A Good Year For Peppers

Surprisingly, considering where we live, one of our most dependable crops is the pepper. With partial sun, sometimes rainy cold summers, and early and late frosts you would think they would be more of a novelty crop. So what's your trick Mike? I don't really know, luck and a really early start I suppose. Now before I brag too much let me say that although I have high hopes this year we hardly ever see any of those wonderful peppers turn red on the vine. The chocolate (purple beauty) and yellow banana peppers usually turn for us but the red bells, Marconi, and Italian, rarely vine ripen. We do have some luck getting the more mature ones to ripen off the vine if the plant is pulled and hung in the greenhouse or on our porch towards the end of the season. This works especially well for small bells and hot peppers.

We are growing 14 different varieties trying to find the ones that do best for us. At this point there are a few clear leaders in this year's batch:

Red Belgian is tied for first place, an extremely early and productive pepper. It's only fault may lie in the fact that the plant seems to have serious issues supporting it's own fruit.


Sweet chocolate is easily my favorite this year, a sturdy plant producing large quantities of peppers. I believe it was the first to produce this year and all of the plants look healthy and are loaded with fruit.


Mini red bell is a prolific producer of numerous small round peppers, perfect for pickling.


Yellow banana is our faithful standby, a constant producer of storage quality elongated peppers.


Pepperoncini, perfect for canning whole or using in various Italian dishes.


Sweet Italian is a beautiful pepper, but only fairly productive in our gardens.


California wonder is outperforming this year but tends to lag behind on the cooler years.


New to us, red-orange mini peppers straight from the organic section of a grocery store seem to be doing extremely well.


Red organic #2 from last year's local farmers market is also showing it's stuff. Really packing them on...to the point that I'm not sure how to get them off.:)


Fresh in salads, as a pizza condiment, or pickled right along with the dills, we love peppers any way we can get them. The jars in the background were canned a few days ago and we are preparing to do few more this afternoon (actually yesterday afternoon). We like to pickle the peppers and cucumbers at the same time. Horseradish, dill, fresh grape leaves, garlic, and a few red pepper flakes make up the spices. We do have luck storing fresh peppers and eggplants all the way into January sometimes but the rest are frozen, dried, or canned.

Toppings for a simple pizza pie we made last week. What pizza is complete without a few peppers?

Our Solar Food Dehydrator

We have been making a crude, but good, nutritious and delicious form of fruit leather using our barn's roof and the sun as a giant solar dehydrator. With berry season in full swing and the amount of space allotted for berries in our freezers already past capacity we begin to focus on other preservation methods. One of these is drying or dehydrating the fruit. We do have a small electric dehydrator that could be forced to run non-stop from now well into mid-December. That's not really an option though as it would waste a lot of electricity and be much too hard on the dehydrator that is mostly used to dry morel mushrooms in the very early spring.

Fortunately, as long as the summer provides us with enough sunshine and not too much humidity we can easily dry various fruits and berries right on top of our barn roof. Any sunny spot works great for this, a car roof, the top of one's cold frame, or even an old stump. The important part is to get the product into the sun and off the ground away from, in our case, ants, cats, and small children. The barn roof works great for this as the one side is angled towards the south and gets full sun most of the day.

One of my drying screens full of shallots for next year's sets. We don't dry these in the sun.


The combination of corrugated galvanized metal roofing, slope of the roof, and the sun creates a perfect scenario for drying food. The corrugation provides air spaces under a screen or tray allowing the air to move up the roof carrying away the moisture from under the trays of food. The galvanized metal also gets hot and reflects heat back onto the food. We use old metal pizza pans for the fruit leather and I have screens for drying apples, pears, plums, tomatoes and so on. Right now we are working on drying raspberries.


Once the berries are picked we simply crush them into a puree and spread evenly onto the pans, about a quarter inch thick. Evenly is the key word as any thin spots will dry first, stick and tear holes in the leather when you try to remove it. Now if you want to be fancy, the puree can be strained of seeds. We like it in it's more natural state and leave the seeds in, besides it's a lot less work that way.


