Time to Settle in for Fall

My kitchen smells absolutely wonderful.  Carol and I have been making salsa for jars all morning, it’s simmering now.  I’ll cut up some fresh cilantro to toss in and will put it all up for future.  Granola is made.  Pesto is made.  Fresh Salsa will be tomorrow’s project.  As those of you who ordered Fresh Salsa last week know, I found the price for the small container to be too much so I gave you more than originally said.  I don’t like to use plastic any more than I already do so the Fresh Salsa is priced differently and is now in a jar.  Please refrigerate and eat within 5 to 7 days for freshness.   

Fall is such a beautiful time of year.  There’s something quite settling about it.  The chipmunks and squirrels are collecting their stash of acorns for the winter.  I miss the songbirds though.  It’s so quiet without them.  The blue jays, finches and chickadees have taken their place in the trees and at the feeders.  The frogs in the pond are turning dark brown getting ready to hunker down under the leaves at the bottom.  The leaves are definitely taking their time turning.  They’ll need a few cold snaps for this to happen.  The tomato and pepper plants are losing their luster, not so much from cold but more from lack of sunlight.  It’s easy to notice these darker mornings and early-come evenings. 

It's a pretty big deal to cover and uncover each morning and 
evening (over an hour each time)
so I've decided to leave the covers on, just in case.

The Greenhouse is again the favourite place to be on these
chilly mornings.  It certainly wasn't a month ago when it
 was so blazing hot you could barely breathe.  

Consider some or all of the following fresh foods for your table this week:

Chard  $3/bag

Garlic  $3 and $2 each  depending on the size – please specify when ordering - thanks  

Herbs:  Citrus Thyme, Dill, Marjoram, Mint, Oregano, Sage, Savory, Sorrel, Thyme  $2/bunch or $5/mixed bag

Kale – limited amounts for now  $3/bag

Onions, white, yellow  $2.50/pound  

Peppers, Alma Paprika  $4/pound  

Peppers, Sweet  $4/pound

Tomatoes  $3 pound  

Tomatoes, cherry  $4 pound  

Turnip  Purple Top White Globe, large  $3/pound.

Tomato Sauce  $6 500/mL jar:  Tomatoes, Onions, Garlic, Sweet Peppers, Hot Pepper, Basil and/or Parsley and/or Oregano all grown here, Organic Olive Oil and Sea Salt not grown here.  The sauce is sealed in jars and will keep for a year on the shelf.

With Thanksgiving weekend on our doorstep, I also have Granola made with pumpkin pie spice as well as some with cinnamon

Granola, with fruit (cherries and blueberries) $8 /500mL jar

Granola, with nuts and fruit (cashews, walnuts and cranberries) $10 /500mL jar

Pesto  $4.50 /125mL jar (organic basil grown here, parmesan cheese, organic olive oil, walnuts, organic garlic grown here, sea salt, pepper)

Salsa, made fresh to be eaten right away (organic/heirloom tomatoes, onions, garlic and jalapeno peppers all grown here, fresh cilantro, a bit of lime juice and salt)  $3 / 250mL This is not sealed for shelf-life.  Those jars will come at a later date.

Sprouts:  $3/bag

Sandwich Booster  (clover, alfalfa, radish and mustard)  

Spring Salad Mix  (broccoli, radish, alfalfa & clover) 

Day Brighteners is a non-certified organic farm, where we practice sustainability and environmentally-friendly farming.  We use non-GMO seeds and products and take pride in all we do.  You are very welcome to drop by most days, but if it’s picking/packing/delivery day you take your chances on the tour.  Calling or emailing first is a good idea.  We do appreciate your business very much and would like to hear from you with any comments you have.  

If you'd like to purchase any of the above items, I'd be happy to provide them if available after our regular customers have ordered.  Perhaps you might like to be added to our Weekly Delivery List.  I send my email out every Wednesday, collect orders Thursdays and deliver Fridays (or another day convenient to us and you if you're not too close to home).  See Contact information and email or call me.  Thanks.

Until next post, have a great every day.  

Jo

Diversity in the Garden is Important

Monoculture is risky.  If I grew, let’s say, only lettuce I’d be in big trouble right now.  Why?  The lettuce seeds we sowed a month ago didn’t germinate, not one seed.  I’m totally baffled by this.  Perhaps the soil was tired?  Perhaps the seeds were blocked by the taller lettuce plants which had bolted?  I really don’t know.  This means it’s time to move on and get planting elsewhere.  I’m thinking the little greenhouse so when the seeds do germinate, it’ll be nice and warm picking in there out of the freezing fall rains and wind – ah yes there is a silver lining to every situation.  Also good is, as the previous lettuces bolted, I now have thousands, if not millions (slight exaggeration) of seeds to sow. 

