, great pictures. I put my fall garden in to late and I’m jealous.
WereBear
Marvel, you are a marvel! Epic stuff!
It fires my ambition… To have a friend like you ;)
Ultraviolet Thunder
No gardening for us today. Just yard cleanup if the weather holds.
Mrs. Thunder made an awesome pie for us yesterday, the first she’s ever attempted.
Sliced apples, chopped fresh cranberries and dried cherries in a single crust. The topping is milled oats and brown sugar. It’s intense like rhubarb pie and not too sweet. Lovely Fall food.
greennotGreen
Beautiful garden pics! I have a request, though. Would the posters of Sunday garden chats tell us in what part of the country (or the world) they are? Growing those beautiful cauliflowers in the Pacific Northwest, for example, is one (very well done) thing. Growing them in the mid-south – now THAT would be an achievement!
the Conster
Beautiful, Marvel – just beauful. The quince juice picture looks like a Vermeer painting, if Vermeer painted metal lidded jars. Do you really consume all those vegetables every year? How on earth do all those squashes get consumed, and how many ways can they be prepared?
tybee
take a smallish butternut squash.
slice it down the middle lengthwise. dig out the seeds.
put a fair amount of cinnamon all over the meat side.
fill the cavity 2/3 full of ginger syrup.
you may have to use something to keep it level during the cooking process.
canning rings work pretty well.
grill until done.
or bake it if the weather is not conducive for grilling.
that works pretty well with most small winter squash.
Satby
I’ll echo all the garden plaudits Marvel, it’s always a treat to see what new pictures you’ve sent in. I tried cauliflower and broccoli two years in a row with not much to show for the effort, most of the farmers around here don’t bother either so we must not have the weather or soil for it. But I love squash of all kinds and make tons of meals out of it. Tonight is going to be spaghetti squash with cubes of eggplant and tomato in a sauce (not sure yet but leaning towards pesto).
I have several pumpkins stored to cook later, and debating if I want to make veggie curry with pumpkin later in the week too. Good stuff!
OzarkHillbilly
@tybee: My easy go to recipe is a pat of butter and a sprinkle of cinnamon or a sprinkle of brown sugar, sometimes both.
Elizabelle
@Satby: Recipes, recipes, recipes.
Elizabelle
I’d love some savory recipes for squash. Not to say can’t look them up online, but you guys have had some scrumptious ideas, over the years. (And now we have Adam S. too!)
debbie
@tybee:
Also, maple syrup.
tybee
@debbie:
yes!
Satby
@Elizabelle: Curried pumpkin soup
Satby
@Elizabelle: Tons of recipes here, but I adjust her pumpkin bread recipe to use buttermilk instead of whatever liquid is in there.
Satby
And I just use any curried veggie recipe and add cubed pumpkin for part of the potatoes or cauliflower.
Scout211
@greennotGreen:
IIRC, Marvel is in Oregon.
Marvel, beautiful produce. What an amazing garden you have.
Here in NorCal, the last of the honedews were picked and the vines pulled. There are a few ambrosia left on the vines but they will be pulled soon, too. Bugs are eating the cabbage and brussel sprouts but the broccoli, lettuce and kale are doing well.
raven
@tybee: Headed to the gulf Thursday!
Elizabelle
@Scout211: How are the areas affected by those terrible wildfires earlier this year doing? Have not been following that …
Elizabelle
@Satby: Yums. Thank you. I have every ingredient but the fresh pumpkin and coriander. Will make that. A bit later this month. It’s Indian summer weather in NoVA this week.
OzarkHillbilly
OT but a second very good read in the Guardian’s 4 part series on the poorest towns in America: Poorest town in poorest state: segregation is gone but so are the jobs
In his second dispatch from the US’s most deprived communities, Chris McGreal visits Tchula in Mississippi, where crime is high and opportunities are few
But Sandra Young’s 4 surviving children had to leave Tchula in order to just have a chance.
Germy
Interview with Buck Henry.
He discusses the American TV version of “This Was The Week That Was” and says:
Scout211
@Elizabelle:
Each new rain comes with it a landslide warning. In The Butte fire area, they have had weeks of heavy equipment working to prepare the burned areas near the roadways to improve drainage and protect the roads. Local volunteers are helping homeowners spread rice straw on their properties from runoff and potential landslides. We have had some local heavy rains but so far, no landslides.
Elizabelle
@Scout211: You’re all in my thoughts. Good luck for the continued recovery.
