July 2015 Harvests

Production in the veggie garden started to slow in July as we started hitting the upper 90's and into the 100's.  That didn't stop the garden from producing over 25 pounds of food in July - plenty more than my household could consume, so again, I had ample goodies to give away to friends and coworkers.  The cukes and tomatoes were especially abundant!  Peppers just didn't take off this year, and eggplant was not as productive as last year either.

With July's addition, I'm just a few pounds away from hitting my 100 pounds of fresh garden produce goal for the year, and we still have the full fall season ahead!  Granted, veggie produce will slow drastically in the next couple of months as I transition from my summer to fall garden.

Here are the July 2015 harvest tallies (25 lb 11.5 oz total)!

• 9 lb 15.2 oz pickling cucumbers (13)
• 3 lb 14.9 oz slicing cucumbers (7)
• 1 lb 8.7 oz Black Beauty eggplant (2)
• 0.8 oz Gypsy pepper (1)
• 2.1 oz Yellow pepper (1)
• 8.6 oz Cherokee Purple tomatoes (2)
• 1 lb 6.2 oz Better Boy tomatoes(4)
• 3 lb 9.9 oz Early Girl tomatoes (20)
• 13.0 oz Grape tomatoes
• 8.4 oz Juliet tomatoes
• 1 lb 8.4 oz Pear tomatoes
• 7.0 oz Roma tomatoes (3)
• 1 lb 4.3 oz Okra

2015 total harvests to date (93 lb 13.5 oz):

• 1 lb 13.5 oz blackberries
• 1 lb 1.2 oz broccoli
• 5 lb 13.9 oz Fordhook chard
• 5 lb 13.2 oz Ruby Red chard
• 7.1 oz cilantro
• 6 lb 10.3 oz Flash collards
• 20 lb 9.2 oz pickling cucumbers (32)
• 11 lb 5.6 oz slicing cucumbers (21)
• 5 lb 0.6 oz Black Beauty eggplant (5)
• 1 lb 6.8 0z Ichiban eggplant (5)
• 7 colanders salad greens (lettuce, spinach, arugula)
• 2 lb 0 oz Blue Lake green beans
• 3 lb 13.9 oz kale
• 1 lb 2.9 oz Meyer lemons (5)
• 6.5 oz parsley
• 0.8 oz Cayenne peppers
• 5.5 oz Flavorburst yellow pepper (2)
• 7.9 oz Gypsy peppers (6)
• 0.8 oz Mariachi pepper (1)
• 2.9 oz Pablano pepper (2)
• 7.5 oz Cherry Bell radish
• 4.0 oz spinach
• 12.5 oz Beefmaster tomatoes (1)
• 1 lb 13.7 oz Better Boy tomatoes (5)
• 6.2 oz Brandywine tomatoes (1)
• 3 lb 1.3 oz Celebrity tomatoes (8)
• 3.5 oz Cherry tomatoes
• 6 lb 9.1 oz Early Girl tomatoes (32)
• 2 lb 0.4 oz Grape tomatoes
• 2 lb 1.6 oz Juliet tomatoes
• 4 lb 4.4 oz Pear tomatoes
• 1 lb 6.8 oz Roma tomatoes (10)
• 8.6 oz Cherokee Purple tomatoes (2)
• 1 lb 4.3 oz Okra

June 2015 Harvests

Looking back on my June veggie and fruit harvests, I can see it was a very productive month.  Of course, I don't need to look at the pictures to figure that out.  I can just open my fridge to see it overflowing with cucumber and tomatoes to see that I have more produce than my household can consume.

I was especially proud of my blackberry harvest.  I planted 6-7 blackberry plants about three years ago, and didn't get a single blackberry harvest until this year.  Unfortunately, only one of my plants survived the last few hot and dry summers, but I still got a decent harvest from the one plant.  I planted another three plants this year, which seem to really be taking off, so hopefully I'll get some good harvests in the coming years, maybe even enough to make some jam.

With our continued heavy rainfalls, I've only had to supplement watering about once or twice this season, which is drastically different from prior years, when my garden required daily watering.  I recently learned from a Central Texas Gardener episode that some stress on plants by not getting daily watering is actually good for them and makes them more productive, so I now only water the garden about once or twice a week, if there is no rainfall.  The garden seems to be doing well with that method.

I am constantly cooking old and new recipes with the produce.  I use as much as I can fresh, as well as dabbled in some of my first canning attempts.  And my family, friends, and co-workers are willing to let me unload any excess produce on them.