Oddly enough the Salad Greens planted at the same time as the lettuces did germinate, which is what we’ve all been eating for the past couple of weeks, complemented with various other greens and herbs growing here such as chard, lamb’s quarters, lovage, strawberry spinach, celery, parsley, dill, sorrel, goutweed, orach, mustard and some edible flower petals.

But tomatoes and peppers are the key words around here these days.  We pick between 30 and 40 pounds of tomatoes a week.  If you wonder if I’m worried about the low temperatures coming up – you bet I am.  When the night time low predicted is 12C, it’s 9C in the morning here.  Tonight they’re saying 6C, so yes I am worried sick about this. 

I can't resist showing you how big some of the Marconi Sweet Peppers grew.  This plant from where this particular pepper came was in the Greenhouse with the Hot Peppers, by mistake.  That's one happy plant.  

Amazingly, I delivered over 11 pounds of Hot Peppers to Wilf & Ada's Scratch Diner 

in Ottawa yesterday.  This is on top of the 5 or so pounds delivered to them each 

week for the past couple of months.  The tiny ones are Thai peppers and the others are a mix 

of Hot Portugal (each about 10") and Hungarian Hot Wax.

This morning, we picked as many ripe tomatoes and peppers as we could, we’ll make sauces and stash the rest in the garage.  We covered the ones remaining outside with frost blanket or row cover and will hope for the best.  It’s not so much the lows but that the Nightshade Garden is in the north field where “the winds sure blow cold way out there”.   The upswing on this cold is the kale will most likely lose its bug following and begin looking beautiful again, with less holes and the carrots will be sweeter after a cold snap. 

And getting back to lettuce, it is a cold weather crop which means we’ll be enjoying salad greens for a long while now.  I’ll be growing micro-greens and shoots indoors this winter.  I, and I know you as well, dislike not having fresh greens for several months of the year.  I’ll keep basil and rosemary going indoors too.  As for the herbs outside, well they’re herbs and they just keep growing like I said last week, ridiculously. 

I like to offer tidbits of information when I can.  Do you know you can freeze Peppers?  Choose between gutting and freezing in halves OR freezing entirely whole with seeds inside OR chopping and freezing.  Put them in the freezer on trays not touching each other like when you freeze berries.  When they are completely frozen, toss them into a plastic bag and then into the freezer.  You can take out the amount you need whenever you like.  I usually freeze jalapenos whole and I cut sweet peppers in half and remove the seeds. 

I offer to you this week:

Carrots   $3/bunch

Celery  $2/bundle

Chard  $3/bag

Garlic  $3 and $2 each  depending on the size – please specify when ordering - thanks  

Herbs:  Basil, Citrus Thyme, Dill, Marjoram, Mint, Oregano, Sage, Savory, Sorrel, Thyme  $2/bunch or $5/mixed bag

Mustard Greens  $3/bag

Onions, white, yellow  $2.50/pound  

Peppers, Alma Paprika  $4/pound  if they survive the next couple of cold nights

Peppers, Sweet  $4/pound  if they survive the next couple of cold nights

Radicchio  $2/head

SALAD GREENS  (washed and table-ready)  $5/bag

Shallots  $6/pound

Tomatoes  $3 pound  if they survive the next couple of cold nights

Tomatoes, cherry  $4 pound  if they survive the next couple of cold nights

Turnips  Purple Top White Globe, really large  $3/pound

Tomato Sauce  $6 500/mL jar, made fresh this week:  Tomatoes, Onions, Garlic, Sweet Peppers, Cayenne Pepper, Basil and/or Parsley and/or Oregano all grown here and  Sea Salt not grown here.  The sauce is sealed in jars and will keep for a year on the shelf, but why would it be on your shelf for a year? 

   

Day Brighteners is a non-certified organic farm, where we practice sustainability and environmentally-friendly farming.  We use non-GMO seeds and products and take pride in all we do.  You are very welcome to drop by most days, but if it’s picking/packing/delivery day you take your chances on the tour.  Calling or emailing first is a good idea.  We do appreciate your business very much and would like to hear from you with any comments you have.  

If you'd like to purchase any of the above items, I'd be happy to provide them if available after our regular customers have ordered.  Perhaps you might like to be added to our Weekly Delivery List.  I send my email out every Wednesday, collect orders Thursdays and deliver Fridays (or another day convenient to us and you if you're not too close to home).  See Contact information and email or call me.  Thanks.

Until next post, have a great every day.  

