Garden, Garlic, and Soil Report

[Charlie]

Just got done planting the garlic. This is our first go with garlic. Planted 75 big cloves. I read somewhere about planting the small cloves to use in the spring as garlic "scallions", so I've about a hundred of them, planted very close together.

I planted where the green beans came out, to utilize the nitrogen produced by the beans. Added some pelletized fish and a light layer of compost over all. Will mulch with chopped leaves and surround with wire mesh to keep the mulch in place during the winter.

I didn't work the soil at all, just opened a narrow trench, I was amazed at the number of small worms. We had three inches of rain over a three day period last week and it quit three days ago, yet the soil was perfect for planting. Loose and moist. This soil improvement stuff is amazing, as is the amount of stuff being produced in a small area.

I picked about a gallon of Empress green beans from a 3'x3' test plot. No rust, spots or any signs of damage. Beautiful beans. I planted them in late summer from seed saved from the spring planting. As I usually don't, I didn't write down when I planted, being sure that I would remember when I did plant. I'm planning on covering the beans with a large cardboard box when frost comes to see how long I can extend harvest. We haven't had a frost yet, which is unusual as hell here in northern MO. Average first *freeze* date is 11 Oct.

The peppers are *still* producing heavily. I picked nineteen fully ripe Golden Marconis from the two plants in a pot. I think I am going to bring them in when frost is expected, could happen tomorrow nite. I'll strip the other peppers of all fruit and freeze them when it frosts.

The Miniature White cukes finally gave up and died. I planted them around the beginning of August just to see what they would do. Had a fair crop. Tasted darn good, as the other cukes gave up long ago.

It's been a good year, for learning *and* unlearning many things. Thanks ya'll.

[cat daddy]

They say there's a village in Russia, where the locals eat garlic like Americans eat potatoes. You may need to send off for recipes......

Cool. It'll be interesting to see if the garlic likes it. I'm sure the little worms are happy about it.

Now you're making me feel guilty about not planting anything for Fall. I do have a tomato volunteer in a pot from the Spring. I'll nurse it along and put it in the greenhouse if it ever cools off around here. Average frost dates haven't meant much around here (8B, late November) for a while.

We did spread 72 yards of pretty good composted shredded mulch at our park this morning. That brings us up to over 700 yards spread over the last two years on a little over an acre. The pecan grove has produced the biggest crop ever (as it has area-wide) mostly due to abundant Summer rains. But, since we started with dying trees and no topsoil, it's been a successful season. And the rest of park of about another acre has had a ton of worm activity. I hope they're migrating.

[Charlie]

Heh heh.......what are you saying? ;-)

We use a *lot* of garlic in cooking (kind of an Emeril thing) and I eat at least three cloves raw daily. It is helping the BP and I would hazard to say the immune system. No vampires bothering lately either. Several weeks ago, everyone around me had a nasty cold. I didn't catch it. Makes you wonder.

I catch hell about the odor once in a while and have to back off a bit.

Next year I plan to sample deeply of the varieties offered at Seed Savers.

I'll bet they are happy. It distressed me to disturb them and I tried to work gently so as not to hurt any of them.

This is the first year I have done any fall planting. I'm working with limited space and am wanting to see how much can be produced in a limited area. Other than the container growing, I am working with two raised beds that are 30' x 3'. Trying sucession planting, double cropping, as in the case of the beans and cukes. Growing things vertically, ie: cukes, melons, pole beans, tomatoes. Planting very tightly, thus creating a canopy over the soil, which is greatly reducing any weeds and keeps the soil much cooler than exposed soil and conserves moisture.

I'm planning to try radishes, lettuce, beets and some other cool season stuff in a sheltered area that I built in a corner of the fence that is about 4'x8' and then line three sides with thermax insulating board and cover it like a cold frame and see how it does. Like I said, that is the plan, but we all know how plans can go......

That is a lot of compost. Congrats on the success and I hope we're all paying attention to what you are doing and the results being seen. Further proof of the value of building up the soil and it's organisms.

And oh wow, you are truly fortunate to have pecans. I'm getting wetmouth just thinking about them. My uncle lives in Georgia and when he wanders thru every decade or so, he brings large bags of cracked and whole pecans. I always wind up with serious soremouth after being an absolute pecanpig. The cookbooks come out and it is pecan everything!

[Cheryl Isaak]

I'm coming to visit!

[Cheryl Isaak]

I'll share my favorite garlic recipes - I start by peeling 2-3 heads of it... C

[William Wagner]

Vincent Price's Sopa de Ajo

(Garlic Soup)

This recipe serves 6.

