Winter Garden Beginnings

October is the time of year to begin the winter garden. Our first one!

First we had to think about location, because what gets sun during the summer doesn’t necessarily get sun in the winter. We actually can’t even use our summer garden plot, which is in the southwest corner of our yard. (The sun is further south in the sky, so the southern wall blocks pretty much all sun in the winter months).

So for our own garden, we are mostly just using the patio planter we built back in June, which has been empty for several months. We planted 8 broccoli plants, and are using netting to keep the dogs out.

Broccoli plants

We also planted heirloom carrots from seed and put in a planter we’re keeping in the front yard, where there is a lot of sun. It has been a week, and they have just started to sprout. We’re considering preparing the soil and actually planting in the front yard as well.

Heirloom carrots planted from seed

The watering schedule is lighter now that we have cooler days. We are currently getting highs in the 80s and lows in the 50s, and find that watering every 2 or 3 days is sufficient (rather than daily or twice-daily watering in the summer).

For the community garden, we cleared out the front two beds (what was left of the bean and edamame plants) and planted seed. In one bed, we planted all rows of carrots – 3 different varieties. In the other bed, we planted garlic and onion. The pepper plants are still going from the summer so we’re keeping those around as long as they last. Because of the south wall, we can’t plant anything here for winter because it won’t get enough sun. We did remove what was left of the cucumber and cantaloupe plants.

Beds of carrots, garlic & onion seed

We are extending the community garden into our neighbor’s backyard. We planted a couple dozen broccoli plants. We also planted a couple rows of radish and beet seeds.

Broccoli plants

We also planted a bed of different varieties of lettuce from seed.

Variety of lettuce seeds

Since sowing, everything has started to come up and we actually are going over there today to thin out some of the plants so they don’t compete for resources.

 

Homemade Hot Chili Oil

So many hot peppers, it was a great opportunity to make some chili oil, which we often buy at the store (Mongolian fire oil is what we commonly get).

First we dried out the hot peppers in our dehydrator. A combination of jalapenos, poblanos, fresnos, and habaneros.

Dehydrated peppers

We crushed the dried peppers in a food chopper.

Put in a saucepan.

 

Added a couple of cups of oil – mostly olive oil and some wok oil. (Last time we did this, we used sesame oil, but the sesame flavor overpowered the peppers).

We turned on the heat to get the oil hot enough that it started to sizzle. Then took it off the heat and let it sit overnight (about 12 hours).

We then drained it slowly using a strainer.

We ended up with a nice amount of dark red, hot chili oil and have been using it in lots of dishes. We had some previously-made chili oil that we topped up, plus a new bottle. It’s pretty spicy so it only takes a few drops to add a real kick (look how dark it is!). It’s very tasty, too. I think next time I’d be interested in adding some more flavors – ginger and garlic come to mind.

 

 

 

 

 

Reflections on Our First Summer Garden

The summer gardening season is just about over. There is a chill in the morning air, we can now open our windows at night, and last night it was cool enough that we even had a fire pit in the backyard.

A few hearty crops remain, but most of them will have to be pulled in the coming week or two. Yesterday we planted the beginnings of our winter garden, which I’ll discuss in another post. Here, I wanted to talk about the good and the bad of our first summer garden and what we learned.

The bad first.

Three sisters didn’t work out as we had hoped (see June & July progress). The corn was the most successful – the beans and squash grew nicely (in the case of the squash – they grew huge!) but they produced next to nothing. Lesson learned: certain squash plants can grow absolutely huge, be careful selecting what bean and squash seeds to plant, and try hand pollinating the squash.

We planted the edamame late in the season, and they were growing nicely until we over-fertilized and they were pretty much dead the next day. The yard long beans were also damaged – we went from having nice, regular production to wilting, spotted leaves and few few beans. Lesson learned: don’t fertilize bean plants, or fertilize them very modestly.

The roma tomato plant never did well. The first one died thanks to a horn worm. The second one stayed alive but what little fruit it produced was eaten by birds. Lesson learned: spray for horn worms, and you need to protect a roma tomato plant from the birds.

BT spray is your friend

In mid-season, a lot of our peppers were getting brown – some from blossom end rot, some just from the heat of the desert sun. Lesson learned: use shade cloths during the hottest part of summer, and manage the calcium level in your soil to avoid blossom end rot.

The cantaloupe plant was very disappointing. The few melons it produced never got very big and most of them seemed to be eaten by ants or rotted very quickly. The one cantaloupe we ate wasn’t very juicy (not quite ripe). Lesson learned: make sure things are ripe before you pick them – although I’m not sure what we did wrong on this one overall – perhaps it just doesn’t do very well in this climate, or perhaps we should try a different variety next time?

On to the good stuff.

