Harvest Monday - May 21, 2012

Bok choy, peas, strawberries, Flamingo Chard, and some beet greens.

I use baby beet leaves for salad regularly but have never used older leaves, 

I assume the taste is similar to chard, I'll find out soon.

 Decided to pick more baby beets, green onions, and sugar snap peas.

This is the earliest tomato Ive grown, it's a Chinese hybrid without a name.
This one is grown in a container, another one growing in raised bed is also bearing fruits.
All other tomato plants are blooming at the same time but no fruits.

Container grown dwarf Blenheim apricot, I should be thinning the fruits.

The seed packet says Broccoli Raab, but they don't look anything like the BR I know, these plants are much bigger and taller than what I'm used to see, there's no head or side shoots forming except lots of leaves, the seeds are from Johnny's, have you grown this broccoli raab before? 

Pontiac red potatoes in smart pots are doing well.

Shark Fin Melon (魚翅瓜), aka Chilacayote squash.

Click here to read more about the squash.

Drop by Daphne's Dandelions host of Harvest Monday to see more harvests from around the globe.

Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard - Cooking with Green Garlic and Chrysanthemum

I've been growing edible chrysanthemum greens in the past two years, I plant them for spring and fall harvest.  The fall crop is used for hotpot and dumplings, the spring crop is used to make cold side dishes. I also planted some garlic in early spring for the purpose of harvesting baby garlic, it's a special treat while waiting for the summer crops to come in.

Here are three sample dishes I made from our garden harvests:

Chrysanthemum greens with baked tofu side dish -- blanch the greens for about half a minute in boiling water, drain, and press out excess liquid, coarsely cut the greens.  In a large bowl combine chrysanthemum and baked tofu (finely chopped) together, season the vegetable with some sea salt, toasted sesame oil, and a pinch of sugar, add couple drops of rice vinegar if you like, then toss everything together, and garnish with minced red pepper.

Grilled baby green garlic -- brush garlic with olive oil and grill for about a minute or two, they cook really fast, watch it closely so they don't dry up.  The dip is quite simple, I use Korean seasoned bean paste (comes in a green plastic container), add few drops of sesame oil, pinch of sugar, and some minced ginger, that was it!

This is green garlic stir fry with Chinese sausage, stir frying with beef or pork is another popular Chinese dish when the vegetable is in season.

Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard is hosted by The Gardener of Eden, drop by Robin's place to see more cooking ideas from home garden harvests around the globe.

Harvest Monday - May 14, 2012

Baby Beets

Chrysanthemum Greens, generally use in hotpot, soup, and stir fry, but I like it for cold side dishes.

This round leaf variety is much milder in taste than the smaller serrated leaf chrysanthemum.

Baby Garlic and Lettuce

Back in late January I planted some garlic for the purpose

of harvesting green garlic for grilling, stir fry, and pickle.

I've been pulling them as needed but they never made it to photo opts.

I'll post some pictures later to show you how I use green garlic and chrysanthemum greens.

Drop by Daphne's Dandelions host of Harvest Monday to see more garden harvests around the globe.

Happy Mother's Day

Harvest Monday - May 7, 2012

Lettuce, bok choy, green onions, strawberries, and broccoli raab thinnings.

My Early May Garden 

Three year old carrot seeds in Earthbox are sprouting,  it's about 75% germination.

These are small round Parisian Market and Little Fingers.

Tomatoes, eggplants, and peppers were transplanted 3 weeks ago, all the tomato plants are blooming now, in the past I pinched off flower buds in early stage of growth, but I'm not doing that this year see if I can get some early fruits, maybe I'll get ONE tomato for our July 4th salad :P

 In this bed I have chrysanthemum greens, celtuce, red white and yellow beets.
This is the first time I grow white beets, they look like regular white chard.

Broccoli raab and lettuce.

Garlic and bok choy.

Sugar snap peas are filling up the half barrel.

Red potatoes growing in smart pots are coming up,

it's so much easier to hill up and harvest the spuds later (lazy gardener here).

Mioga ginger is moving up in the housing department, they lived in containers last year.

The roots survived our winter outdoor unprotected and woke up (whew~~ relief..),

Harvest Monday is hosted by Daphne's Dandelions drop by to see more garden harvests from around the globe. 

Wordless

My Caper Plants One Year Later

Last March my daughter brought me 2 caper seedlings from California, I kept them in the 4" pot until fall then moved up to 1 gallon pot, they overwintered in our old house unheated enclosed patio, I brought them home last weekend, here's how they look now. 

 May 3rd, 2012 - wonder how long I can keep them in 1 gallon pot, 

they look different, one is more upright with smaller leaves,

and the other is more like a vine with bigger leaves, could be different strains.  

I'm so tempted to take cuttings from these plants and try to root them.

 When I got them in March 2011.

I was trying to root the broken tiny sprout in a cup - it die, I forgot to water.