Rainy June Brings Both Rainbows and Mud

Girls looking for berries in all the right places

It’s been too rainy to do much gardening this past week at the Stoddart Avenue Community Garden.  However, our extremely nutritious and yummy black raspberries are in season and so I’ve managed to stop by almost every day to pick a couple of pints (which, as anyone who does it knows, is very time consuming).  I’m rarely alone in my berry picking since the neighborhood children almost always use my visit as an excuse to pick berries as well (both inside and outside the fence).  While Lynd's charges $3.50/pint to pick berries in Licking County, we have them for free at the SACG.

On Monday, I gave a presentation at Wings’ restaurant to the Bexley Lions Club about the Garden.  As faithful readers know, I have collected a lot of pictures over the years of our activities.  I showed them pictures  on Wings’ large digital television (via my laptop) from before we broke ground in 2009, while we broke ground in 2009, during the demolition of the building next door, of our litter pick-ups and our various capital improvements.  Some of the members had grown up in the area and attended the old Rosary high school across the street.  Rock of Faith Baptist Church used to be Holy Rosary Catholic church.   I explained how we really need volunteers to help us keep up with all of the work involved in maintaining and improving a community garden.

Tuesday, it briefly stopped raining long enough to let me stop by and pick berries.  While I was there, one of the neighbor girls reported that she had discovered some of the items which had been stolen out of our shed the prior week.  The thief had dumped the container which held all of our seeds a block from the Garden, at 450 Fairwood Avenue (which is an abandoned and dilapidated apartment building surrounded by waist-high grass).   The lid had been run over by cars.  Some of the seeds had also been dumped on the sidewalk: mostly beans, peas and winter squashes.  However, because it had been raining for days since the theft, the seeds had germinated and bean and pea sprouts littered the sidewalk in front of that building.  I retrieved the container and returned it to the shed. 

On Wednesday, it rained most of the afternoon and later briefly stopped so that I could pick berries before it started raining again.  However, it did not stop soon enough for a new gardener to get in her work equity so that she could join.   Weeds are taking over the south fence and I spent way too much time pulling those weeds off and grumbling about why the gardeners with those plots aren’t doing this themselves (since I have not found it particularly difficult to pull weeds off the brambles in my plot).  Of course, I found numerous berries under the vining weeds.   I sadly also discovered squash bugs had found my plot and begun laying eggs.  I warned the rest of the gardeners to be on the lookout.

On Thursday, it stopped raining long enough for me to mow my lawn and visit the SACG to pick more berries.    While there, I discovered that our thieves had returned, and had stomped on the flowers in front of the Garden to climb over the front gate.  Grrrr.  I couldn’t discover if they stole anything. Maybe they came for berries.  Happily, they did not stomp on any of the vegetables growing in the food pantry plot and I couldn’t tell that they had stolen any food.  No one has reported any vandalism or thefts to me, so I don’t know what was accomplished.  After picking berries for myself and our weekly food pantry donation, I reinforced all of the front fence with additional stakes.   This served to remind me why we do not leave spaces between our flowers like most well-tended flower beds. Spaces merely create opportunities for thieves to climb over our fence.   I also had to commend Stan for doing a good job reinforcing the fence in his plot so well that it deterred the thieves from using that space again.

On Friday, I stopped by early to get in our food pantry harvest (which, of course, included more black raspberries).  I delivered it to the St. Vincent de Paul pantry off Livingston Avenue and picked up some more petunias for the SACG which had been generously donated by Strader’s Garden Centers.  Hundreds of flats of petunias had been delivered by Strader’s on Wednesday and two-thirds of them had been taken by the time I arrived.  While I was at the SACG, neighbor Greg stopped by and mowed the block watch lot next door.  The grass was so high and wet that the mower was constantly choking and dropping large clumps of grass (which I hastily gathered up and put in our compost bin).   I also took the opportunity to start pulling weeds out of Jon’s former plot and discovered that the roma tomatoes he planted from seed had survived and that the sweet bell peppers that he planted using Scott’s peat pods (which Scotts Miracle Gro had donated to us in April) had similarly thrived and survived. He also had a row of broccoli and peas that were still alive.   The weeds  -- which were taller than my knees and some as high as my waist -- proved exceedingly easy to pull out of the damp soil.   Also, Melinda – who runs the Kimball Farms community garden next to us – had dropped off some large and lovely basil plants for our gardeners, especially Barb and Frank.  I put one container in their plot and one on the bench for the rest of the gardeners.