We had a decent bean crop at the very end of the season. While the three sisters beans were a bust, the purple beans and yard long beans did alright.

Yard long bean plant in September

Cucumbers were pretty amazing all summer long. We had more cucumbers than we could eat for almost the entire season (May-September). We just removed the plant yesterday, and were able to pick two last cucumbers – it wasn’t looking as hot, but it was  still producing five months later!

Cucumber plants in their prime (photo from June)

Our last two (odd looking!) cucumbers from the garden, picked in mid-October

Our Thai basil plant is also amazing, continuing to grow and be in great health so we’re going to keep her going. The other herbs didn’t take off as much (chives, peppermint, oregano), but are still healthy and we are still able to get use out of them.

Thai basil plant in July

Thai basil plant in October (look at those flowers! I trimmed them back after taking this photo)

The regular basil has also done very well. I just trimmed it back yesterday but we’re going to keep her going as well.

Basil plant in August

The peppers were another huge success. We had all kinds of mild and hot peppers, and nearly every single one produced good tasting fruit for the last couple of months. (See September peppers). We did try to plant some later in the season, as well, but they take a long time to grow so that’s not working out. These need to be planted early, especially if you’re planting from seed.

Poblanos in August

Fresnos in August

The watermelon plant did really well. It was planted later in the season (June), but it grows fast and has produced about 15-20 watermelons to date. Too much watermelon to eat, really. Funny our cantaloupes did so poorly but watermelon did so well. I think the watermelon had more sun, which could be a factor.

Watermelon plant in October

Our cherry tomato plant did well overall. There were probably in their prime in August, and there was a good month where I could easily pick a handful of tomatoes every day. We did have some problems with birds and insects, but it grew big enough that a lot of the fruit was well protected in the middle of the bush.

Cherry tomato plant in June

There was also a tomato plant that started growing unexpectedly in the community garden (a seed must have been in the compost), and as of yesterday it’s producing tomatoes so we might get lucky and have a small fall season of tomatoes!

Tomatoes growing on a mysterious tomato plant in October

Overall things we learned:

Shade covers are your friend in Tucson. They are necessary to stop your plant leaves from wilting and fruits from burning.

Covering our garden with shade cloth

Fertilize every 6 weeks or so, but don’t over-fertilize!

Water twice a day and use irrigation – once in the morning, once in the afternoon.

Try to keep your soil loose, especially after planting seed – most of this is when you are preparing your soil, but you can also use a claw and break up the dirt near the surface around your plants to help the roots grow.

Also, be patient and wait until something is ripe before you pick it. I picked an unripe cantaloupe and watermelon, as well as unripe eggplants (we had a mysterious eggplant grow near some pepper plants thanks to a seed in the compost). I managed to eat the melons anyway, but the eggplant I just had to compost.

Compost.

And finally, not everything is going to work well. Gardening is often experimental. There are some things we’ll definitely do differently next year. But it’s all a learning experience. We are very excited now to start the winter garden!

Herbed Cashew Dip

As an alternative to hummus, I made this cashew dip – really simple, it’s essentially just pureed cashews, herbs from the garden, a little olive oil and a squeeze of lemon juice.

1 1/2 cups cashews
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 tbs lemon juice
2 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tbs greek oregano
1/2 tbs spicy oregano
1 tbs italian parsley
1 scallion, chopped (just the white & light green end)

Soaked cashews and other ingredients

I soaked the cashews in water for 30 minutes, then drained but kept the juice on hand. Blended the oil, lemon juice, garlic, and herbs in a food processor. Then added the cashews and pureed – added some of the cashew juice until it reached the right consistency. Served with some veggies for dipping. Real yummy and a nice change from hummus.

Cashew dip

First Purple Beans

In the community garden, we finally have our first beans. We have been trying to grow beans since May (remember the whole three sisters debacle). Well, we planted some purple beans awhile back, and just this week they have started to produce.

Purple bean plant

Purple beans growing

I harvested some and decided to make a grilled bean salad. (Originally I was actually going to make a grilled eggplant salad, but for the second time I harvested an eggplant too soon – they are still green inside – I need to be patient!).

I chopped the beans – notice they are green on the inside.

I slowly sauteed some red onion in olive oil then added the chopped beans. Purple beans are fun because they actually turn green when you cook them! (Why?).

I chopped half an avocado, cucumber (also from the community garden), some tomato (fresh from our neighbor’s garden), and cilantro. I made a dressing of 1/2 tbs red wine vinegar, 1/2 tsp mustard, and some oregano from the garden.

I let the grilled beans and onions cool for a few minutes then tossed everything together.

It was a good salad – probably better as a side dish than a main course since there isn’t much to it. If I had had tofu I would have added it to add some protein. I did end up adding some sesame seeds.