Odds and Ends of Summer

I realized I have all these random pictures of things I did at the end of the summer and haven’t had time to write about. Now that it’s about to snow tomorrow, I’ve got time.

Tomatoes

When we picked our tomatoes, we had a giant bowl of green tomatoes. They did turn red, but before they did, I made one of Walt’s favorite dishes. They aren’t my favorite, but I’ll cook and eat them because he is so happy when I make:

FRIED GREEN TOMATOES

1 medium green tomato per person     

Salt     

Freshly ground pepper

Cornmeal     

Bacon drippings, or shortening 

Slice tomatoes about ½ inch thick,

season with salt and pepper

and then coat both sides with cornmeal.

In a large skillet, heat enough drippings or shortening to coat the bottom of the pan and fry tomatoes until lightly browned on both sides.

 

We had LOTS of tomatoes when we picked them before the first big storm. So I made roasted tomatoes. These are wonderful on toast, pizza, in spaghetti sauce, and just to eat. The sugar in the tomatoes caramelizes so they are incredibly sweet.

Roasted tomatoes

Roma tomatoes  

Garlic salt   

Pasta sprinkle (oregano, basil, etc.)

Olive oil

Freshly ground pepper 

Oven 325˚. Pour olive oil on baking sheet. Cut tomatoes in halves or thirds. Dip both sides in oil.

Sprinkle with salt, pepper, herbs.

Bake for 2 hours till soft and shriveled. Restrain yourself from eating all the tomatoes on the pan and licking it clean.

When we harvested the things in the front gardens, I made this for dinner:

LAST OF SUMMER OMELET

2 eggs per person

Onion, chopped

1 minced clove garlic

Tomato, chopped or sliced

Swiss chard, chopped

Half and half

Grated cheese

Salt and fresh grated pepper to taste

Butter

Sauté the onion and garlic in some butter for 5 minutes. Add tomato and Swiss chard. Stir fry until chard is limp. Meanwhile, beat the eggs with some half and half, salt and pepper. Remove the vegetables from the pan. Melt some more butter. Pour in the eggs. Cook the eggs, lifting the edges so the uncooked part can get to the bottom of the pan. Keep cooking until the eggs are nearly set. Put the vegetables on half of the omelet. Sprinkle on grated cheese. Gently lift the other half of the omelet over the vegetables. Slide out of the pan onto a plate. Doesn’t that sound so easy? Just slide it out? That happens about 1 time in 5 that it comes out beautifully, but that’s ok. It still tastes wonderful.

Decorative Corn

This year, I figured if we could grow corn in the garden, I could do an early variety of decorative corn. You can’t eat them – well, I guess you could scrape off the hard kernels and grind them with your mortar and pestle like Native American women used to do. Oh my.

The corn stalks are pretty – some of them are red or purple just like the corn. After picking the ears, we soaked them in a bucket of water for half an hour or so. Then Walt patiently sat on the deck and pulled back the husks to expose the corn and make them look pretty. This was one of the fun things – seeing what each ear looked like. We got enough to give each of our daughters some and several for ourselves. I will definitely plant more next year.

Basket

When I go out to the garden, I carry my basket. The first few years, I would take a giant stainless steel bowl, but everything would get jumbled in the bottom of the bowl. I looked everywhere for a basket big and sturdy enough with a handle. I finally found an Amish basket maker online and got this one. I love it. I do.

Bees

I plant lots of flowers and shrubs that will attract bees. Bees are having a tough time of it these days with colony collapse disorder. This kills off the entire hive of bees. Without bees, we wouldn’t have almonds, broccoli, cashews, watermelon, squash, pumpkin, tangerines, lemons, apples, peaches, strawberries, you name it. These little busy creatures are responsible for the pollination of most of the fresh foods we eat.

I’ve found they love the Russian sage, the climbing roses, the marigolds, and the Echinacea. So I plant these things and the bees, in turn, pollinate the tomatoes, the squash, the pumpkins, the chokecherries, and things I probably don’t even know about. I’m grateful for their work ethic.

Pests

Eeewwww

Conversely, I hate grasshoppers. Really. They eat the potato vines, the corn, the Swiss chard, the spinach and the bean leaves. I pride myself on growing things organically, but we finally had to break down and get some grasshopper-killing-bran. Last year, they stripped the potato vine leaves in a couple of days. This year, we got an early start on sprinkling the bran on the potato leaves and didn’t have as much of a problem with the hoppers in that bed. But they were still a problem. They nibble on just-ripening tomatoes. Makes me crazy. So I become a ruthless killer around the tomatoes. Scissors are my weapon of choice. The hoppers will flee if they see my hand or foot, but they don’t recognize scissors as a threat. So I decapitate the nasty hoppers. It’s gross, but I do get a bit of satisfaction that one less hopper will survive to make baby hoppers. And chomp my tomatoes.

This is not a pest - just a really cool spider picture

Fall leaves

This has nothing to do with anything except pretty.

We’ve had the prettiest fall, even with that 7” of snow that fell a few weeks ago. The snow was just the icing on the cake, as it were, for fall watering of trees and shrubs.

But I took this today

Clothesline

We’ve lived in about nine houses in the course of our married life. Of those nine, seven have had a clothesline. In fact, when we built the house we currently live in, I asked the builder to put in a clothesline. His look said it all: “You do know that they’ve invented dryers, right?” But he was too kind to say it out loud. Just smiled and nodded.

I love the way sheets and towels smell when they hang on the line. I love putting those sheets on the bed and that they are smooth and fresh. In the summer, on a warm breezy day, they dry faster than if they were in the dryer. If the temperature is above 60° and the wind isn’t blowing a gale, sheets and towels go on the line. Even when it’s like this:

They even got dry

Missy

I have a running buddy. Her life consists of waiting for me in the morning to go run. Going for a run. Then waiting another 24 hours to go for a run. When I go out to garden, she follows me. She follows me everywhere I go. She sits and watches everything I do, in case I decide to drop everything and go for a run. So I talk to her. I tell her what I’m going to pick next or where I need to move a hose. She’s extremely understanding and patient and wise. She agrees with everything I tell her. She thinks if she does, we’ll go for a run.