How does your Garden grow?

Astronuc

Caponata - a Sicilian specialty, which varies slightly from one part of the island to another, but it always contains eggplant, onion, celery, tomato and capers. It is traditionally served at room temperature.

4 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp sugar
1 onion, sliced
3 tbsp chopped fresh flatleaf parsley (to garnish)
12 black olives, pitted
2 celery stalks, sliced
1 eggplant, diced
5 plum tomatoes, chopped
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
3 tbsp red wine vinegar
salt - a pinch or less, or to taste

2 tbsp capers (mandatory in Sicily, but optional outside)


1. Heat 32 tablespoons of olive oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pan. Add the onion and celery and cook over low heat, stirring frequently, for 5 minutes, or until softened. Add the remaining oil with the eggplant and cook, stirring constantly, for 10 minutes.

2. Stir in the tomatoes, garlic, vinegar and sugar. Cover the surface with a circle of waxed paper and simmer for 10 minutes.

3. Stir in the olives and capers ans season with salt. Transfer the mixture to a serving dish and let cool to room temperature. Sprinkle with the chopped parsley and serve.

4. While waiting for the caponata to cool, enjoy a nice glass of wine, while sitting on the porch or veranda and watch the beach or sunset or some other nice scenery.

It is recommended to prepare caponata ahead of time (several hours) and let sit so that the strong flavors blend.

An option for non-vegetarians is to add 4 anchovies. This recipe serves 4, or one of me.

Evo

Yeah, you could pass for an ice weasel. I like ice weasels.

turbo

We just had a BBQ dinner. I came up with a new marinade last night for the chicken. I sauteed chopped onions, crushed garlic, and grated fresh ginger in peanut oil with a couple of tbs of butter for flavor, some salt and lots of black pepper. When that was browned, I shut off the gas, poured in a few ounces of dry wine, juice of a lemon, and a few oz. of honey. The chicken (skinned and cut up) marinaded for about 24 hours in that mix, and I painted the basket of chicken parts throughout the cooking. It came out really good, but (anal, as always!) I will tweak that marinade for months. My wife chipped in with a BBQ sauce for the chopped vegetables that we processed tonight, with lemon, pepper, honey, etc. It was in the mid-60's so we ate out on the deck, but it was a "dry run" with "fresh" vegetables bought from a store 5-7K miles from where the food was grown. I cannot wait for our garden to come in.

Evo

It sends out underground runners.

Just wait.

turbo

Thank you for the free pass into weasle-dom. Turbo might have been an ice weasel. I can tell you that he was not a soap and water weasel. He would jump into the tub with my wife every morning during her shower, but when we gave him a personal bath every month or so (with no-tears shampoo in the kitchen sink) he was unhappy, although obedient. He was a sweetie, but he did not want to have his pelt saturated.

These little guys can manipulate their environments, and are WAY smarter than animals that are much larger. Weasels, minks, martins, ferrets, and fishers (don't leave out the skunks!) are very personable little fellows and can leave cats and dogs in the dust when it come to social engineering. We had a skunk that would come to the back yard with a cat, a coon, and/or a possum, and benefited from each relationship as they fed on the food that we had left out for the birds. The skunks were invariably friendly and were never threatening. When I observed astronomically on a hill on a rented farm in the late '70's, skunks would come around quite often in the evening, and the babies would often come up right to my pant-legs, trying to see who I was - they are so cute, I still want a skunk for a pet, after having tons of ferrets over the course of a couple of decades.

Evo

When did you say I could move up there?

turbo

How deep do the runners go? If I have to corral peppermint, I will take precautions. I wish I did not have to take such precautions to prevent the growth of tomatos, hot peppers, green beans, etc!!!

turbo

I think I said you could stay here when you can split at least 1 cord a day of firewood, but due to the overwhelming response, you may have to committ to splitting AND stacking at least 1 cord a day.

Evo

Do I get a weasel?

Evo

You do have to take precautions, I will look up some references later.

Moonbear

Of course, how bad could it be if peppermint took over your lawn? Wouldn't it be lovely to have everything smelling fresh and minty when you walked across the yard? Friends of mine had a bench out in the middle of a plot of thyme which was wonderful...you'd get the fresh thyme smell as you walked to the bench, and were just surrounded by it. Absolutely heavenly. Of course, in their case, it was an island in the center of a circular driveway, so it couldn't escape very far.

turbo

Evo, you can have a weasel if you can catch one! (pop)

turbo

Wow! how many aromatic perennials could I get to "fight it out" over on the side lawn? I could jump in there and roll around like like a cat in a patch of catnip!

hypatia

I took the top 18 inches of a plastic garbage can and sunk it into the ground to plant mint in. It works really well.

turbo

OK, I'm no spring chicken, but I didn't expect to be this sore tonight. I had to satisfy my urge to work in the garden, so I bought, loaded, unloaded, and spread by hand 400# of composted cow manure, 100# of organic fertilizer and a few small bags of sulfur. The jerk clerks at the store didn't offer to help me load my truck, nor did they come outside to make sure I only loaded the 10 bags of manure that I paid for. What is this world coming to?

When my tiller engine is rebuilt (OK, I just have to know what a really nice cast-iron Horse with a really nice cast-iron Tecumseh engine can do!) I am going to town. Actually I am staying at home and I have no intention of going to town (avoiding the ~1500 folks who live here). I intend to add 4-5 big bales of compressed peat moss to bring up the organic content of the soil. The previous owner of this place never took care of the garden spot. He simply planted plants started at local greenhouses, and flogged them along with Miracle-Gro...that is not gardening.

My dad started his tomatoes well after we did last year, and while we got a fair yield from the many spindly plants we had, he was swamped with tomatoes from half as many plants and the plants were so big it was tough to pull them out at year's end after we harvested the last of the green tomatoes. Of course, he has a buddy that he plays poker with every week with a nice big tractor and a dump truck who will gladly bring in a load of old rotted manure and till it - no charge. The soil in his garden is fluffy and black. It's easy to weed and it holds water wonderfully. It will take a few years, but this garden spot will get that way eventually.

turbo

My wife and I have been making up a list of the seeds, seedlings, etc that we want to buy for this growing season. We are concentrating on vegetables that give a very high yield for the area required to grow them. What do you grow in your own gardens that give you a lot of usable/preservable food for the investment in space? I'm going to offer my dad to till/weed his garden space to get extra growing space in his rich-soil plot - he's 80 and is scaling back his garden to tomatos, cucumbers, squash, etc and I want to grow much more. If you've got really nice organic-rich soil available at 45 degrees N, what would you grow?

Astronuc

Yesterday, I relocated my second rhubarb plant and divided it into three new plants.

This is for ZapperZ - I just added my 7th blueberry bush - a highbush, Elliot which produces fruit late season. I bought at a local nursery but it comes from Virginia Berry farm. www.virginiaberryfarm.com

There are four new blackberry canes, but I hope for a couple more. Propagation is finally working.

We are still getting very cool night - frost two nights ago, and near freezing air the last two nights.