After 5-8 hours in the sun, or when the top portion appears dry but before the bottom begins to harden, the fruit needs to be flipped over to finish drying. I use a metal spatula for this and carefully work my way under the fruit folding it over as I go until it can be carefully turned. Another 3 or more hours and it should be ready. Sometimes this process takes two days to complete, one for each side. It all depends upon what you are drying. For example, it always takes me two days to dry raspberries...7 hours on one side and 4 on the other. Once thoroughly dried there should be no moist spots and the leather will hold together quite well, it can then be either frozen or stored in an airtight container, we use old gallon jars for this.

Voilà! Ready to be torn or cut up into smaller pieces for storage. What a great hiking snack this makes.

Properly dried fruit can keep this way for years, if not dried enough it may start to mold.

Lightning Strikes Twice

The skies were dark, but not ominously so. Lightning flashes could be seen far off in the distance but overhead all appeared to be calm. I had just locked the chickens up for the night and was sitting down at the computer, preparing to dig up some information on eggplants...and boom! A huge explosion shook our whole house. The day, having almost turned to night, was simultaneously lit up with a blinding red-orange flash, and then all was silent. A few minutes later, having realized that it was not our lovely neighbor firing off his cannon in our front yard, we looked for smoke and fire as it became obvious that a freak lightning strike had hit within a few yards of the house. We found nothing in the dark.


It was not until early the next morning that we noticed wood shrapnel all over our driveway and the neighboring bushes. Close by was a tree with a large splinter of wood that had been unceremoniously stripped from tip to tail. The same thing happened two years ago in August to a tree not thirty feet away. That tree was much larger and managed to live, this one will not. I will remove it for firewood next spring.

The Epicenter

It has been about as perfect a gardening year, weather wise, as I can remember. The temperatures have been extremely hot but we have had a decent rain every 2-3 weeks since spring...today included. We have used less water this summer than ever before, even with the close to 90-100° temperatures and an ever expanding garden.

The above picture depicts our gardens "epicenter". Isn't she a beauty? Yeah...not really. Filled with timers, modes, and valves attached to eleven hoses that stretch hundreds of feet and are attached to various soaker systems and sprinklers...the garden can literally water itself.

I set up this system a few years ago so that we could take a vacation and not worry about watering the garden in August, our driest month, it worked great. Depending upon the weather and particular location in the garden, I set the timers to water for a certain amount of time, when needed, at night. They turn on and off automatically or manually, and I am able to carefully control the amount of water I use. The timers were set up for the first time this year, a couple weeks ago, when I could no longer justify the time it took to manually water the gardens.

We use the soaker hoses on our tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, tomatillos, and the outskirts of the main garden. Everything else is still watered using overhead sprinklers that I hope to replace with soaker hoses over time. Some of our plants, like my "no water" tomatoes never get a drop of water. I have other crops that are deeply planted and mulched that I hand water once a week or so.

These little cherry tomato plants in the chicken run never get any water from me, and are just starting to produce a few nice little fruits.


Anyway, I like the automatic watering system and have cut my water output by at least half, perhaps even more this year, since setting it up. Hopefully as time goes on and I become more advanced in "no water" gardening I will no longer need to use it at all, but for now it is my best solution to water conservation in the garden.

Grow Your Own Laundry Detergent

We started processing our alternative laundry detergent the other day. For about 50 cents worth of cheap white vinegar added to our soapwort concoction we made enough laundry detergent to last approximately six months. I'm waiting for the plants to go to seed before making more this fall. My wife wrote a whimsical post Saponaria Officionalis...What? back in February with links providing more information on this wonderful plant.

In our ongoing endeavor to tread more lightly on the planet and focus our energies on the use of more natural products we are constantly experimenting with a wide variety of plants that can be used for more than just food sources. Only a few hundred years ago many people were much more versed in the forgotten art of self sufficient living, using natures vast array of resources to aid them as they went about their daily tasks.

