What's Up Wednesday

Laundry is up (literally)! I only recently discovered the joy that is line-dried laundry.
For me it falls into that 'retro and awesome' category, along with canning and apron-wearing.

The tomatoes I started in the spring that weren't doing well are now finally starting to ripen-

I guess I'll have a sort of staggered tomato season!

 My one lone sunflower this year, getting ready to bloom!

 Prize Choy! A new addition to the garden for Fall.

 'Parade' Bunching onions, and pumpkin plants in the background

 The canned goods shelf is starting to fill up!

Apricots, Blueberry jam, Raspberry jam, Corn, & Green beans!

Tell me- What's Up in your Garden this Week?

Canning 101: Blueberry Jam

The canning workshop today went really well! We covered a lot, and ran long, which I felt bad about. Overall though, interested folks got to learn how to can, and participate in the process, which I think is really important!

We also talked over techniques on freezing and drying fruits and vegetables, and everyone left with some handouts that I think will be helpful reference in the future.

As I suggested to the class participants, if you're going to can more than once, I suggest you purchase a canning recipe/instruction manual, like the Ball Blue Book of Canning. It's kind of like having a bible or religious book to reference, vs. copying some pages or passages out of said book. The passages are helpful, but if you want context and more guidance, having the actual book is really essential. Not a bad religious metaphore for a Jew(ish) agnostic, huh?  

I chose to can the Berry Jam recipe from the Ball Blue Book of Canning. It's easy, simply, and straight-forward; a good jam for beginning canners.

If you're looking for a easy recipe to start your canning adventures with, here it is:

Berry Jam

Supplies needed:

a water bather canner (or a really large pot)

a rack to go inside the canning pot

canning jars- Ball and Kerr are two frequently-used brands

a set of jar lids & bands

canning tongs to grab the hot jars
a potato masher                                                                                 

9 cups crushed berries
6  cups sugar

Directions:

Combine berries and sugar in a large saucepot. Bring slowly to a boil, stirring until sugar disolves. Cook rapidly to gelling point. As mixture thickens, stir frequently to prevent sticking. Remove from heat. Ladle hot jam into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch of headspace. Place the lid and the band on the top of the jar, and screw on. Process 15 minutes in a boiling water canner.

                           

                                             Then Ta-da!! Jam.

Friday Favorites

My favorite things about this Friday include:

Pollinators in my garden this morning

Tomato time!!!

Spacemaster cucumbers- you rock my world!

Local blueberries for breakfast

Happy Friday! What are some of your favorites today?

Tuesday Takehome + a Recipe

I haven't picked up my CSA share this week yet, but I DID shop at the Farmers' Market, of course.

I came home with:
2 quarts cherries
1 quarts blueberries
1 pint sungold cherry tomatoes
8 oz mozzarella cheese

Nom nom nom nom! I need to get out there and do some serious fruit picking for my canning plans. In the mean time, this amazing stuff will definitely do.










I've also been harvesting a good deal out of the garden lately. Here's a photo of yesterday's harvest- 3 leeks, and handful of Provider green beans, 7 Yukon Gold potatoes, 2 giant kale leaves, some sprigs of thyme, rosemary, and oregano, and a pinch of the first dried cilantro seeds of the summer (called corriander)!!

I'm patting myself on the back- I've been doing a good job of picking what I need for dinner each night, rather than harvesting a whole bunch just because I'm excited to see it all laid out. It's helped me get more time out of each crop I've grow.
I'm starting to have post-harvest holes in the garden- I'll need to fill those in with fall veggies! I've already planted some acorn squash as well as several cucumber plants and a watermelon, but it'll be time to seed carrots and spinach and fall greens before we know it.






I'm too inspired by fresh fruits and veggies to share a recipe today. My recipe for today is simply this-

• Go find some locally grown veggies and fruits
• Cut them up and prepare as minimally as possible
• Eat :)

Here's a photo of my plans for dinner on the right.

What have you been harvesting out of your garden lately or enjoying most from your local Farmers' Market?

Preserving Fruit- Canning Raspberry Jam

I almost can't believe it, but this summer is my 4th year canning- whoa.

My knowledge on canning has definitely grown since that first summer canning in my sweltering kitchen in the apartment overlooking Michigan Ave in downtown Ypsi. Since then, I've got my own canning supplies, tried my hand at pressure canning, added freezing and dehydrating to my preservation "tool kit", and even taught a few canning classes!

There's several particularly satisfying things about canning; I enjoy the time spent during the process, working with the fruit or veggie or medium of choice. Canning allows me to really focus on that product and feel like I'm truly appreciating it.

Also, as I so articulately said it 3 years ago (ha ha- first blog post ever!), canning makes me feel like a "settler", or a pioneer of sorts. What I mean by that is the feeling of connection to the seasons, to the history of canning and preserving of those that canned before me in my family. Most would say that in 2012, we don't "need" to can at home in order to survive. While I think that's true to a point, canning helps me to live a more season-oriented lifestyle, and to save costs on food year round- not only through gardening in the summer.

The Farmers' Market was overwhelming today, in the best sense possible. There were lots of "new" things to the market this week- firsts for the season. Peaches, blueberries, potatoes, as well as more raspberries and strawberries. I couldn't even let myself look at the peaches- too tempting to buy 6 quarts and go to town canning them up.

I picked 3 pints of blueberries and freeze those. I also got 2 pints of raspberries, and I was going to freeze them, but upon getting them home realized that they were melting into a messy blob.  When you're faced with such a blob, you make jam.

