Category: Garden uses

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10/29/2023 first freeze forecast tonight

Piles of vegetable greenery on a concrete front poor with a black double door in the background
So, in spite of rain all day and temperatures in the 30s F, I went out and cut all the plants. That’s the giant pile of cut basil on an overflowing Rubbermaid tub and assorted cut off pepper plants nearby. The rest of the day was getting basil leaves off the stems.
An inch thick basil stem cut off, with my hand nearby for scale.
The basil stems were so big I had to use the loppers to cut them at the base.
A blue-gray rubber made plastic tub almost full of bright green basil leaves
3608 grams of basil leaves. This is 7.95 pounds. Yes, we did tare the tub weight. Yes, it is a lot of basil. No, I don’t even know what’s going to happen.
Close up view of a red and blue striped leaf hopper. Its legs and tip of snoot grade to yellow. It has tiny hair like antennae.
Leafhopper
A small true bug nymph on my fingers. It’s small enough that you don’t see around my whole finger. The brown colors are speckled
True bug nymph
A brownish jumping spider with iridescent green pedipalps peeks out from its web, which holds a bright green basil leaf folded over as shelter.
Jumping spider
Close up of the face of a praying mantis. It is watching me.
Praying mantis
We had several little friends come in on the basil. All were released back into the shelter of adjacent plants outside.
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10/05/2023 three chef meal

Credit for fancy salad to Paula. The Chef made the bacon cheese chicken rounds and sautéed veggies. All of us and our guest rolled out potato gnocchi. The potato gnocchi is topped with pesto made with garden basil. the sunflowers are the ones from the garden from two days ago.
Our guest brought this exquisite chocolate flourless cake topped with chocolate ganache. Paula added the edible flower of Texas mallow. (It tastes… like a plant haha.). The cake was DIVINE.

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09/27/2023 Thai larb

A half empty bowl of steamed rice awaits lettuce and laab, piled on nearby dishes.
Paula and The Chef collaborated on tonight’s dinner. Larb (or laab) is a meat salad. We used the lettuce leaves as little scoops/wraps and put rice with each scoop. Very tasty. From the garden, the larb contained Chimayó peppers and mint. It was delicious.
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09/02/2023 behind on peppers

A peeling white enameled metal colander full of red, orange, brown, and yellow peppers of various shapes and sizes.
I got very behind on the garden and the blog the last few weeks with my household humans on a trip. The cats said they needed feeding and it just kept happening! The long skinny peppers in the colander are Corbaci peppers. The upper left conical red one is an Apple Pepper (I assume it’s named for the shape). The lower left orange one was California Wonder bell. The lower right brown one is a Chocolate Bell.
Peppers seeds and a wrinkly whole red apple pepper in a white bowl with black stripes bordering the rim.
Some peppers, like these apple peppers, were at a stage where I’ve just extracted their seeds to save.
Tomato sauced bow tie pasta is heaped with veggies and feta cheese, with a side of buttered sourdough bread on a white plate with stripe and square black border.
Mom made a delicious dish of veggies, pasta, and beans for dinner during her and Dad’s visit! From the garden, it had apple peppers and California Wonder peppers (both sweet bell-ish types) in it, as well as fresh basil and oregano.
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09/09/2023 dinner and a show

Paula made this Thai dish, rad nah. It has garden garlic in it. The chef made the broth from scratch, from chicken and turkey bones. He also provided Paula with the hearty noodles. It was delicious!
Earlier in the day, Shacks watched the herb garden for skinks and grasshoppers.