Late update: more planting

This is one of those updates that never actually happened. I had all intentions of adding these planting dates, but never actually did. Luckily I did add the dates to my journal so I really know when I planted these!

Red cabbage: 5/12

Beans - Scarlet Runner and Cannellini: 5/20

Cucumbers: 5/18
Super Zagross Middle Eastern Cukes: 5/19 (seeds)

Eggplant - Calliope, Ghostbuster, Little Fingers, Twinkle: 5/18

Kale - Lacinato/Nero Toscana: 5/12

Red Leaf Lettuce: 5/12

Green Peppers: 5/15, 5/18

Popcorn - Dutch Butter: 5/12, 5/19

Spinach: 5/12

Tomatoes - Plum, Jet Star, Early Girl, Black Krim, Costoluta Genovese, Green Zebra,
Mr. Stripey, Box Car Willie, Sungold, Yellow Brandywine, Juliet: 5/17

Zucchini - Cocozelle, Costata Romanesca, Black Beauty, Tondo Chiaro di Toscana: 5/19

Flowers - Nasturtium, Torch Sunflower, Marigolds, Zinnia, Cosmos: 5/17

Herbs - Basil, Oregano, Thyme: 5/17

The garden has really taken off with the recent rain and plenty of sun that we've had. Unfortunately, we have yet to put up any stakes for tomatoes, or trellises for the peas and beans. I think we are looking to build this kind of set up for the tomatoes: Stake-and-weave trellis system. We have corn growing behind our peas in hopes to use the corn as a trellis, but the peas are growing much faster than the corn right now, so I am unsure about that system actually working. I was hoping to build teepees for the beans, as I planted them in little squares in the rows in order to do that eventually.

The lettuce is growing nicely, and providing us with more than enough for salads everynight. The arugula has begun to bolt and go to seed, so it is much to spicy for eating now. I will have to try and plant more, as well as new lettuce before we finish harvesting the heads we have now. In any case, the lettuce is far more successful than in our smaller garden last year, where it bolted before we harvested any for eating.

One Local Summer 1st week

Eating local here in New Hampshire is still a bit hard as far as fresh vegetables go, though we are harvesting more than enough salad greens to enjoy with every meal. For this week's meal I focused more on the proteins of the meal, which are available year round from local sources, right here in town. We dined on a local version of Spaghetti Carbonara, with homemade pasta made from fresh duck eggs and NH smoked bacon. Unfortunately the semolina flour was from Bob's Red Mill in Oregon, but that was the only ingredient (aside from salt and pepper) that came from far away.


Spaghetti Carbonara (New Hampshire version)

serves 4

For the spaghetti dough:

3 eggs (we used duck eggs)
2 cups semolina flour
1 cup AP flour

Create a well on a board or counter in the flour. Crack the eggs into the well, and scramble the eggs slowly using a fork. Gradually bring the flour into the eggs until the eggs become thick enough that they will not run out onto the board. Using your hands, bring in the rest of the flour (adding water if necessary) until a ball forms. Knead the dough for at least 10 minutes, until it becomes smooth. Allow the dough to rest for about 20 minutes. After resting, cut the dough into smaller pieces, about the size of a golf ball. Using a pasta machine, roll out the dough to the second to last setting on the machine. Lay out all the pieces, allowing them to dry out a bit to prevent the dough from sticking in the next step. (You may also need to flip them, or rub a bit of flour over them to help the drying) Using the thinnest noodle cutters, cut the dough and lay onto towels or on a rack to dry.

Get a pot of water to a boil on the stove.

For the carbonara:

6 slices of bacon, chopped
1 tablespoon bacon drippings or oil
2 eggs

In a skillet melt bacon drippings. Add the chopped bacon to the skillet and cook until crisp; it is better to get them quite crispy since they soften up a bit when mixed with the pasta. Begin cooking the pasta, it should only take 3-5 minutes, and will be ready when the bacon is ready. While the bacon and pasta are cooking, beat the eggs into a serving bowl, large enough to hold the pasta.

When the pasta is finished (cooked al dente) reserve a bit of the cooking water and immediately drain the pasta. Quickly add the drained pasta to the bowl, and begin tossing with two forks, which will help to cook the eggs. Add the bacon, and all the drippings from the pan to the pasta. Continue to toss the pasta for about 2 minutes, adding some of the reserved cooking water if the pasta seems dry. You will notice that when you continue to toss the pasta a creamy sauce is created right in the bowl from only a few simple ingredients.



Local sources:

eggs: Fitch's Farm, Milford, NH
bacon: Garfield's Smoked Bacon (purchased from Lull Farm)

Spring Flowers

Here's a small sample of the flowers we have seen popping up around here this spring...






Here's a small sample of the flowers we have seen popping up around here this spring...

More planting

This is the time in gardening I most look forward to - planting dates beginning! I really enjoy being able to have a garden to tend to, but sometimes it seems that there isn't much tending to do at all. Or, that the weeds have gotten so out of hand that there is too much to tend to. I of course enjoy the harvesting, but that's too easy...it's really the eating that I enjoy from that, which is no work at all. It seems now that the time when we can start getting more and more plants or seeds in the ground is upon us. Here's what we've been up to lately:

Arugula: 4/10 and 4/28 (I tried making a seed tape, but I don't think they are germinating)

Beets, Golden Detroit: 4/15, 4/29 (looking good so far)
Bull's Blood and Chiogga: 4/29

Carrots: 4/15 (they've sprouted nicely!)