That evening, there was a block party in my neighborhood.  Folks like me on the west side of the street were supposed to bring a dessert.  So, I made a raspberry bread pudding.  I chopped up two hamburger buns, mixed the bread chunks in the baking dish with 1-1/2 pints of black raspberries and then stirred in a mixture of 2 tablespoons of melted butter, two eggs and 2 tablespoons of brown sugar.  I baked this for 30-40 minutes in my toaster oven at 400 degrees.  I pulled it out and topped it with a mixture of red and white raspberries (which grow in my back yard and most of my neighbors had never seen before).  It was a big hit.  When I make a similar pineapple bread pudding, I usually need to add some pineapple juice to the bread to keep it from drying out during baking, but that is not necessary with juicy black raspberries.

I had planned to get an early start to gardening and arrived at the SACG at 8 a.m.  As everyone knows, we received about 2.5 inches of rain on Saturday from Tropical  Storm Bill and so gardening was impossible.  My niece had her high school graduation party that afternoon.  It was supposed to be at Scioto Park in Dublin, but it had been flooded.  So, she moved it to Emerald Fields and we huddled in the shelter while eating lovely Indian food and sushi (provided by her two co-hosts’ families) and our family mocked her for simply supplying hot dogs and chips.  

On my way home, I stopped by the Moravian Church community garden where I used to garden in 2008 (which was the rainiest June in Central Ohio history with over 10 inches of rain).   It is right next to the Emerald Fields park where the party was held.  It is still there and is surrounded by new apartment buildings.   I remembered that it flooded a lot during heavy rains, like the one we were experiencing.  I wondered if anyone was losing their crops this month and was very grateful that we have a slight incline to our lot at the SACG to prevent water from pooling in any of our plots.  I then went shopping for contender green bean seeds and finally found some at Strader’s Garden Center on Riverside Drive.  While there, I founds some very reasonably priced gardening gloves and took the opportunity to purchase more than a dozen pairs to replace the gloves which were stolen last week.   Even though it finally stopped raining about an hour after her party ended, I focused on cleaning house and gardening in my own yard instead of going to the SACG.  

On Sunday, I headed over to the SACG to pick more berries and prune back the dying daisies.   However, Amy had beat me to it, which saved me some time and let me focus on other things, like weeding the herb garden and transplanting some more basil.  Thanks to Amy completing one of my tasks, I also tidied up our shed, which was still in a shambles after the theft last week.  I discovered that the thieves had taken some gardening tools (like a rake, hoe and shovel) and organic fertilizer.  Stan stopped by and mowed our lawn before weeding his plot.

Finally, last night, I again stopped by and picked another pint of raspberries, and weeded the food pantry and my plots.  The bee balm and day lilies are blooming.    Frank mentioned that he had been trying to improve the front gate -- which seems fine to me -- on Sunday and will be back to do some more work.   Despite all of the rain, some of the gardeners (like Amy, Lea and Stan) have managed to continue visiting the Garden to weed and tend their plots.  Others have thrown up their hands and their plots show it.  There is a lot of grass growing that will become difficult to pull once the ground dries out and hardens. 

This week, I’m hoping to finally have the time to plant the rest of my basil and sweet potatoes, transplant  some kale to where lettuce used to be in the food pantry plot, plant some bush contender green beans where my bok choy used to be, weed out the abandoned plots, transplant the remaining peppers and tomatoes in them and hopefully transplant some extra swash and cucumbers from my plot into them.   We’ll see . . . . . .  It would be good to get this all accomplished before the rain that is predicted for Thursday (and which had better hold off until the afternoon since I have  a group of volunteers coming in the morning).

