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Urban Gardening Using your Harvest

Beefsteaks; Not Just for Slicing!

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This summer, I have mostly focused on our Amish Paste roma tomatoes, but I don’t want anyone to think they are the king of the garden. Though they make great sauce because they contain few seeds and juice–mostly meat–that doesn’t mean you have to disregard your other tomatoes when you are preserving your harvest.

 

Beefsteaks are known for their wonderful flavor and the way their copious juice dribble down your chin as you eat them, slice by slice. But how many beefsteaks can you really eat before they so bad?

 

 

 

I scored 15 pounds of beefsteaks from Uncle Loren (he is always so willing to share!). He also gave me 3 beefsteak tomato plants earlier in the spring that have been producing like crazy. I knew we wouldn’t eat them all. So, we got the food mill out again, much to the delight of Simon, who had missed the opportunity to use it during our other tomato-squishing sessions.

 

Simon figuring out all the pieces of the food mill

 

This is what 15 pounds of tomatoes looks like

 

 

The squishing and cranking never gets old

 

A great job for two brothers!

 

Preserving stuff does take time. After the boys milled the tomatoes, I put the whole bowl of sauce/juice in the fridge to deal with the next day. Nothing wrong with dividing the process up to make it manageable!

 

Even though you will get a lot of juice when milling beefsteaks, the juice will boil down, given enough time, into a luscious sauce. Which is what we did. I decided to finally pay homage to the spaghetti sauce recipe in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle–one of the books that got me started on my whole gardening journey. The recipe can be found HERE: we cut it in half since we were dealing with 15 pounds of tomatoes, not 30. (We also did not add dried lemon peel as the recipe asked for. Oh, and we also cut the basil in half…it seemed like so much!)

 

Love, juicy tomato puree, with a mountain of spices, pre-cooking

 

After hours of slowly cooking down-a delightful spaghetti sauce!

The flavor was great, but maybe a bit spicy. I think one of the reasons it turned out spicier than we expected is because we added all the ingredients prior to cooking the sauce down. Next time, we’ll cook the sauce down a bit to get rid of some of the juice, then add the rest of the ingredients as it finishes cooking to the perfect thickness.We will also experiment with more sauce recipes, but for now we have 3 meals worth of delicious homemade sauce waiting for us in the freezer, and that is such a satisfying feeling!

From Andi’s Garden at Little*Big*Harvest

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Urban Gardening

We WILL Have Peas!

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We have never had very good luck with peas. Sadly, our much-anticipated straw-bale project has failed; the pea plants are dried and shriveled and it’s not looking good at all. The beauty of learning to grow things is that a small failure is just a speed bump. The kids and I can learn a lot more than we expected when we go about our garden projects: trying again after a disappointment is the key to a great life and a great garden!

 

Sad looking pea plants in our straw bale planter

We had half a packet of peas left and decided to give it one more go, hoping for a small fall crop. Our whiskey barrel planter in the back yard seemed like as good a place as any to throw the seeds in and try it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ella and Noah helped sow the seeds, and we’ve been watering them each day. We want some fresh peas, and we won’t give up until we have them!

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Uncategorized

If bees go extinct, this is what your supermarket will look like

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reposted from this source

Over the past decade, bee populations have been dropping, partly as a result of a disease called colony collapse disorder. This is very bad news for humans, because bees are a crucial part of the reproductive cycle of many of our favorite foods, including apples, onions, avocados, and more. This incredible data visualization shows what you’d lose if the world lost bees.

Whole Foods created this image (see full image below) to make an important point that many people miss in discussions about extinction. When a life form goes extinct, it can also cause knock-on extinctions in its ecosystem. Without bees to fertilize fruit and other crops, we lose many species. That’s what it means to be part of an ecosystem in the first place: other life forms depend on you, just as you depend on them.

If bees go extinct, this is what your supermarket will look like

There are a lot of theories about how to bring bees back from their population collapse. One is to reform bee care practices, allowing queens to have multiple mates, creating hives with more robust genetic diversity. Another is to study whether there are microbial changes causing colony collapse — perhaps from viruses or gut bacteria associated with toxins in the environment.