Here are some of the ways I've been using my produce:

Breakfast

• Tomatoes and peppers chopped and added to egg dishes
• Blackberries on top of cereal or with yogurt and granola for a parfait

Lunch

• Tomatoes and cucumbers added to every sandwich
• Cucumber soup
• Caprese salad, with fresh basil from the garden

Snack

• Sliced cucumbers dipped in hummus
• Blackberries with crackers, cheese, and charcuterie

Side Dish

• Tomato and cucumber salad with lemon juice, salt and pepper
• Fresh babaganoush with garden eggplant

Dinner

• Eggplant rollatini

Here are the June 2015 harvest tallies (37 lbs 7.8 oz total)!:

• 1 lb 13.5 oz blackberries
• 10 lb 10 oz pickling cucumbers (19)
• 7 lb 6.7 oz slicing cucumbers (14)
• 2 lb 10.3 oz Black Beauty eggplant (3)
• 1 lb 6.8 0z Ichiban eggplant (5)
• 4.5 oz Blue Lake green beans
• 0.8 oz Cayenne peppers
• 4.3 oz Gypsy peppers (3)
• 12.5 oz Beefmaster tomatoes (1)
• 7.5 oz Better Boy tomatoes (1)
• 6.2 oz Brandywine tomatoes (1)
• 3 lb 1.3 oz Celebrity tomatoes (8)
• 3.5 oz Cherry tomatoes
• 1 lb 13.5 oz Early Girl tomatoes (8)
• 1 lb 1.6 oz Grape tomatoes
• 1 lb 9.2 oz Juliet tomatoes
• 2 lb 7.8 oz Pear tomatoes
• 15.8 oz Roma tomatoes (7)

2015 total harvests to date (68 lbs 2.0 oz):

• 1 lb 13.5 oz blackberries
• 1 lb 1.2 oz broccoli
• 5 lb 13.9 oz Fordhook chard
• 5 lb 13.2 oz Ruby Red chard
• 7.1 oz cilantro
• 6 lb 10.3 oz Flash collards
• 10 lb 10 oz pickling cucumbers (19)
• 7 lb 6.7 oz slicing cucumbers (14)
• 3 lb 7.9 oz Black Beauty eggplant (3)
• 1 lb 6.8 0z Ichiban eggplant (5)
• 7 colanders salad greens (lettuce, spinach, arugula)
• 2 lb 0 oz Blue Lake green beans
• 3 lb 13.9 oz kale
• 1 lb 2.9 oz Meyer lemons (5)
• 6.5 oz parsley
• 0.8 oz Cayenne peppers
• 2.4 oz Flavorburst yellow pepper (1)
• 7.1 oz Gypsy peppers (5)
• 0.8 oz Mariachi pepper (1)
• 2.9 oz Pablano pepper (2)
• 7.5 oz Cherry Bell radish
• 4.0 oz spinach
• 12.5 oz Beefmaster tomatoes (1)
• 7.5 oz Better Boy tomatoes (1)
• 6.2 oz Brandywine tomatoes (1)
• 3 lb 1.3 oz Celebrity tomatoes (8)
• 3.5 oz Cherry tomatoes
• 2 lb 15.2 oz Early Girl tomatoes (12)
• 1 lb 3.4 oz Grape tomatoes
• 1 lb 9.2 oz Juliet tomatoes
• 2 lb 12.0 oz Pear tomatoes
• 15.8 oz Roma tomatoes (7)

Collard Wraps & This Week's Harvest

The winter greens are getting to the end of the season and starting to flower, so I've been trying to use up as much of what remains as possible while I still can.

I haven't consumed my collards in many ways this year, other than by juicing them.  Since I had a lot of salad and sandwich type of ingredients on hand, I decided to make some collard wraps.

I grabbed three large collard leaves from the garden, as well as some kale leaves and fresh cilantro from the garden for my wraps.

I de-ribbed (took off the stem) of the collards and kale, and then prepped other items to stuff inside my wrap: grape tomatoes, avocado, red pepper hummus, deli turkey, pepperjack cheese and lemon.

I spread a couple tablespoons of the hummus on the leaf first (it helps to "glue" the leaf together), then stuffed the rest of the ingredients inside and rolled it up.  One and a half wraps were quite filling, so I'll have the remaining wraps for lunch tomorrow (yay for leftovers!)

Other winter green harvests this week included swiss chard and salad greens.

Arugula, Romaine lettuce, leaf lettuce, and baby spinach.

My harvest totals so far this year include:

• 7.5 oz Cherry Bell radish
• 1 lb 9.7 oz kale (unknown variety)
• 2 lb 6.8 oz Flash collards
• 1 lb 7.7 oz Ruby Red chard
• 14.2 oz Fordhook Giant chard
• 7 colanders salad greens (lettuce, spinach, arugula) 
• 1 lb 2.9 oz Meyer Lemons (5)
• 1 lb 1.2 oz Broccoli (5)
• 7.1 oz cilantro
• 6.5 oz parsley

2014 Harvest Recap

Looking back on 2014, I can say that I really started honing my veggie gardening skills.  Overall, I hauled in 75 pounds and 2.2 ounces of veggies (at least, as far as I kept track of).  That is just over 34 kilograms for my non US readers.  Pretty decent! 

Some key take-aways of mine this year:

What I will do again:

• Plant cucumbers and eggplant – they are my most productive crops and I found several new recipes this year that allow me to use up all my fresh produce.
• Plant Early Girl, Juliet Roma Grape, Roma, and Sweet 100 Cherry tomatoes.
• Plant all the same peppers, but maybe an extra Gypsy pepper since it was my most productive pepper for only having one plant.

