corrientes cowpea Archives : Cast Iron Garden

November 5, 2023November 5, 2023

11/05/2023 late but clearing for garlic

A series of seven raised beds edged by corrugated stainless steel and connected by three beige plastic trellises. A pile of holly branches in front, and some beds still having tomato cages covered in frost killed cowpea vines. One bed has hoops and plastic over it. — I got probably a total of three beds cleared (two halves and two wholes) for putting our garlic back in. I also moved some yaupon branches into the city compost bins (saving some to try making tea). I put a lot of cowpea seeds behind the yaupon holly in hopes that they’ll take over there next year. The rest of vine waste I set over south of the fourth bed to try to smother the invasive sedges and bermudagrass that keeps creeping in since we haven’t put ground covers there yet. We haven’t got the garlic in yet. But closer. Next year not letting cowpeas bury the raised beds.

May 27, 2023May 27, 2023

05/27/2023 tacos

Corrientes cowpeas refried beans with two onions from yard. Garden walking onions. Garden cilantro. Oregano in the adobe seasoning for pork tacos.

January 21, 2023January 21, 2023

01/21/2023 refried cowpeas

Paula has been experimenting with what beans can be refried using the Rancho Gordo refried bean recipe. The refried cowpeas were great! These were the Corrientes cowpeas from last summer. Tacos had ground venison for the meat; the non-tomato veggies were mostly from the farmshare.

December 21, 2022December 21, 2022

12/21/2022 split cowpea soup

This afternoon the Chef inquired if he could use this jar of cowpeas. His request was approved.

Corrientes cowpeas, farm share veggies, and a bit of leftover salted pork.

I asked the Chef for the recipe and he said this is what he has documented so far. He had two different meals going and this one was on the left burner (marked L). The ingredients without a burner noted were in both meals. He doesn’t know why one is marked both LR. I’m sure the periodic table of elements was useful somehow in this.

November 24, 2022November 24, 2022

11/24/2022 plenty of thanks

We thought it was supposed to rain today, so yesterday we picked up all the tomato cages and put all the vegetable debris in the city compost pile. (I don’t know that ours gets hot enough to kill any diseases.). We piled the dead marigolds on the bed where we’ll put peppers next year. We put some sugar pea seeds there to see if the debris will shelter them. We took the plastic off the greens so they could get rain. We put cilantro seeds everywhere and carrot seeds among the greens.

For Thanksgiving, Paula started our Corrientes cowpeas soaking.

The Turkey is from Paula’s aunt and uncle in Texas where they raise some. All the veggies in the beans are from the farm share except garden poblanos. Wes used some store apples and store ham as flavors. But otherwise the veggies are all our garden or the farm share!

August 24, 2022August 24, 2022

08/24/2022 giant squash time and other things

I thought I saw something in a firewood piece.

It was a mason wasp!

The Chef made a delicious dinner. BLT with farm share tomatoes and Paula’s sourdough bread. The okra and peppers side was breaded and pan fried, with both farm share and garden okra, topped with cholula hot sauce.

These corrientes cowpea leaves seemed maybe diseased because they were covered in light yellow speckles, so I removed them.

Some sort of fungus maybe on the basil? It is the round dark spot I’m pointing to with my snippers. I have been removing them. If anyone knows otherwise, I’d let a leaf miner live.

Trimmed all the basil this evening for the Chef to do a pesto batch.

This corrientes cowpea stem is flat like a ribbon.

Side view of flat stem of cowpea. A mystery.

Last but definitely not least, the giant green-striped cushaw squash.

I’m not sure if Briar was concerned or unimpressed.

We got out the bathroom scale for this magnificent beast. The squash weighed 14.5 lbs. Last year’s big squash was barely 7 lbs.