In other words, paying attention to environmental problems is becoming a purely selfish issue. Protecting vulnerable species keeps fruit and vegetables on the table.

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Urban Gardening Using your Harvest

Let's Deal with the Tomatoes

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Well, I said I wanted tomatoes this year. I certainly got my wish! They’ve been coming in by the bucket-full. Not too shabby for the tiny little space they are growing in. Pictured above is the harvest from one morning! Here are our overgrown, gangly, but beautiful tomato kids:

 

9 plants here (Amish Paste, heirloom)

 



5 plants here (from left to right behind Rylee–1 early girl hybrid, 2 beefsteak hybrid, 2 mystery plants from neighbor)

 

 

The Amish Paste (purchased from Baker Creek Seeds) have produced beyond our wildest dreams. The variety of shapes that have come from them has been a little surprising…from slim, typical looking Roma tomatoes (what I expected) to huge red balloons that somewhat resemble Romas, to perfectly round, unRoma looking little guys. It’s okay, we will take them all, no matter what shape or size. Roma-type tomatoes are the very best tomatoes for preserving, because they contain much more flesh than they do seeds or juice.

 

 

 

We have had three tomato processing sessions, one per week in the month of August. While I have all the stuff for canning, I just don’t have the guts to set it all up yet. I feel confident that we would be able to, after last fall’s applesauce and this summer’s jam, but for now I just feel more comfortable with freezing. We have plenty of freezer space in the garage right now, so it works out well.

 

Following are the picture stories of our three separate tomato processing sessions! We are getting quite a stash for winter!

 

Note: The food mill you see in our saucing pictures is one of the best contraptions ever. We used it to make applesauce last fall. It is a magical little machine that screens all the seeds and skin off the fruit, leaving you with sauce. The kids LOVE turning the crank and watching the slurpy, squirty demise of the tomatoes! It is one of my favorite preservation tools at the moment, and though it set me back about 40.00, I won’t be without one from now on.


Week one: Sauce

 

 

Squish!! I can’t emphasize enough how enjoyable this food press is for little hands to operate!

 

 

Beautiful, fresh tomato sauce…yum

 

Bennet the Knight, with his conquest

 

Week two: Sauce

 

The always-goofy brother and sister pair, Rylee and Brady!

 

The leftover guts are spilling into our big white bowl. We send the guts through again, sometimes even yet again after that, to get all the juice we possibly can.

 

Maggie joined in, she could not resist

 

We simmered our juicy sauce down for quite some time, until it was reduced by half. We wanted a nice, thick sauce.

 

Can’t forget to feed the leftover seeds and skin to the compost!

 

 

 

Week three: Diced and Whole

 

Since I’ve skinned tomatoes before, I had a plan this time. It’s so much easier if everything is set up in order; your tomatoes, a boiling pot, a compost pot for the skins, a bowl of ice water, cutting board, and large bowl for newly skinned tomatoes. A knife and slotted spoon are essential.

 

Make an X with your knife on the bottom of the tomato.

 

Put into the boiling water. I am way too distracted to time it…but usually a minute or so will do. The skin will start to peel as it boils, usually.

 

Take the tomato from the boiling water, dunk it into ice water…

 

…and the skin will peel right off.

 

Rylee helped make this a very quick, efficient job! I HIGHLY recommend that two people work together on tomato peeling. It is much quicker and less messy if you both have designated jobs.

 

Some of the tomatoes we left whole, and some we diced.

 

Rylee assured me that her mother was ok with her using a knife!

 

Dividing our skinless tomatoes up; whole and diced.

 

Justin came to check out the fun!

 

We used a scale to get about 15 ounces in each freezer container; the size we use most in recipes.

 

 

 

Near the end, Rylee snuck a lot of bites. How awesome is it that she became famished for tomatoes while skinning and chopping them?!

 

 

I like to use scotch tape for a label, with one side folded over so it’s easy to remove later.

 

 

We will be enjoying these all winter! AND, we still are being bombarded by tomatoes, so we will be freezing even more–maybe even filling the whole top section of the freezer!