Rainy June Brings Both Rainbows and Mud

Girls looking for berries in all the right places

It’s been too rainy to do much gardening this past week at the Stoddart Avenue Community Garden.  However, our extremely nutritious and yummy black raspberries are in season and so I’ve managed to stop by almost every day to pick a couple of pints (which, as anyone who does it knows, is very time consuming).  I’m rarely alone in my berry picking since the neighborhood children almost always use my visit as an excuse to pick berries as well (both inside and outside the fence).  While Lynd's charges $3.50/pint to pick berries in Licking County, we have them for free at the SACG.

On Monday, I gave a presentation at Wings’ restaurant to the Bexley Lions Club about the Garden.  As faithful readers know, I have collected a lot of pictures over the years of our activities.  I showed them pictures  on Wings’ large digital television (via my laptop) from before we broke ground in 2009, while we broke ground in 2009, during the demolition of the building next door, of our litter pick-ups and our various capital improvements.  Some of the members had grown up in the area and attended the old Rosary high school across the street.  Rock of Faith Baptist Church used to be Holy Rosary Catholic church.   I explained how we really need volunteers to help us keep up with all of the work involved in maintaining and improving a community garden.

Tuesday, it briefly stopped raining long enough to let me stop by and pick berries.  While I was there, one of the neighbor girls reported that she had discovered some of the items which had been stolen out of our shed the prior week.  The thief had dumped the container which held all of our seeds a block from the Garden, at 450 Fairwood Avenue (which is an abandoned and dilapidated apartment building surrounded by waist-high grass).   The lid had been run over by cars.  Some of the seeds had also been dumped on the sidewalk: mostly beans, peas and winter squashes.  However, because it had been raining for days since the theft, the seeds had germinated and bean and pea sprouts littered the sidewalk in front of that building.  I retrieved the container and returned it to the shed. 

On Wednesday, it rained most of the afternoon and later briefly stopped so that I could pick berries before it started raining again.  However, it did not stop soon enough for a new gardener to get in her work equity so that she could join.   Weeds are taking over the south fence and I spent way too much time pulling those weeds off and grumbling about why the gardeners with those plots aren’t doing this themselves (since I have not found it particularly difficult to pull weeds off the brambles in my plot).  Of course, I found numerous berries under the vining weeds.   I sadly also discovered squash bugs had found my plot and begun laying eggs.  I warned the rest of the gardeners to be on the lookout.

On Thursday, it stopped raining long enough for me to mow my lawn and visit the SACG to pick more berries.    While there, I discovered that our thieves had returned, and had stomped on the flowers in front of the Garden to climb over the front gate.  Grrrr.  I couldn’t discover if they stole anything. Maybe they came for berries.  Happily, they did not stomp on any of the vegetables growing in the food pantry plot and I couldn’t tell that they had stolen any food.  No one has reported any vandalism or thefts to me, so I don’t know what was accomplished.  After picking berries for myself and our weekly food pantry donation, I reinforced all of the front fence with additional stakes.   This served to remind me why we do not leave spaces between our flowers like most well-tended flower beds. Spaces merely create opportunities for thieves to climb over our fence.   I also had to commend Stan for doing a good job reinforcing the fence in his plot so well that it deterred the thieves from using that space again.

On Friday, I stopped by early to get in our food pantry harvest (which, of course, included more black raspberries).  I delivered it to the St. Vincent de Paul pantry off Livingston Avenue and picked up some more petunias for the SACG which had been generously donated by Strader’s Garden Centers.  Hundreds of flats of petunias had been delivered by Strader’s on Wednesday and two-thirds of them had been taken by the time I arrived.  While I was at the SACG, neighbor Greg stopped by and mowed the block watch lot next door.  The grass was so high and wet that the mower was constantly choking and dropping large clumps of grass (which I hastily gathered up and put in our compost bin).   I also took the opportunity to start pulling weeds out of Jon’s former plot and discovered that the roma tomatoes he planted from seed had survived and that the sweet bell peppers that he planted using Scott’s peat pods (which Scotts Miracle Gro had donated to us in April) had similarly thrived and survived. He also had a row of broccoli and peas that were still alive.   The weeds  -- which were taller than my knees and some as high as my waist -- proved exceedingly easy to pull out of the damp soil.   Also, Melinda – who runs the Kimball Farms community garden next to us – had dropped off some large and lovely basil plants for our gardeners, especially Barb and Frank.  I put one container in their plot and one on the bench for the rest of the gardeners.