What I won’t do again:

• Plant Big Boy and Bradley Heirloom tomatoes – they produced a decent amount of fruit, but were very susceptible to being eaten by insects and other pests.
• Plant so many jalapenos – I ended up not being able to use a lot of them

What I’ll change:

• Plant more green beans in my shadiest garden bed.  They produced well in the shady veggie bed, much better than most other veggies.
• Try squash plants one more time, but with row covers next year so that the squash vine borers don’t destroy all my plants.
• Find a delicious okra recipe.  Okra is definitely the easiest veggie to grow in the Central Texas garden.  Unfortunately, most of my okra ends up going to waste because I’ve not liked any of the recipes I’ve tried so far.
• Start more plants seedlings indoors and have them going throughout the year.  I still try to plant too many of one plant all at the same time.  I need to plant fewer plants at a time, but have several successions of the plants to elongate my growing season.
• Keep my fall/winter veggies on an automatic timer.  I was good about watering my summer veggies, but think that I got lax during the fall when there was more rainfall.  However, it still wasn’t enough or consistent enough to help my plants grow quickly.
• Fertilize more.  I’m good about putting compost in the beds when I plant new transplants, but haven’t kept up with regular fertilizing during the growing season.

Harvest Totals (since April)

• 11 lb 11.1 oz Marketmore 76 Cucumbers (11)
• 11 lb 0.1 oz Black Beauty Eggplant (12)
• 5 lbs 6.3 oz Black Beauty Zucchini (3)
• 5 lb 4.0 oz Long Eggplant (21)
• 5 lbs Cherry Bell Radishes
• 3 lb 12.0 oz Early Girl Tomato (12)
• 3 lb 7.9 oz Okra (63)
• 3 lb 5.5 oz Pic-N-Pic Summer Squash (5)
• 3 lbs Giant Fordhook Swiss Chard
• 2 lb 7.5 oz Juliet Roma Grape Tomato
• 2 lb 2.4 oz Bush Blue Lake 274 Green Beans
• 2 lb 2.3 oz Roma Tomato (22)
• 1 lb 15.9 oz Sweet 100 Cherry Tomato
• 1 lb 10.4 oz Big Boy Tomato (3)
• 1 lb 10.2 oz Pablano Pepper (22)
• 1 lb 10.1 oz Green Bell Sweet Pepper (10)
• 1 lb 8.7 oz Gypsy Sweet Peppers (14)
• 1 lb 7.3 oz oz Bradley Heirloom Tomato (4)
• 1 lb 6.6 oz Spaghetti Squash (1)
• 1 lb 2.0 oz Acorn Squash (1)
• 1 lb 1.0 oz Butternut Squash (1)
• 15.7 oz Jalapeno (9)
• 13.7 oz Mammoth Melting Sugar Peas
• 11.6 oz Mucho Nacho Jumbo Jalapeno (13)
• 3.8 oz Serrano Pepper (14)
• 2.1 oz Cayenne Pepper (9)

Goal for 2015 is to haul in over 100 pounds of fresh food!

More Rain and Today's Harvest

It has been about seven straight days of rain here in Central Texas, and the garden is loving it - not to mention all the wildlife around here that is enjoying the wet weather and break from the Texas heat.  It has rained so much that there is now a pond in the park behind our house!  It is actually a retention pond for instances such as this, but most of the year it is completely dry.

The wet weather has really been making the garden grow.  Today I harvested a large bunch of basil that I have growing next to my tomatoes.  I cut the basil back, but left enough of the stems so that it will grow back and I can harvest it again in a couple of weeks.  Now is time to make a little pesto to put in pastas and on chicken sandwiches. 

I also pulled one radish from the garden today.  It looked picture perfect, but wasn't the best tasting in my opinion.  It was definitely fresh enough, just too-radishy.  I think I had them in the garden a little too long, so they got overwhelmingly flavorful.  I also planted radish during the Texas summer, which is not the suggested season for them.  They prefer the cooler spring and fall months.  I think the heat made them extra potent and a bit too much for me.  I'll be planting radishes only in the spring and fall now.

I was able to plant some seeds indoors on my new grow shelves as well.  Yesterday I planted:

• Fruit/Veggies
• Eggplant - Early Long Purple (Martha Stuart Organic)
• Eggplant - Black Beauty (Ferry-Morse)
• Watermelon - Tasty Sweet (Burpee)
• Pablano Pepper (Ferry-Morse)
• Pepper - California Wonder 300 TMR (Ferry-Morse)
• Tomato - Supersweet 100 VF Hybrid (Ferry-Morse)
• Swiss Chard - Fordhook Giant (Burpee)
• Swiss Chard - Ruby Red (Burpee)
• Herbs
• Sweet Basil (Burpee)
• Spanish Cilantro (Burpee)
• Flowers
• Marigold - Best Mix (Burpee)
• Morning Glory - Tall Mix (Burpee)
• Lupine - Russell's Hybrid Mixed Colors (Ferry-Morse)
• Painted Daisy - Giant Mixed Colors (Burpee)

Note - I soaked the morning glory and lupine seeds for about 18 hours before planting to soften the hard seed shells to hasten germination.