 
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Urban Gardening

Local Spotlight: Young Urban Homesteaders

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I really admire how young these two food-growers are!  People in my city are becoming more and more interested in learning how to grow produce in their yards, or are seeking out food that has been grown organically within the city. It is so wonderful watching this growth and enthusiasm as it takes off!

Also spotlighted on Andi’s blog — LittleBigHarvest

 

Young Urban Homesteaders create ecosystem in their backyard in the Wells Street Corridor near downtown Fort Wayne

Urban gardeners sell goods at Fort Wayne area markets

By Jaclyn Goldsborough of The News-Sentinel

Friday, August 16, 2013 – 8:18 am

 

For 24-year-old Philippe Carroll and 23-year-old Samantha Arney, growing a large urban garden next to their home on their double lot in the Wells Street Corridor near downtown Fort Wayne is more than just a way to make extra money, it’s a way of life. It’s a way of feeling connected to the Earth and to their community.

Carroll and Arney are the owners of Young Urban Homesteaders and part of a growing trend of the farm-to-fork food movement and the grow-food-not-lawns agricultural movement. Status, titles and trends are not important to this young couple, however.

What is important is building a sustainable ecosystem and selling the best product to Fort Wayne market shoppers.

The Homesteaders offer everything from chard and kale to okra and kahlrabi. They also sell handmade herbal teas with herbs from the garden.

While prices vary for each different market item, the Homesteaders also offer a unique pricing system: prices are a suggested donation.

“We want to make it available to anyone,” Carroll said. “If you are used to paying for more your food at certian places then you are more than welcome to pay more and pay what you are used to. If you are used to paying less you are welcome to pay less to have access to food. But we also need to stay afloat,” he said.

When they first moved to their home in November, they noticed two apple trees and a peach tree. Carroll said they began to build their farm around the existing fruit trees.

In their garden, everything is connected and strategically placed. The sunflowers are planted above the lettuce to maximize space and protect each other from the elements to provide the ideal growing condition. The young two farmers have a wealth of knowledge. From planting to ways to reuse waste, most everything is considered.

The Homesteaders also develop their own black gold fertilizer, creating their own compost and even cultivating their own worms.

Everything that comes out of the soil or the beds goes back into it one way or another.

Arney said while they have only been selling for a few months, so far they are getting a lot of support from the community.

“Just for people to be able to see that we can grow food in a small place and actually get it to people – it’s inspiring to people. It’s a way to do what we love and make a living off of it. It’s also a way to show other people that this is possible. We have neighborhood kids that started coming around and they have taken to it and they love it,” Arney said.

Georgina Balestra, Carroll’s grandmother, grew up on a farm in Cuba. She said she is proud of what he is doing.

She said she was wondering about how much he could really grow in such a small area, but she said she is extremely impressed.

“He has always been interested in nature. I’m learning a lot from him,” she said. “It’s the satisfaction of not only doing something for yourself, but doing something for others.”

Carroll said he is on a mission to live with less impact in a high density environment.

“When it came down to it I was thinking, ‘What do I want to do with my day? What do I want to do with my daily energy?’ There’s something I really enjoy about putting my daily energy – I get my exercise – into growing food which then sustains me and it sustains my community,” Carroll said.

The Young Urban Homesteaders set up a stand at the Fort Wayne Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Wednesdays at One Summit Square. They also appear at the West Main Street Farmers Market from 3 to 8 p.m. on Friday’s at 1938 West Main St. They accept credit and debit card.

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Garden Tips and Ideas

Fast Friday Tip-Tomatoes on Newspaper

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When you are collecting tomatoes every day, they start taking up a lot of counter space. As they wait for their end (eaten fresh, juice dripping down your chin? sauced? roasted?), set them out on a layer of newspaper. Make sure each tomato has its own little space (try not to stack them), and the newspaper will help with airflow so the tomatoes continue to ripen, not rot.

If you have a silly tomato with a nose, by all means, dress it up and hide it among the others. The reaction from passersby is awesome.