Quote from "A Treasury of Great Recipes" by Mary and Vincent Price (1980 printing): "This recipe is a triumph of experiments over experience. The first time I had this soup in San Juan at La Mallorquina, I was nearly overpowered and so were my traveling companions. But I was assured that garlic soup was a great delicacy and I'd be missing something if I didn't have it in my repertoire. So I took the recipe and we tried it this way and that way. Suddenly, a marvelous concoction! Garlic soup! The trick is that your garlic must be absolutely fresh, and you saute' it very gently--don't burn it. An easy and truly delicious soup."

8 cloves garlic, chopped finely 1/4 cup olive oil I quart beef stock 1 teaspoon salt fresh eggs

Chop garlic. Saute in olive oil until lightly browned. Add beef stock and salt. Bring to a rapid boil. Break a fresh egg into each heated soup plate. Strain the hot soup over the raw egg and serve immediately.

[cat daddy]

I think garlic has many medicinal and nutritional qualities. I was never able to include it regularly in my diet, though. There was quite a discussion of garlic and longevity years ago, but the theraputic dose from anecdotal evidence was apparently eating the equivalent of a couple of cereal bowls of garlic a day.

I've always gotten very excited about that method of gardening, although I've never tried it. Like the original square foot gardening concepts to your raised beds, compatible and successive plantings make a lot of sense. I hope you have good luck with it.

Yes, and the Parks Dept. and other volunteer groups have taken notice and adopting our methods. I knew they had vast amounts of wood chip stockpiles, but they didn't seem to see the value in using it beyond tree planting. We also spread about 1200 lbs. of coffee grounds around the 6 most sickly trees, then added 500 lbs. of alfalfa meal the next year. I was making compost and alfalfa tea to innoculate the soil, too. But mostly just getting the soil moisture content up and letting Nature restore some biological activity helped the most.

I've always lived around pecan trees and have a great love for them. This grove was planted in the 20's, but in highly alkaline degraded limestone "soil". They were planted too close together (20' grid) and only kept thriving due to irrigation from a sulfur artesian well. When that was cut-off sometime in the 70's, the trees declined and a drought in the 90's killed off quite a few. When the rains returned, it washed off virtually all of the very thin topsoil. But, today we had a storm and the ground is thick with ripe pecans. We reversed about 30 years of neglect in less than 3 years. It was a very rewarding sight today. And, good eating....

[cat daddy]

I found these ingredients for Georgian (Russia) garlic salad. Feeds *4*

***50 To 75 cloves of garlic*** Peeled 1 cup Extra-virgin olive oil 1/2 cup Fresh lemon juice (or Balsamic vinegar) 1/2 tsp. Salt 1 tsp. Freshly ground or cracked Black pepper 1 tbsp. Herbs (oregano is nice)

[Cheryl Isaak]

I'll post mine as soon as the current round of insanity ends....

Have you tried this?

[Omelet]

Sounds more like a condiment to me... To be used SPARINGLY! ;-)

[Cheryl Isaak]

I've eaten roasted garlic as a vegetable and marinated cloves in a salad but not as the main ingredient in a salad.... Cheryl

[cat daddy]

Oh hell no........ Do I look Russian?

[cat daddy]

Pffft.... That's a lot of condiment for four people. Which was the point I was making; that some cultures use garlic as a staple side dish, and some as just a flavouring .

I'm sure there's some horrible place where people take a single jalapeno, scoop out the seeds, chop it up and put it in a bowl of tomatoes and call it "hot sauce". My favourite little taqueria fills a blender with fresh jalapenos, pours in a half cup of lime juice and purees it into heaven on a tortilla chip........

[Omelet]

Nah.

Just take a whole Jalapeno, remove the insides, stuff it with cheese and wrap 1/2 a strip of bacon around it. Secure with a toothpick and grill.

There are a number of names for this recipe from "wolf turds" to "Armadillo eggs". ;-)

[Billy]

Since garlic is a rubefacient, this recipe (12 - 18 cloves/person) sounds nuts.

[cat daddy]

Not so crazy about the bacon part, being vegetarian and all....... Back in the day, the only jalapenos I encountered were on the nachos at the Armadillo (and at the Posse East). Picked them off and what juice was left was hot enough for me. Now, it's hard to find jalapenos served publicly with enough heat to actually call them hot peppers, except the Eastside joints where you order in Spanish. [for those world-wide readers, Om lives up the road a bit, hence the local references]

[Billy]

To "widow maker";-)

[Billy]

Ja-lap-pin-nos outt'en my garden will take that smile off'en your face;-)

[cat daddy]

There were some pretty hot ones available a couple of months ago at my aforementioned restaurant. The salsa verde was so hot it was like pouring acid on my tongue and had no flavour. I guess they just got a potent batch and it wasn't very enjoyable.

[doofy]

You could convert me into a methane generator with this.