Beauty in a Bowl

Today's garden produce found its shape in a lovely gazpacho inspired salad. I was about to make gazpacho but decided that a blended soup is not always as visually appealing. Therefore, I kept the veggies in their chopped form and simply kept it as a salad. All of the veggies featured in my dish today were straight from my garden. I'm so thankful for freshness, nutrition, color, beauty, and tastiness found in my home-grown veggies.

• 2 large heirloom tomatoes
• 1 large red sweet bell pepper
• 1 large cucumber, peeled
• 1 extra small yellow onion
• handful of purple basil
• sprinkle of sea salt and black pepper
• generous spoonful of sheep's milk feta cheese
• several nice splashes of balsamic vinegar
• several nice splashes of olive oil

Isn't it beautiful?

I also added some garbanzo beans for a little added protein.

Squash Season

Tis the season for summer squash overload! I have been eating it numerous times a day, everyday, for the past several weeks. I usually eat it whole-heartily for a while until the squash bugs take over and kill my plants. Usually by then I'm ready for them to die. Although there are numerous recipe collections using squash online I usually don't even get to trying them. I thought I might share the methods of my squash eating as I have answered numerous requests lately for what to do with squash.

• Simply slice or dice, saute in a bit of butter, add desired seasonings and call it magic! This is probably my most frequent eating method. I like a little cumin, paprika, salt and pepper added. Sometimes I get crazy and sprinkle nutritional yeast on top for a cheesy nutty flavor. I eat this with my eggs almost everyday.
• Shred it, mix it with some more random spices, cheese, thickener of some kind like bread crumbs or cornmeal or specifically green pea flour and hemp seeds and make it a pancake. Once you have a thick mixture, slap it into a skillet and brown on both sides for a zucchini fritter type delicacy. Here's a picture of my creation last night!

• Pickle the suckers just like they were cucumbers! They certainly don't turn out as crunchy and crisp as pickling cucumbers would but they still are tasty pickled creations.
• Make a tasty fritatta like I did today for the kiddos at the Summer Feeding Program. I shredded the zucchini and potatoes and sauteed with onion. Then poured a bunch of farm fresh eggs on top, added some cheese and let cook into a delightful healthy veggie filled fritatta. The kids loved it too!
•  Of course most people know that zucchini lends itself pretty excellently in a quick bread or cake. Tonight I made my first batch of zucchini muffins and I'm pretty proud because these do not involve a pound of sugar and they are quite tasty. Find the recipe here.

On another squash note, I have started harvesting my first acorn squash. I have honestly never grown a successful crop of winter squash variety because my plants always get devoured by squash bugs before they produce anything. Praise the Lord, these acorn squash grew out of my compost that I had buried in the garden and they were a complete surprise when I found the wonderful squash ready for picking!

Got any other brilliant ideas for using the abundance of summer squash? Please leave a comment and let me know how you prefer to eat these tasty treats!

Community Garden

Our Community Garden brings great joy to my heart. I've spent a decent amount of time in the space over the past several weeks since returning to Abilene and already I have decided it is well worth the effort and perseverance that it took to see it come to fruition. It is continually a work in progress but just in the past couple of weeks I have observed several great moments.

• On a personal level, I love having the space to grow all my crazy vegetables!
• I have thoroughly enjoyed spending time with others measuring things out, hauling wood chips, sharing ideas, and planning for demonstration garden ideas. 
• Already I've observed gardeners helping each other out with garden knowledge and sharing of time and watering skills.
• I got to watch a family of four plant their plot. Pretty great interactions between Mom & Dad and teenage boy and elementary age girl. Youngest is sprawled out on the soil at one end of the plot while Mom orders the rest of the family around and then noticing small child is taking a nap snaps her back into planting action. So great. They also put down some serious newspaper and leaves mulch.
• There is apparently an older garden couple that bring in a small generator and electric tiller to till the one foot space between their rows. They have the prettiest plot ever! Today I used it for some photo opps since mine is covered in grass that desperately needs to be covered in mulch.
• I've even already been blessed with vegetables from a kind sharing garden neighbor. The asparagus given to me did not come out of the community garden but still to think that we are a bunch of sharing generous folks is beautiful.
• Tending the soil and nurturing the tiny seeds that produce abundant crops is just a holy indescribable process. Praise the Lord!