I didn't realize how much I missed canning until I got my first taste of it for the season today! Only 1 pint and 1 half pint of jam done today, but that's ok- there will be more to come. Lots, lots more!


Have you canned yet this summer? If so, what did you make?

Tour of my Urban Garden

I spend a lot of my time on this blog posting about my garden and the veggies & fruits within it. I thought I'd give an overview of all the food-growing space I have, so those of ya'll who are interested enough to visit again could better visualize the space!

We live on a small city lot, between two streets that forks out in a "V" shape. The lot is about 1/10th of an acre- pretty small! Right now, all of the edible gardening I do, minus some herbs like lavendar and russian sage, are in the backyard. Currently. nearly one whole side of the backyard is devoted to edible gardening. Here's more about the spaces I grow in, and what I grow there!

Vegetable Beds

Raised Bed gardens
First stop on the tour is my vegetable gardens, and my favorite part of my outdoor space!  My veggie gardening mostly happens in concrete block raised beds, which we installed over the past several years- first we started with just the "S" shape you see in the foreground of this picture. The next year, I added the little tail that extends it closer to the house, and then this past fall I added a whole other section that runs up the side of the house up to the front fence.  All in all, this area totals about 260 sq ft.


What's planted in this space is the bulk of the vegetables I grow throughout the year.

Staples always on my planting list include:
potatoes, onions (sets, seeds, or transplants), tomatoes, carrots, peppers, lettuce, bush beans, and garlic.

New additions this year include:
spinach, kale, leeks and sugar snap peas.

Asparagus bed

This season, I cultivated a 10 ft x 1ft Asparagus Bed on the Right side of the house. I haven't seen much action out there so far, but I'm hoping these plants establish. I chose two varieties- Jersey Knight, and Purple Passion. They're a nice addition to the variety of edibles I grow!

We'll see how they do. Anyone have any asparagus advice?

Space for Herbs
During the Spring-Fall, I start seeds indoors using my homemade seed starting shelves. During the Winter months, these shelves have another function- keeping alive more tender herbs that wouldn't produce well outdoors!

This is the first year that I bought/brought in herbs for the Winter, and while I didn't have enough to use them tpo often, it sure was nice to use a little homegrown oregano or thyme now and then!

I ended up planting all the herbs outdoors, in the holes of my cinder block raised beds!

Backyard Fruit

In my backyard, I have several fruit areas, where I've taken advantage of space and sun to grow some sweet treats!

Raspberries
As of this year, I have 7 black raspberry canes- 4 along the back inside fence, and 3 that I transplanted on the side of the house by my raised beds. These really produced for the first time last summer, and it was such a pleasure to walk out back and pick a few berries! The canes I have (not sure what variety I have) produce small, purple/black berries that are really sweet.

Apple Trees

In addition to raspberries, we also have apple trees (planted super-close to the garage for some reason) and several small blueberry bushes.

The apple trees produce small apples that squirrels love to pick off and throw around my yard and eat. This season is going to be the season that I show those squirrels who's boss. I want to eat a few apples, damn it!

Blueberry bushes
The blueberry bushes have been kind of overshadowed in weedy beds for the past several years so this year I dug them up and re-planted them where the majority of the raspberry canes are. I hope they do better in that location- it would be great to have a small, steady crop of blueberries.

I'm also supposed to be getting an apricot tree delivered soon- still looking for a home for that!



Dwarf Cherry trees
We purchased these two dwarf cherry trees last year although one was mis-labeled as an apple tree- whoops! Last year we harvest 1 cherry from each tree which cracked me up! There are lots of blossoms on the trees this year and they've grown some- crossing my fingers for like 8 cherries per tree this year!

In the future, I'd love to add some grapes, as well as some hardy kiwifruit. Both of those grow well on arbors and trellises and it is easy to find cold-tolerant varieties. It's important for me to not get too carried away though- I want to make sure I can manage the garden and plants that I have now and make sure they are healthy and fruitful!

Pest protection

So back to a homesteading topic- Pests!

Something is ripping up my strawberry plants. The actual plants themselves- there aren't even any berries or any beginnings of any fruit to eat! I found 5 plants just pulled out of the ground, and some of the stems were ripped off- but none of the plant actually seemed to be eaten.

Any guesses on what this might be? I'm thinking about getting netting but I'd like to have more than just a stab in the dark about what this is.

But look!:

Blueberries!!

Pipe dreams (or nightmares)

I had an exciting weekend as far as home improvement projects go this weekend!

Outside:

• The plants I orderd from Hartmann Plant Company in Lacota, MI came in!


• I dug up a space for the blueberry plants along my fence

• I accidentally uncovered a huge pipe that I mistakenly dug out of the ground..




• Planted 3 blueberry bushes
  
• Planted 5 raspberry plants




• Put some decaying leaves in the compost bin to add some "brown"
  

Inside:

• Painted another coat of red in the basement

So projects are coming along nicely! If anyone is looking to get local(ish) plants and you live in the lower penninsylua, Hartmann's Plant Company is local! I don't know if they're very into organic practices (at all) but they are at least plants grown in Michigan. Sometimes you have to pick and choose! Here is their website:

http://www.hartmannsplantcompany.com/index.html

I found out that they sell Wild Ginger plants which is WAY exciting because that's what I want to use as ground cover in the Pit of Despair! I've been looking for it, but I couldn't find anything that was grown in Michigan!

Woo! :)

Making progress...