My wife and I have "advanced" from chemically ridden cleaning products like Purex- free and clear, to supposedly better Seventh Generation laundry soap, to this↓...soapwort. Truly free and clear of man-made chemicals, and about as pure and natural as it gets.
We break down this perennial's second year roots, leaves, stems, and flowers to make soap. The leaves off first year plants work as well but the root is more potent.

First we cut and chop the various parts of Saponaria Officionalis into more manageable pieces.


Then it is added to the cauldrons to simmer for 5 or 6 hours breaking down the plants tissues, helping to release the sudsy saponins contained therein. We let ours sit overnight before straining the pale green liquid.


The next day you simply mash the leaves up and remove them, making sure to squeeze all the remaining saponins out. Then carefully strain the remaining debris. The hardest part is straining the liquid because it really does want to foam up quit a bit...pour slowly.



Straining the soapwort - look at all that foam! The bucket was only part way filled and already overflowing with suds. For whatever reason the pouring action really causes the suds to form.


Luckily, years ago we saved about 20 of these laundry bottles that we now use to hold our homemade soap. We add 2/3 cup vinegar, to prevent against mold, to each bottle. The vinegar also assists as a cleaning agent, a product I also hope to make myself sometime in the not too distant future.

There you have it, laundry soap grown next to the basil in our garden. Keep in mind that soapwort should not be added to pizza with the basil as it does contain toxic saponins. Regardless of what the many herb books, and herbal internet sites out there suggest, I would give serious thought to consuming this plant in any form for medicinal purposes...just my opinion. I'm formulating a plan to make a shampoo using this same herb, vinegar, and ground flax as a thickener...I'll make sure and share if it turns out.

Kimchi

We finally followed through on making some kimchi for my father's birthday. Week old Kimchi, a couple books on Native American medicinal herbs, and he was happy to say the least. We made some for the first time a couple years ago and it took me about five minutes to fall in love with it.

Kimchi is a somewhat spicy Korean delicacy made of various vegetables. The main ingredient in ours is salted (sea salt) napa, savoy cabbage, or bok choy seasoned with ginger, garlic, red pepper flakes, and onions. We then add a few other vegetables and let the concoction sit in loosely covered jars at around 60° for about five days to undergo lactic acid fermentation. The added vegetables can be anything you like, kale, carrots, peppers, cucumbers, corn even certain fruits like apples.

Like sauerkraut, kefir and other fermented foods we eat, kimchi is supposed to be very healthy. Full of probiotics due to the fermentation process, vitamins contained in the ingredients, and good bacteria, it is possibly a true "super food". Give it a try.


Basic Kimchi recipe -

Ingredients:

2 large napa or savoy cabbage

1 thinly sliced red pepper

6 cups of cold water

3 tablespoons of sea salt

1 tablespoon of fresh garlic, finely diced

1 - 2 tablespoon of fresh ginger, finely diced or grated

1/4 cup of fresh green onions, thinly sliced into 2" pieces

2 teaspoon of dried red chili pepper flakes

2 tablespoon chili powder

2 teaspoon of sugar

Directions:

1. Chop cabbage into 2" pieces

2. Mix salt in cold water

3. Place cabbage in gallon zip lock bags or tightly sealed glass jars, fill with salt water brine and place in refrigerator for 12 hours or overnight flipping occasionally

4. Drain and reserve brine

5. Mix all other ingredients with cabbage

6. Pack 1 gallon jar with mixture leaving 2" space at top. Pour reserved brine over the cabbage to cover.

7. Push a small freezer bag into the mouth of the jar and pour the remaining brine into the bags (you may need the extra brine later). Better yet, use another glass jar that will fit inside your gallon jar.