Basement beginnings

Oh the things that go down in basements, treasures I tell you! I decided to go ahead and plant the remaining seeds that I have from the past two years, so this was the first weekend to think about starting my cool season crops. I am fully aware that seed does stay good for much more than 2-3 years so it's now or never for most of it. Although I haven't had the greatest luck with my own seedlings the past two years, I still end up saving a ton of money by starting my own seeds so I decided to go for it again. As I ventured down to the basement to set up my system of grow lights and warming pads I had to do a bit of organizing first. Although last year's growing season was the worst ever we still manage to have a stockpile of canned goods. Basically, in the event of a natural disaster we are going to survive on disgusting looking plums, pears of all forms, pickled products, and some salsa. It could be interesting eating. 

But onward with the anticipation of a GREAT growing season this year. Seriously, if I don't get any tomatoes this year I will be moving somewhere where it's not 100 degrees 24/7 for two months in a row. Please dear Lord provide just enough heat but not too much!

I started seed for cabbage, brussel sprouts, and lettuce! The beginnings of my garden season, so exciting!

Holy HOT!

Sunday we set a record for 111 degrees in Kansas! No wonder each time I went outside to hang my laundry I started sweating after 10 seconds in the heat. It is miserable, but the garden is still alive!

 My corn both in town and on the farm is giant! The stalks are literally way over 6 feet tall.

Okra is a coming!

My organic zucchini still surviving the squash bug attacks.

Feelin' Hot Hot Hot

It is mighty hot out there. I got up early this morning and thought about going running but decided to head out to the farm for some garden work instead. It was about 75 degrees when I was driving out at 7am and it quickly got up to the 95-100 degree mark. At least today there is a bit of a wind but hello hot, humid Kansas summer in the beginning of June!

I first harvested some lettuce. I don't think we'll get much more, with all this heat it is quickly turning bitter. I then went to town weeding and mulching. I dug out some of the tomato cages, staked some of the bigger tomatoes and then planted some winter squash and some more basil. I officially filled up the entire garden space. 

Potatoes on the left with green beans

My biggest tomato plant. Go baby go!

Like a diamond

First planting of corn.

Cabbage and potatoes in the distance

My second and third plantings of corn.

Urban Garden

I planted two gardens this year. I planted my garden as usual at the family homestead and then when given the opportunity to plow up the back yard of my quad-plex apartment I jumped! Thus births my urban garden. It's small to me, although in comparison to the few I've noticed in my neighborhood, pretty large. My first attempts at planting resulted in a nice deconstruction by the neighborhood rabbits. I was so mad, they demolished everything. I then replanted some tomatoes, put up some makeshift cages and left for a week of vacation. I was delighted to come home from vacation and still have a garden. My tomatoes, peppers, beans, and squash are doing quite well now. I have also planted corn and plan to put in some okra and more beans soon.

I'm really enjoying my little cucumber bed I created.

Rain barrel installed thanks to landlord Bob!

This picture is horrible. I must mulch in the next 5 minutes as well.

A few pots just to be safe and up and away from critters. 

Fresh Start

I was very excited last week when my grow lights finally arrived in the mail. They were delayed due to extreme weather conditions or a natural disaster. (That's what my confirmation email said!) This week has been crazy so it wasn't until this morning that I finally got one of the two light systems put together and some seeds started. 

Notice the adjustable height on the light fixture

Lettuce and Cabbage

 I have a random array of seeds. I ordered my new seeds this year from Seed Savers. They are a fabulous organization out of Iowa. I also have some leftover seeds from my last year's supply. Then we also have some  freebie seeds Dad and I got at a conference earlier this fall. 

Grow little seeds, grow!

On another note we have an official meeting scheduled for people interested in starting a community garden in Abilene! I have been attempting to make contacts with people for quite some and see what the possibilities may be. Thanks to some help from the local extension office we have a meeting scheduled for next week.  I'm also going to meet with a local board this next week to see if they might have some land to use. This is very exciting to see come together!