These tomatoes are waiting to become sauce! Stay tuned!

 

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Urban Gardening

Straw Bale Planting

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Not too long ago I mentioned this straw bale that sits next to the garden, and that it was destined for a special purpose. Well, it has met it’s destiny—as a self-contained planter!

 

I only recently learned that you can directly grow plants in straw bales, with just a small layer of soil on top. The straw that begins to decay inside the bale becomes a great environment for the roots of your plants. Some people have whole gardens made of straw bales. If you take a minute and google for images of ‘straw bale gardens’, you’ll be totally amazed . This idea is especially nice if you have access to cheap or free straw.

 

I thought this was the perfect way to put our straw bale to use. I love to use straw as mulch around the garden plants, but a little bit goes a long way when you have small growing space like we do; the rest of the straw bale just sits there, slowly disintegrating. Last year, late in the fall, I ended up stuffing the whole thing in my compost ball, since the compost needed carbon anyway. Early this summer, after mulching, the bale sat again, and though I know it will end up in the compost in the late fall, I thought I’d give it a purpose in the meantime. (Note: the compost ball is becoming way too small for us. Knowing that the straw bale itself will fill that thing, plans are in the works for a new compost site, using cheap–or free–materials. Stay tuned!)

 

We planted peas in mid July. Is that a bit late to plant anything? Maybe. Don’t forget, I’m a newbie who likes to experiment. Perhaps we will get a fall harvest of delicious peas—they do like cooler weather. Using some leftover bagged potting soil, we made a nice little bed, and in went the peas. The kids LOVED doing this. But then, what kid doesn’t get a thrill when you tell them to grab some dirt with their bare hands?!

 

The pictures below tell the story. About a week after the initial seed sowing, we replanted in the areas where nothing came up, and pushed bamboo stakes down into the straw (so easy) for supports. If needed, we can thread some thick string around the stakes and give these peas a happy growing space.

 

 

Once all the peas have been harvested and we head into winter, we can put the spent plants, soil, and straw, all together, in our compost!

 

 

 

Handfuls of dirt-awesome!

 

 

 

 

Even the littlest helper gets into the dirt-piling

 

 

We may have been mashing that dirt down a little too hard!

 

Oh yeah. That’s what I like to see..

 

Muddy, dirty…

 

little hands– working hard!

 

 

 

Carefully placing peas

 

 

 

Water break!

 

 

The straw, newly planted, sitting nicely by the garden!

 

Several days later..we have green!:

 

 

 

 

 

Filling in where no sprouts seem to want to show up

 

 

Keeping the peas misted and happy!

 

Looking GOOD! 
Categories
Garden Tips and Ideas

Fast Friday Tip: Panty Hose Tomato Ties

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Don’t spend another dime on fancy tomato ties from the garden center! Panty hose work perfectly for the task of keeping wayward vines trained where you want them.

 

I’ve always kept store-bought ties like the ones pictured below on hand, but always felt like I had to ration them out. The cost can really add up when you only get a dozen or so in a pack that cost 2 or 3 bucks. The cable ties on the far left are essential for other garden tasks, but can cut into the tender skin of your tomato vines, leaving them injured and susceptible to disease.

 

 

 I personally don’t wear panty hose, but bought some just for this purpose. This pair cost me only a dollar (at the handy dollar store within walking distance from me) and will give me dozens of ties.

 

 

Just take the panty hose and cut a length from it. It will stretch out and tie easily around your vines. The material is soft and gentle and you won’t have to worry about the homemade ties cutting into the vine and hurting your plant.

 

 

 

Now go search your drawer for some old hose you know you are never going to wear again, and tie up some tomatoes!

 

 

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Book Review

Book Review: Gaining Ground

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Gaining Ground: A Story of Farmers' Markets, Local Food, and Saving the Family FarmGaining Ground: A Story of Farmers’ Markets, Local Food, and Saving the Family Farm by Forrest Pritchard

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I love this farmer memoir because it’s funny, accessible, and deeply touching. Forrest Pritchard writes directly from his heart, and the resulting chapters move from amusing to hilarious, heart-warming to heart-breaking, finally culminating in both triumph and tragedy. It’s not just a good model for our food system, it’s simply an amazing read!