8. Let kimchi ferment in a cool place no higher than 70° for 3-6 days. The longer the stronger.

9. Remove the brine weight, add more brine to jar if neccesary and cap tightly. Store in the refrigerator where it will keep for a couple months.

That is the basic recipe we used on my fathers kimchi. The new batch we are making will include a little diced kale, radichio, Italian chicory and perhaps a little more red pepper and red pepper powder. We have not made this in years and it was fun to get back into it. We try to keep the salt content low and always use real sea salt when fermenting foods. Remember salt obtained from the natural evaporation of sea water is entirely different from modern refined salt and much better for you.

Learning To Speak Garlic

A few bundles of garlic and bulbils tagged and tied waiting to be hung up to dry. Some will be used for food other for next year's crop.

One of the best things about writing on this blog is that it forces me to learn more about what I do through reading and closer observation so that I can post, hopefully, factual information. Thus my horizons are expanded and perhaps someone else out there learns a little with me. If I come across as knowledgeable in some of these posts, beware, a few years of gardening does not make for an expert. I am green, you could say a gardening infant struggling to grasp the many and varied concepts involved in this most challenging of tasks. There are other bloggers far more insightful than I, some having more experience, others are just plain smarter. Tenacity is my talent, and an insatiable drive to learn more about that which I love. So, with that in mind, here is what I think I might now know about MY garlic.

My ever present assistant displaying garlic ready to be harvested. Can you believe I used to be a dog person, what's happened to me?


We harvested a little less than 1/3 of our garlic today, roughly 200 bulbs. The majority get a little less sun due to overhanging trees and will not be ready for another week or two. Once approximately half of the leaves have turned brown and the scapes have straightened out it is time to pick garlic. At this point the underground bulb should be separated into cloves and have a firm skin wrapped about them. We harvested Nootka Rose, German Porcelain, and Chesnok Red, the latter two being hardneck varieties and all three new to our little garden. "Mike's hardneck garlic", having long forgotten the original name, and a few elephant garlic plants make up the remaining 2/3 left to be pulled.

This is a nice specimen reflecting bulb separation and a good storage skin


A bundle of Chesnok Red being set aside for next year's garlic


Normally I plant one type of garlic sometime in September and harvest and dry them in early to mid August, paying little attention to the subtle nuances associated with the plant. This year, due to the various types we are growing, I decided to learn more so that I could speak, if you will, garlic talk. I learned that basically there are two types of garlic, hardneck and softneck both having different classifications.

Our three hardneck varieties are classified as rocambole, porcelain, and purple stripe. Rocambole garlic has a thinner skin, strong flavor, and the scape will often form a double loop. The porcelain type has a thick white skin, fewer larger cloves (ours contain 4 per bulb), stores well and also has a strong, sometimes hot flavor. Purple stripe garlic has striped colorful wrappers, milder flavor, and is supposed to be excellent for roasting. The hardneck varieties have a hard stem or neck and are known for their scapes and bulbils and have anywhere from 4-12 cloves per bulb.

Our softneck variety, Nootka Rose, does not normally (though two of them did) produce a seed head or bulbils. This silverskin garlic can be easily braided, has superior storage qualities, seems to have a much stronger flavor then its hardneck brethren, and produces many more cloves per bulb. Regardless of the information regarding storage, our original hardneck variety "Mike's" stored for a good 9 months last year. We planted the extras this spring and should be able to harvest them soon, they do not appear to be as large as the fall planted garlic though. One a side note, I did find the harvest of the softneck garlic to be a little annoying as the stems easily broke off and had to be carefully dug rather then easily pulled as the hardneck was.

Large bulbils formed on the head of one of "Mike's" garlic scapes

Small bulbils of the German Porcelain garlic


If allowed, the hardneck garlic will form pig tailed scapes that can be cut at an early tender stage and cooked for a delightful garlicky treat. We simply fry them with onions and morel mushrooms...ambrosia. If the scapes are left to further develop they produce bulbils of various sizes that can either be eaten or replanted in the fall or spring. These will produce a decent size clove in 2 or 3 years depending upon the bulbils size, we will be trying this with our garlic this year. Many an article states that if one cuts a garlic top before it develops into a scape the bulb will be larger, I have done this over the years and have yet to see a noticeable difference. This is perhaps due to good soil fertility, I'm really not sure.