That evening, there was a block party in my neighborhood.  Folks like me on the west side of the street were supposed to bring a dessert.  So, I made a raspberry bread pudding.  I chopped up two hamburger buns, mixed the bread chunks in the baking dish with 1-1/2 pints of black raspberries and then stirred in a mixture of 2 tablespoons of melted butter, two eggs and 2 tablespoons of brown sugar.  I baked this for 30-40 minutes in my toaster oven at 400 degrees.  I pulled it out and topped it with a mixture of red and white raspberries (which grow in my back yard and most of my neighbors had never seen before).  It was a big hit.  When I make a similar pineapple bread pudding, I usually need to add some pineapple juice to the bread to keep it from drying out during baking, but that is not necessary with juicy black raspberries.

I had planned to get an early start to gardening and arrived at the SACG at 8 a.m.  As everyone knows, we received about 2.5 inches of rain on Saturday from Tropical  Storm Bill and so gardening was impossible.  My niece had her high school graduation party that afternoon.  It was supposed to be at Scioto Park in Dublin, but it had been flooded.  So, she moved it to Emerald Fields and we huddled in the shelter while eating lovely Indian food and sushi (provided by her two co-hosts’ families) and our family mocked her for simply supplying hot dogs and chips.  

On my way home, I stopped by the Moravian Church community garden where I used to garden in 2008 (which was the rainiest June in Central Ohio history with over 10 inches of rain).   It is right next to the Emerald Fields park where the party was held.  It is still there and is surrounded by new apartment buildings.   I remembered that it flooded a lot during heavy rains, like the one we were experiencing.  I wondered if anyone was losing their crops this month and was very grateful that we have a slight incline to our lot at the SACG to prevent water from pooling in any of our plots.  I then went shopping for contender green bean seeds and finally found some at Strader’s Garden Center on Riverside Drive.  While there, I founds some very reasonably priced gardening gloves and took the opportunity to purchase more than a dozen pairs to replace the gloves which were stolen last week.   Even though it finally stopped raining about an hour after her party ended, I focused on cleaning house and gardening in my own yard instead of going to the SACG.  

On Sunday, I headed over to the SACG to pick more berries and prune back the dying daisies.   However, Amy had beat me to it, which saved me some time and let me focus on other things, like weeding the herb garden and transplanting some more basil.  Thanks to Amy completing one of my tasks, I also tidied up our shed, which was still in a shambles after the theft last week.  I discovered that the thieves had taken some gardening tools (like a rake, hoe and shovel) and organic fertilizer.  Stan stopped by and mowed our lawn before weeding his plot.

Finally, last night, I again stopped by and picked another pint of raspberries, and weeded the food pantry and my plots.  The bee balm and day lilies are blooming.    Frank mentioned that he had been trying to improve the front gate -- which seems fine to me -- on Sunday and will be back to do some more work.   Despite all of the rain, some of the gardeners (like Amy, Lea and Stan) have managed to continue visiting the Garden to weed and tend their plots.  Others have thrown up their hands and their plots show it.  There is a lot of grass growing that will become difficult to pull once the ground dries out and hardens. 

This week, I’m hoping to finally have the time to plant the rest of my basil and sweet potatoes, transplant  some kale to where lettuce used to be in the food pantry plot, plant some bush contender green beans where my bok choy used to be, weed out the abandoned plots, transplant the remaining peppers and tomatoes in them and hopefully transplant some extra swash and cucumbers from my plot into them.   We’ll see . . . . . .  It would be good to get this all accomplished before the rain that is predicted for Thursday (and which had better hold off until the afternoon since I have  a group of volunteers coming in the morning).