Forrest Pritchard is a farmboy at heart, as evident by his childhood memories of chickens, cows, pigs, crop fields and gardens—though not always all at once; his parents maintained full time jobs off the farm while continually starting projects at home in an attempt to keep the family farm going. Upon graduation, Pritchard quickly sets his sights on staying on the family land and saving the farm from its steady decline into debt and failure, much to the chagrin of his dad, who had hoped his son would use his college education to get a stable job and ‘better life’. The resulting adventures that follow Pritchard’s new found dedication to the farm are woven into this page-turning book. Pritchard generously shares his foibles right along with his victories, and doesn’t mind looking for the humor in his mistakes. All the of the great moments in the book are wonderfully enhanced by his writing style; he’s a gifted writer with an English degree, and that shows.

Though he is light-hearted and humble, the bottom line is, his critical eye of the current farming system that surrounds him leads him to make risky and courageous changes. While farmers around him stick with the status quo–often out of desperation, more often out of a lack of knowing things could be different–Pritchard goes out on a limb to make the changes he thinks make more sense. He begins to analyze the ways that farming could be kept simpler, to better care for our now and our later. The changes he dives into can be very difficult (and yet sometimes so very simple), and at times costly, but Pritchard keeps the long vision in his mind as he works out a plan to create the farm of his dreams. The farm of his dreams slowly takes shape as a sustainable, healthy place, providing food to many different farmer’s markets. The work is still very hard, but to Pritchard the hard work is meaningful, rather than a constant struggle to stay ahead. Pritchard’s clear-headed bravery had me hooked, as I turned page after page to see how he would transform the family farm into an organic, grass-fed livestock operation. We need lots more Forrest Pritchards in order to heal our land and move forward in a better way of feeding ourselves.

One of my land-healing heroes, Joel Salatin, actually wrote the foreword for the book. Pritchard had visited his farm as a young boy and was ultimately inspired by the sustainable techniques Salatin has implemented for decades. Something in the foreword stuck with me: Salatin states that these type of farmer-memoir books should appeal to not just fellow farmers, but to the eaters who depend on those who grow food. People will feel more connected and mindful of the sources of their food when they read the entertaining, personal accounts of those providing it. I totally, whole-heartedly agree with this sentiment, but not just as one of the eaters. I want to be one of the growers, the providers, even if not in the rural-farm atmosphere. Though my path leans more toward suburban and urban food growing, I feel like I’m touching base with kindred spirits when I read about the people who are already embarked, passionately, in growing sustainable food. I’m motivated and filled with fresh inspiration when I read stories like Pritchard’s, and ready to jump into my own plans, head first.


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In The Kitchen

Too-Sweet Defeat

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Maybe I was basking in the joy of my mulberry harvest a little too blithely. Maybe I shouldn’t have taken the lazy way out of making jam by trying to make freezer jam instead of cooked jam. Or maybe I should have just Googled for awhile before following the recipe included with the Cert-O pectin; after all, my instincts were cringing at the mountain of sugar I was setting aside (per very specific directions on Cert-O insert). That way I would have known how many options are out there for making jam that don’t rely on pounds of sugar.

 

Whatever the error, I’m sitting here now trying not to cry.

 

8 cups of beautiful, perfect mulberries, picked over the course of a couple weeks, now sit imprisoned in a sickeningly sweet ….gel? Slime? The texture is so thick and gritty and weird I’m having trouble coming up with an analogy. This sugar concoction has not only ruined my mulberries, it is using up precious jar space. I’m trying to think of a way to use up this sweet mess, but I’m wondering if I’ll end up dumping it all. The latter option seems inconceivable. 🙁

 

I had wanted to try the recipe that follows this post. I’ve been reading a lot about jams that don’t use commercial pectin, and I was so game for it. But, I was feeling lazy. And I just so happened to have an extra box of Cert-O in the pantry (which worked beautifully with the sour cherries, and probably would have been beautiful with my mulberries had I not been too lazy to get out the cooking gear).