Jo

Herbs Are Ridiculous

…ridiculous in such a way that they just keep growing.  No matter how much I cut that basil, it just keeps coming back.  Despite our harsh winter temperatures and extreme heat in summer, the perennial herbs such as oregano, marjoram, sage, winter savory, chives, lovage and the thymes all stand their ground.  Dill which was in a Spicy Salad Mix of seeds we sowed last year and/or the year before continues to re-plant itself in every garden and is true to its originality in every wonderful way.   Herbs add so much flavour to dishes and, something I haven’t even delved into, they are medicinal cures for most of what might ail us. 

I keep a variety of cut herbs standing in water on my back deck just outside the kitchen door.  It’s so handy to step out, grab a handful, bring them in, wash and dry them, chop them up and sprinkle them on most foods such as any egg dish or pizza or on fish or chicken, fold into salads, sauces or stir into soups.  I usually cut and chop extra and leave what I don’t use in a ramekin on the counter letting them dry in case I’m in a hurry and don’t have time to do the whole pluck/clean/chop/dry thing (which only takes minutes, but sometimes minutes are precious).  It’s too easy, how can you not? 

We haven’t had pea shoots or sunflower shoots lately because the chipmunks keep taking the seeds out of the trays and planting them elsewhere on the property leaving me with a tray of soilless seed mix and very few, if any, shoots.  Oh, those chippies.  I’ll start growing them indoors again now that I have my shelves set up for such activity.    

I really dislike food going bad on me so what tomatoes I don’t sell I always end up using for something.  This means Tomato Sauce is now back on our menu.  I’m using cayenne peppers in the sauce this year instead of thai.  I like these better.  There’s more of a pleasant hot pepper flavour rather than just extreme heat. 

I’ll also be dehydrating some of those tomatoes, some to make powder to keep us in the tastes of summer over the months after the plants have died back and we’re missing the real thing.  I’ll roast and freeze some too.  Oh and, of course, will make Salsa over the next couple of weeks.  In the meantime, I’ve been making Fresh Salsa with some pretty colourful tomatoes, onions and garlic all grown here.  I throw in some fresh cilantro and a bit of lime juice and salt and it’s absolutely wonderful.  It’s a regular in our refrigerator. 

When temps dropped down to 6C last Friday night, I covered the veggies in the Nightshade Garden, and again the next night.  I wasn’t about to lose plants, some of which I started in January.  The next few nights look like they’re back into summer-vegetable-growing range.  Whew. 

I would love to deliver any of the following fresh foods to you this week:

Carrots   $3/bunch

Celery  $2/bundle

Chard  $3/bag

Endive:  frisee, batavian  $3/bag 

Garlic  $3 and $2 each  depending on the size – please specify when ordering - thanks  

Herbs:  Basil, Chives, Citrus Thyme, Dill, Marjoram, Mint, Oregano, Sage, Savory, Sorrel, Thyme  $2/bunch or $5/mixed bag

Mustard Greens  $3/bag

Onions, white, yellow  $2.50/pound  

Peppers, Alma Paprika  $4/pound

Peppers, Sweet  $4/pound

Radicchio  $2/head

SALAD GREENS  (washed and table-ready)  $5/bag

Shallots  $6/pound

Tomatoes  $3 pound 

Tomatoes, cherry  $4 pound

Turnips  Purple Top White Globe, really large  $3/pound

Granola, with fruit  $8 /500mL jar

Granola, with nuts and fruit  $10 /500mL jar

Pesto  $4.50 /125mL jar (organic basil grown here, parmesan cheese, organic olive oil, walnuts, organic garlic grown here, sea salt, pepper)

Sprouts:  $3/bag

Sandwich Booster (clover, alfalfa, radish and mustard) 

Spring Salad Mix  (broccoli, radish, alfalfa & clover) 

Tomato Sauce, made fresh this week:  Tomatoes, Onions, Garlic, Peppers, Cayenne Pepper, Parsley, Oregano, Sea Salt.  It is sealed in jars and will keep for a year on the shelf, but why would it be on your shelf for a year?    

  

Day Brighteners is a non-certified organic farm, where we practice sustainability and environmentally-friendly farming.  We use non-GMO seeds and products and take pride in all we do.  You are very welcome to drop by most days, but if it’s picking/packing/delivery day you take your chances on the tour.  Calling or emailing first is a good idea.  We do appreciate your business very much and would like to hear from you with any comments you have.  

If you'd like to purchase any of the above items, I'd be happy to provide them if available after our regular customers have ordered.  Perhaps you might like to be added to our Weekly Delivery List.  I send my email out every Wednesday, collect orders Thursdays and deliver Fridays (or another day convenient to us and you if you're not too close to home).  See Contact information and email or call me.  Thanks.

Until next post, have a great every day.  

Jo