Beet Red Velvet Cake and Other Adventures

It seems that you cannot have a community garden in Central Ohio without growing lots of beets.  They are a two-season crop and are very pretty.  Trouble is,  I wasn’t raised with beets and I just don’t like them.  I’ve really, really tried, but they don’t work for me.  Last year, I tried the national dish of Russia, borscht, but I couldn’t finish a bowl.  Maybe I don’t have a good recipe.  I tried roasted beets (even mixed with roasted potatoes and turnips).  I’ve made them into bruchetta spreads and taken them to parties topped with feta (to very faint praise). I’m told that they are good pickled, particularly at a restaurant in Mt. Sterling, but I’ve never had the pleasure.  I’ve even tried some Mark Bittman recipes. The best I can say is that I can tolerate them raw and shaved onto salads.  They make my kale slaws very colorful.  While the beets in the food pantry plot have been relatively tiny, the beets in my plot have been as big as my fist. 

Last week, as she was driving away, I asked Cathy Alexander what to do with them (because she lovesbeets).  Red velvet cake she says.   I’m not much of a baker and I almost never bake from scratch.  However, I did some research and it turns out that back in the day, beets were used to make the cakes red before there was red food dye.   There are additional benefits to baking with beets, too.  They add a natural sweetness (so that you can reduce the amount of processed sugar) and they add moisture to the batter so that they stay moist longer without adding lots of extra cooking oil.    I found a number of recipes for beet red velvet cake on the internet and used an easy recipeon Friday night to make cupcakes for my intrepid volunteers who showed up on Saturday.  (Of course, it rained until almost 3 p.m.).  Sadly, I used dark chocolate, so you cannot see the red color, but I have no doubt it would be there if I had used regular chocolate.  They are still moist on Monday.   I messed with the recipe a little bit.  I added more than ¾ cup roasted/pureed beets (bad idea) and added ¼ cup lemon juice (to beef up the color).   I will be making these again.  And often.

As for our other adventures.  Sabrina worked really hard this week to catch up on weeding the food pantry plots.  It took her a few trips, but the weeds are finally under control in there.  I can even see cantaloupes growing.  Her husband,  Tom, mowed our lawn.    Cassie stopped by on Tuesday, too, to do some light weeding in her plot and the flower beds.  Sadly, she did not make much progress.  She was able to harvest a lot of neglected vegetables.  Her butternut squash had grown out to almost the alley and there was a large fruit forming out there.  There was no way to bring it back inside the Garden and it was gone by Friday.  I had to spend most of my time at the Garden this week doing her chores since she refuses to make time to weed and prune the flower beds.  Grumble.  Grumble.   Because we seem to be having a mild summer, I decided to plant some extra impatiens in our flower beds with the hopes that they will not get fried out and will spruce up our bare spots.  

When I stopped by the Garden on Friday with new books for the kids, I used my time waiting for them to return from Alum Creek Beach by spraying weeds along the street and alley with Round Up.  By the time I returned on Sunday afternoon, however, Sabrina had come and weeded the alley for several hours in the rain on Saturday.  It hasn’t looked that good since we broke ground for the season in April.  I’m always overwhelmed when someone goes over and beyond their chores and surprises me like that.  She came to the Garden in the rain on Saturday hoping to get some red velvet cupcakes.  She told me that I would notice her work and she was right.

Sabrina and Christen are moving on to their second season crops and it is not even August.  Christen doesn't like to keep plants -- like broccoli  -- long after her major harvest.  Secondary minor harvests just don't interest her.  She pulled her cabbage and giant broccoli plant out yesterday and planted more carrots.  This will create more sunlight for her watermelon and cucumbers. Sabrina will be pulling out her lettuce to make room and might pull out her bug-infested squash.  The food pantry plot is near the end of its Spring crops (turnips, beets, lettuce, and carrots), so I need to start making plans for that space as well.