A scape that is a little past its prime on a spring planted garlic


We will plant the best of these same cloves sometime in September depending upon the weather. In colder regions garlic is normally planted in the fall in order for the root to begin to develop, this helps the garlic get off to a good start the following spring. It's best to wait until just before planting to separate the cloves as this keeps the root bud from drying out allowing the garlic to set roots sooner.

Right now our garlic has been hung to dry or cure on our porch and will soon be joined by those that were left behind. This is where they will remain until we move them into baskets in a cool dry back room for winter storage, our garlic room's temperature is kept at around 40-45° most of the storage year. One of the nice things about heating solely with wood and pellets is that it removes much of the humidity from the air making for an excellent environment for the storage of garlic and squash.

The first batch of garlic curing on our porch


Well, in brief, that's what I have learned about my garlic thus far. In years to come I hope to become not only more proficient in the growing of garlic but knowledgeable in the various facets of home grown garlic production. The eventual goal being to develop a more consistent garlic bulb that not only keeps well but has larger, more pungent cloves for cooking.

The flower of an elephant garlic, not a true garlic but actually a type of leek

An Abundance of Berries

We have been picking raspberries daily now for almost two weeks. The seedy and uniquely flavored black raspberries come on quick and are gone within a month, they're my favorites. While our everbearing red ones produce from mid June all the way into the first part of October on a good year. The hearty fall gold berries are just beginning to show and will also be available well into early autumn. Most of these berries will be frozen and used with kefir to make morning smoothies and the occasional dessert (crisp)...yum. The fresh berries are included in our salads, wild huckleberries are especially good that way.

This is one of the best years we have had for the various raspberries we grow. It helps to take the sting out of the total lack of currants this year, almost all of which were knocked of the bushes in an early spring hail storm. Although we should have some blackberries this year they also felt Mother Nature's harshness this past winter as heavy wet snow took its toll on them, breaking many of the canes. I should have cut them back more as I did with the raspberries.

Is it obvious yet that we love berries? I could live without a lot of things but never berries, be they from the wild or our garden. Nutritionally speaking raspberries and all berries for that matter are high in various vitamins and antioxidants, but don't forget to use the leaves as well. Raspberry leaves contain, calcium, potassium, magnesium, iron, B1, B3, E and many other beneficial constitutes.

Raspberry leaves have been used by Native American woman and others throughout history as an aid in childbirth. Not only for humans this is supposed to be an excellent herb to use on pregnant animals as well. Apparently it tones the uterus, improves contractions, and helps restore numerous vitamins, minerals, and is a rich source of easily assimilated calcium for the mother and newborn.

We have begun using the leaves in salads and teas for the vitamin C and calcium content. I am a big believer in vitamin C that has been derived fresh from plants. Truly, a little raw garlic, French or wild sorrel (high in C), and a few Oregon grapes eaten every day or so and I can't remember the last time I had a cold or flu. At this point I don't even shy away from others that are sick...watch, now I've surely just jinxed myself.:)

The young leaves are best used fresh but can also be dried for later use. We dice them up and add them to our daily salads or steep a few leaves in boiling water for tea. Like clover, this also makes a really great sun tea (wild huckleberry leaves can also be made into a fine healthful tea).

Peppermint and sage steeping for this morning's tea.

Black raspberries or black caps also grow wild throughout Northern Idaho and my backyard. I am very careful to keep them away from my garden variety as they sometimes carry diseases.

The fall gold berries can be very productive and have a great flavor.

In the below picture I am standing next to the thorny fall gold berries, some will get 9' or taller. Picking them can be a real challange.