 

 

At any rate, we all need lessons in humility, and here was one for me. I’ve been experiencing a lot of ‘beginner’s luck’ with so many of my projects lately, that failure was bound to happen eventually. Instead of the deep, dark, subtly-sweet, mulberry flavored jam seen in the jar (almost gone, as you can see) at the right, I’m left with 7 jars of gloppy, crystal-ly reddish sugar. With some mulberries chunks hiding out here and there. It occurred to me that maybe freezer jam is supposed to turn out like that, but I doubt it. Something had to be wrong with the way I read the instructions. If that is what freezer jam is, I’m not interested!

 

I am looking for ideas to NOT waste these mulberries. Craig said I should try mixing the ‘jam’ (I don’t think this stuff deserves the name) with fresh berries and making some pie. I thought about using a couple spoonfuls to stir into plain yogurt, then freezing into pops. I won’t pout for long, I’ll figure out a way to make it right. The horribly sweet concoction will not go into the trash. While I’m at it, with this ‘glass is half full’ attitude, I will go ahead and say that all the fun I had collecting the berries with the kids is absolutely worth having an epic fail. 🙂

 

Following is the recipe I’ll be trying the next time I have a harvest of mulberries. In– *gulp* –a year from now. Lessons learned with the seasons can be hard to swallow, since there is no re-do until the season comes around again. The mulberries are essentially over with for the summer. Maybe if I can find a great deal on some blackberries, or if a vendor at the farmer’s market still miraculously has mulberries in the next week or two, I will snatch them up to test the recipe out.

 

In the meantime, I’ll try hard not to feel utterly sick over the failed fate of those perfect mulberries!

 

 

I will try this recipe next time to avoid too-sweet defeat!!!

BLACKBERRY JAM WITH LEMON ZEST (In my case, MULBERRY JAM)

Makes about 5 half-pint jars

This recipe is from Canning for a New Generation by Liana Krissoff.

1 pound Granny Smith apples (about 3 small)

3 pounds blackberries (about 8 cups), rinsed

2 cups sugar

3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Grated zest of 2 small lemons

Sterilize jars and keep them hot in the canning pot. Put a small plate in the freezer and put the flat lids in a heatproof bowl.

Quarter and core the apples, reserving the cores and seeds. Put as many of the apple trimmings as possible in a jelly bag or 4 layers of cheesecloth and tie the bag closed.

Put the blackberries and sugar in a wide, 6- to 8-quart preserving pan. Bring to a simmer, stirring frequently, then continue to cook until the juices are just deep enough to cover the blackberries, about 5 minutes. Pour into a colander set over a large bowl and stir the berries gently to drain off the juice.

Return the juice to the pan along with the apples and the bag of trimmings. Bring to a boil over high heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until the syrup is reduced and thick and registers about 220 degrees on a candy thermometer, 15 to 20 minutes. Return the blackberries and any accumulated juices along with the lemon juice and zest to the pan. Bring to a simmer. Simmer, stirring frequently, until a small dab of the jam spooned onto the chilled plate and returned to the freezer for a minute wrinkles when you nudge it, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat. Stir gently for a few seconds to distribute the fruit. Remove the bag and the apples.

Ladle boiling water from the canning pot into the bowl with the lids. Using a jar lifter, remove the sterilized jar from the canning pot, carefully pouring the water from each one back into the pot. Place them upright on a folded towel. Drain the water off the jar lids.

Ladle the hot jam into the jars, leaving 1/4-inch headspace. Use a damp paper towel to wipe the rims of the jars, then put a flat lid and ring on each, adjusting the ring so that it’s just finger-tight. Reutrn the jars to the water in the canning pot, making sure the water covers the jars by at least 1 inch. Bring to a boil, and boil 5 minutes to process. Transfer the jars to the folded towel and do not disturb for 12 hours. Check the seals by pressing down on the center of each jar. If it can be pushed down, it hasn’t sealed. Store the jam in the refrigerator for up to a month.