Squash Bugs.  While Sabrina was weeding on Tuesday or Thursday, I found some squash bugs in her plot.  The adults were hiding in Rose’s cilantro and on Sabrina’s cosmos flowers.  This was her first exposure to the critters.   They had already killed a couple of her squash plants.  (I think they have also killed some of Mari’s plants, one of the boys’ plants and are working on Cassie’s).   I told her that this year I wanted to burn them out.  This works well for the eggs, but the adults – believe it or not – do not stand still to be burned alive.  Sabrina used her own lighter on the eggs, but opted to squash them with rocks and bricks.  While I chatted in the alley with Cathy, we could hear periodic screams coming from Sabrina’s plot as she discovered a new nest of squash bugs.  It was hysterical. 

Yesterday, Barb mentioned to me that she and Frank had seen some tell-tale squash bug eggs in the Garden.  They – like Charlie – decided to not grow squash in their plot this year.  I told her that I had noticed them, but I’m pretty philosophical about it this year.  2013 will be the first time in my adult life that I will be harvesting zucchini in August.  I planted my squash among my invasive chocolate mint plants and it seems to have disguised my squash plants from the bugs.  The only place where I seem to find them is where the leaves overhang Charlie’s plot (which is now so clean, there are no mint plants anywhere near the vicinity).   Fact is, I’m having trouble keeping up with my zucchini harvest.  I’ve also already harvested 2 delicatta squashes from my plot and am hoping for a couple of butternut and acorn squashes.  It’s almost surreal.

Ice Cream.  Speaking of my invasive mint, I gave some to Sabrina at the beginning of the season and she made ice cream with it yesterday.  I loaned her my ice cream maker on Thursday and she emailed me last night confirming my warning:  Most ice cream recipes are a lot of work.  My strawberry ice cream is easy to make, but I don’t make a real custard with it.   She’s not ready to try again anytime soon and will be returning my maker.   I can only imagine what she would have thought if I had loaned her a hand crank machine:-)

Dill and Water Guns.  The volunteer dill in the food pantry plot (left over from Rayna’s crop last year) is nearing the end of its useful life.  I doubt pantry clients will want it, so I’m going to pitch it soon.  Like this week.  So, faithful readers, if you want some dill head seeds to make dill pickles or to otherwise store, please stop by the SACG on Tuesday or Thursday evening and I will fill your bag with large seed heads.  We have dozens of plants.  However, be forewarned.  Thursday is also likely to be the Second Annual  Shootout at the CG Corral.  The kids have been waiting all summer for me to bring my super soaker water gun to the Garden.  However, with the exception of two weeks ago, it just hasn’t been hot enough.  They showed up yesterday with their new super soakers to attack me and I convinced them to give me until Thursday to get my old gun and make it a fair fight.  Assuming they remember this that long, the plants will be getting an unusual amount of water and the gardeners and other volunteers are likely to get wet, too.

Food Pantry Donations.   Finally, for what seems to be the third week in a row, I have been rained out again on Saturday.  Only this time, it was a heavy and sustained rain.  I’m not complaining; .75 inch is always welcome.  However, it made it a challenge to harvest and make a food pantry delivery.  Luckily, my neighbors, the Pipinos have an extra refrigerator which is usually empty.  I harvested over 30 pounds of vegetables yesterday and stored about half of them in their extra refrigerator so that I can deliver them to the food pantry when it is open today.   At this point in the season, we are 300% above our donations for this same time in 2012 and 2011.    Craziness.  This is what perfect growing weather will do.  Even Mari is over the moon with her harvest this year.  The only downside is that the weeds are a little more aggressive this year than in the past.

Upcoming Events.  Well, on Wednesday, some of us will be going to the ProMusica concert at the Franklin Park Conservatory. Thursday is our second annual water gun fight.  (BYOG and filled water balloons).  Be there or be dry.   