I love California. You are in for some interesting years, with the drought followed by an el nino.
Totes moving back one year. Not settling anywhere but a blue state, if I have a say.
Elizabelle
@OzarkHillbilly: Ta. Bookmarked. Fascinated with this topic, although behind on reading about it.
NotMax
@Germy
Kind of surprised that Nesteroff, who is usually on point with details, refers to the show as T3. That Was the Week That Was was known colloquially as TW3.
Have naught but fond memories of that program, even in spite of the smarmy David Frost hogging most of the spotlight. Don’t think I missed a single episode.
TaMara (BHF)
Beautiful. Now I want Quince for my car…to get rid of puppy funk.
Ruviana
Seems to be some life left in this thread so here’s a link to Baked spaghetti squash carbonara that is so so so good. I made it and told my brother on the left coast about it and they made it the next day. Writing about it makes me think I need to go buy another spaghetti squash…
ruemara
You have an amazing garden Marvel. And you get quinces? I haven’t even seen one in years. I love quince jam, but havent tasted it in nearly 30 years. You should make some of that with your haul. Thanks for the pictures.
max
I moved everything indoors due to freeze, and now everything is going out back again. I reshuffled everything to prepare for winter, but I still have some stuff to go.
max
[‘I need to send some pics.’]
Marvel
@currants: Re the garden: we’ve several raised beds and/or growing plots scattered over about a quarter of our .75 acre lot. Here in the Willamette Valley (OR), we can grow some veggies over Fall & Winter (under 6-mil plastic), so our garden planning (done in the quiet days in dead of Winter) includes plans for starting cold-hardy plants in beds vacated by early-year crops. We rotate plant families every few years as best we can. I start off with a well-laid scheme (http://imgur.com/tfL9Bil), but it rarely works out as smooth as planned.
Marvel
@Elizabelle: Quince paste is cool (kind of like a bright, thick apple/pear sauce) and we like it with Asiago. Some folks like it with Manchego cheese.
Marvel
@the Conster: We eat much of what we grow (frankly, we plant too much because as relative novices, we experience plenty of crop failures & under-achievement!). The extra stuff goes to our friends & neighbors and a local women’s shelter.
Marvel
@Elizabelle: One of my favorite non-soup/curry squash dishes = enchiladas w/ cubed cooked squash, a bunch of fresh spinach and pepper jack cheese. Ole!
Elizabelle
@Ruviana: Thank you. Bookmarked.
Followed some links, and found this recipe for spaghetti squash, from Dead Chef blog. (Chef is still very much alive, and cooking/living in Washington, DC area.)
Spaghetti Squash with Ricotta Salata and Black Olives
Elizabelle
@Marvel: Thank you for the recommendations. Will try them! Think I’ve had Manchego at a tapas bar and liked it.
J R in WV
@raven:
Nice looking gardening. Thanks for the pix.
It’s sunny and in the 60s here today. I have a huge backlog of stuff to do, and I’m surfing/watching Cleveland at P’burgh, rooting for the defense!
tybee
@raven:
so i heard. keep us posted on the piscatorial pursuits.
Steeplejack
I was instructed to water two plants and keep the hummingbird feeder filled while my brother’s away. I can probably handle that.
currants
@Marvel: Sorry I’m just getting back to this–it’s been a long day. I’ll try to catch you maybe next Sunday. But on the off chance… LOVED that graphic of your plans. That was incredibly helpful. How big are your raised beds? I have 6 4×8 beds, plus a section about 5-6 x 18 for asparagus (moving it in the spring–the asparagus can’t compete with the maple), a 10×15 section that was tomatoes last year but will be asparagus and tomatoes next year, and another 6×10 section that’s–well, volunteer parsley, some perennial flowers, some thyme, and melons, strawberries and rhubarb (which is moving to where the asparagus isn’t growing very well). As the only person gardening (here, also at my daughter and SiL’s), even that fairly small space (compared to yours) is hard to keep up with. Not to mention the failures–yearly. For one, I have yet to grow more than 2 zucchinis–the squash vine borers get them (and I get busy, so they win). For another, this year–dry as it was–I didn’t get the watering system set up until it was far too late. Anyway–Thank you again, Marvel. You’re inspiring, as are all of these garden chats.
Michele Quarton
Believe or not I just harvest 7 watermelons from November North Texas garden. First time grower of watermelons. We have had a warm fall. But the rain and cooler weather has arrived. So the summer parts of my garden are done. Still waiting on Broccoli and Brussels sprouts. Could be a while.