Lettuce: Salad Bowl Mix: 4/28, all are sprouting nicely, and we've transplated successfully the heads that are growing too closely.

Radishes, French Breakfast: 4/15 (looking good, about 2 weeks until harvest!)

Peas, Wando Shelling: 4/28, 5/8 (filled in the holes where seeds did not germinate)

Squash, Trombocino: 4/29 (I don't think these will germinate, the heat wave got me overly ambitious!)

Broccoli, Packman (transplants): 5/3, 5/7

Cauliflower (transplants): 5/7

Parsley (transplants): 5/3

In the kids' garden: Peas: 4/28
Green Beans (transplants): 5/7
Broccoli: 5/7

Early season gardening

So far we have done a decent job getting an early start to the garden this year. We got a huge delivery of "super soil" (a soil/compost blend) to the garden the last week in March. The boys were really excited about that. What could be better on a Saturday morning than watching a dump truck drive through your yard to dump some dirt piles? Oh yeah, playing in those dirt piles that afternoon...


The dirt has been shoveled around the garden to make two large beds with one long path for flowers down the center. Hopefully the added depth will give us a little help with the horrible rock and clay conditions found here in New Hampshire. With the dirt in we were able to start on our spring seeds: Wando Shelling Peas (3/30 and 4/9), Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce (3/30), Salad Bowl Mix (3/30 and 4/9) and Arugula (4/7).

Though the morning started out cloudy and rainy we lucked out and enjoyed a sunny afternoon at a maple sugar house in Lyndeborough. Maple weekend is always a fun little activity celebrating the beginning of spring around here. Last year we checked out Ben's Sugar Shack, but this year we headed to the Maple Guys Sugar Shack, which was a bit closer to us, and I kind of liked their syrup better. It had a nice smoky flavor to it that I never noticed in other syrups before. Both places offer mail order syrup, so check either out if you are in need of some real syrup!

Opening Day

Today was our first day out working and planting in the garden. We worked on getting a few rocks out of the garden, but mostly, accomplished our two goals of getting some old seafood and egg shells out of the kitchen, and seeds into the garden. We put the shells into an old heavy duty plastic bag and crushed them up with a sledgehammer, then sprinkled it over the area of the garden where we are planning to plant our tomatoes. I am hoping to use eggshells for the tomatoes, and I read that seashells can act as lime, so I think the tomatoes could (hopefully)benefit from that as well. We marked out a small row to plant some broccoli raab seed. Last year we had no luck with the raab at all. It didn't grow very well, and whatever plants we got bolted since it was planted too late. We're about 5 or 6 weeks from our last frost date, so this time I'm hoping our timing is right on. This is one of my favorite vegetables and I have never found it at any of the farmers' markets, so we really need to grow our own. The last job was adding some compost to the seeds. This was a first for me. We started our compost pile last summer and this is the first time I stuck my hands into the stuff. Worms, dirt, some leftover bits of scraps and all...I dug right in. After getting over my initial squeamishness of it, it was a somewhat satisfying way of starting off our 2009 gardening season. Aside from the purchase of the seeds, this crop will be all our own.




(Picture from the BI website, seeds purchased from Ponemah Farms last year)

Botanical Interests
Ponemah Farms

Strawberry Brown Betty

One of our favorite ways of spending a summer morning is to head to one of the local strawberry farms. Everything is still quiet, and the sun has yet to heat everything up again. I admit, the whole process is easier said than done. I have one boy who can do most of the picking on his own and does a good job of it, that is until he picks about 10 berries and claims he is done. I much prefer that, however, over the chasing down of his little brother, running up and down the rows, picking unripe strawberries and eating them before anyone can catch him. We have yet to head home from picking without that little guy covered in strawberry juice. But really, having 2 kids who love fresh fruit and are willing to work to gather some? How could I complain?


This simple and delicious recipe came from 2 sources of inspiration. One was the leftover cider donuts in the fridge, the other, a quart of strawberries picked at a local farm, just on the verge of spoilage. This dessert was really made way back in August, but I chose to bring it out now because someone out there must have a bag of frozen local fruit in the freezer just waiting to be brought out and baked into something. In fact, I am hoping to try our peaches in this very soon.


Strawberry Brown Betty
(Adapted from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything: Apple Brown Betty)

4 to 6 servings

4 cups day-old donuts (or bread, cake or biscuits) cut or broken into small cubes
4 cups strawberries (or any other fruit, peeling if necessary) sliced
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter

Optional (from the original apple recipe):
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
Pinch ground cloves
Pinch ground allspice


Preheat the oven to 300 F. Place the donuts on a baking sheet and place in the oven. Bake until very lightly browned, about 10 minutes, shaking the pan once or twice during baking. Prepare the fruit and toss with the lemon juice. Melt the butter over low heat.

When the donuts are done, turn the oven up to 375 F. Toss the donuts with the sugars and half the butter. On the bottom of an 8- or 9-inch square baking pan, place one-third of the donuts. Top with half the strawberries. Repeat, then finish with the last of the donuts. Drizzle the rest of the butter over all.

Bake for at least 30 minutes, or until the liquid is bubbly and the top is browned. Serve warm with whipped cream (preferably local and fresh) or ice cream. This can be made ahead and reheated at 300 F for 15 minutes.

Note: Aside from picking the fruit, the kids did a great job breaking up the donuts, cleaning the berries and stirring ingredients together.