What are you Growing? - 2017

Didn't start anything besides peas and salad greens from seeds but the purchased tomato plants are off to a great start this year. My raised bed got a big load of homemade compost this spring including a large amount of worms that worked their way into the composter over the last year. I hooped the bed with 1" PVC and plastic last fall and have kept it on due to random snow showers and a few rounds of pea sized hail this spring. Granted, anything larger than pea sized hail will trash the cover. Out here in Denver I've learned that I've got to water way more than I did in Chicago! Having the hoop house helps retain some of the moisture and I'm about to use a neighboor's grass clippings as a cover mulch to hold as much moisture in the soil as I can.

This season is a mixed bag: only three snap peas sprouted (I fear chipmunks got the rest), and the gai lan hasn't done well from seed either, but the lettuce is quite robust.

Of seedlings, the tomatoes (of various varieties) are bushy and flowering, but no sign of fruit yet. Several of the peppers have babies, including a 2-inch-long melrose pepper. The one hill of cucumbers has gherkins galore. Chard and lacinato kale are doing quite well.

And the black raspberries are insanely prolific this year.

All in all, the garden provided a good portion of the last 24 hours' meals: Black raspberries (with Brown Cow full-fat yogurt) for the last two breakfasts, and chives and kale for a baked potato last night (first time a microwave cheese sauce recipe has worked well for me: melt a tablespoon of butter; whisk in a tablespoon of flour, pinch of salt, half-teaspoon of sun-dried chimayo chile powder, half cup of milk and whisk again, half cup of shredded cheddar jack we keep in the freezer for just such emergencies), and back in the micro for 30-second bursts alternating with whisking until everything is smooth. Stir in a half cup cooked chopped kale (which was cooked in the micro on its own with a little water and covered).

I just have some vegetables and herbs in containers this year. I'm planning to build some raised beds to maybe do some late summer stuff and be ready for doing a lot more gardening next year.

My tomatoes are two varieties of Tumbling Toms (mini tomatoes, cascading habit) that I have just noticed green fruit on in the last couple of days. Some bunny nibbled some of the beet greens, so I had to put those containers up on a table. Daikon radish greens are growing well. Parsnips take a long time to sprout; just now seeing a speck or two of green.

As for the herbs, the thyme, dill, lavender, rosemary, and oregano are all doing well on the kitchen windowsill, the cilantro not so much. I harvested most of the dill and made a dill butter with it. The plant has gone to flower and I'm waiting to see if I'll be able to harvest any seeds.

I expected a poor cherry harvest this year, due to the cold snap in the early spring, and not spraying this year (you have to time it right, and rain kept hitting at the wrong time for me). But no, this year was pretty good, plus we had fewer noticeable worms! The fruit were smaller than usual, and the last few on the tree just didn't get ripe - probably due to the chill this week. I think I lost more to birds this year - perhaps because my neighbors put up a bird feeder. The population in our yard really went up.

But we did get enough for several pies and batches of Albaloo Polow.

Herbs: Thyme, Rosemary, Thai & Italian Basil, all are growing like crazy

Bought a 2" tall cucumber bush, potted it in large pot, thing has gone crazy producing very delicious cucumbers

2 small cherry tomato plants have also gone crazy and have lots of green bunches of tomatoes at this point, I've only harvested ~12 ripe tomatoes so far but will soon be swimming in them. I'll eat them for breakfast, lunch & dinner so that's fine by me.

Planted 52 pounds of garlic last fall. About 18 varieties. Just harvested it and will let it dry for a month. Some will get replanted, we use quite a bit and some will be sold.

The basil has been going crazy, the peppers perking along, and the tomatoes are huge, green, and unripe. It's been a cool, wet summer, I think... maybe a week of nice hot weather would finish them off, but this morning felt like early fall so I'm not holding my breath.

The city's war on rats seems to have made a pretty big difference in our community garden's success this year, thankfully.

We just started more kale under the grow lights, so I'll be planting them in the public boxes for fall harvesting. Maybe we'll put out some more chard and lettuce too. The bees seem to have had a wonderful year and we'll be collecting honey soon. I hope you all are enjoying your productive and delicious gardens!