On Saturday – weather permitting – we will put the Garden into the final touches for the bike tour of near east side community gardens on Saturday, August 10 by Yea Bikes! and Local Matters.   We are thinking about scheduling a neighborhood litter pick up on the morning of Saturday, September 7.  (Kickoff for the  OSU/San Diego football game is not until 3:30 p.m. that afternoon).  The Children’s Parade starts at 11 a.m. and ends at the Hot Times Festival in Olde Towne East that same day. 

Beet Red Velvet Cake and Other Adventures

It seems that you cannot have a community garden in Central Ohio without growing lots of beets.  They are a two-season crop and are very pretty.  Trouble is,  I wasn’t raised with beets and I just don’t like them.  I’ve really, really tried, but they don’t work for me.  Last year, I tried the national dish of Russia, borscht, but I couldn’t finish a bowl.  Maybe I don’t have a good recipe.  I tried roasted beets (even mixed with roasted potatoes and turnips).  I’ve made them into bruchetta spreads and taken them to parties topped with feta (to very faint praise). I’m told that they are good pickled, particularly at a restaurant in Mt. Sterling, but I’ve never had the pleasure.  I’ve even tried some Mark Bittman recipes. The best I can say is that I can tolerate them raw and shaved onto salads.  They make my kale slaws very colorful.  While the beets in the food pantry plot have been relatively tiny, the beets in my plot have been as big as my fist. 

Last week, as she was driving away, I asked Cathy Alexander what to do with them (because she loves beets).  Red velvet cake she says.   I’m not much of a baker and I almost never bake from scratch.  However, I did some research and it turns out that back in the day, beets were used to make the cakes red before there was red food dye.   There are additional benefits to baking with beets, too.  They add a natural sweetness (so that you can reduce the amount of processed sugar) and they add moisture to the batter so that they stay moist longer without adding lots of extra cooking oil.    I found a number of recipes for beet red velvet cake on the internet and used an easy recipe on Friday night to make cupcakes for my intrepid volunteers who showed up on Saturday.  (Of course, it rained until almost 3 p.m.).  Sadly, I used dark chocolate, so you cannot see the red color, but I have no doubt it would be there if I had used regular chocolate.  They are still moist on Monday.   I messed with the recipe a little bit.  I added more than ¾ cup roasted/pureed beets (bad idea) and added ¼ cup lemon juice (to beef up the color).   I will be making these again.  And often.

As for our other adventures.  Sabrina worked really hard this week to catch up on weeding the food pantry plots.  It took her a few trips, but the weeds are finally under control in there.  I can even see cantaloupes growing.  Her husband,  Tom, mowed our lawn.    Cassie stopped by on Tuesday, too, to do some light weeding in her plot and the flower beds.  Sadly, she did not make much progress.  She was able to harvest a lot of neglected vegetables.  Her butternut squash had grown out to almost the alley and there was a large fruit forming out there.  There was no way to bring it back inside the Garden and it was gone by Friday.  I had to spend most of my time at the Garden this week doing her chores since she refuses to make time to weed and prune the flower beds.  Grumble.  Grumble.   Because we seem to be having a mild summer, I decided to plant some extra impatiens in our flower beds with the hopes that they will not get fried out and will spruce up our bare spots.  

When I stopped by the Garden on Friday with new books for the kids, I used my time waiting for them to return from Alum Creek Beach by spraying weeds along the street and alley with Round Up.  By the time I returned on Sunday afternoon, however, Sabrina had come and weeded the alley for several hours in the rain on Saturday.  It hasn’t looked that good since we broke ground for the season in April.  I’m always overwhelmed when someone goes over and beyond their chores and surprises me like that.  She came to the Garden in the rain on Saturday hoping to get some red velvet cupcakes.  She told me that I would notice her work and she was right.

Sabrina and Christen are moving on to their second season crops and it is not even August.  Christen doesn't like to keep plants -- like broccoli  -- long after her major harvest.  Secondary minor harvests just don't interest her.  She pulled her cabbage and giant broccoli plant out yesterday and planted more carrots.  This will create more sunlight for her watermelon and cucumbers. Sabrina will be pulling out her lettuce to make room and might pull out her bug-infested squash.  The food pantry plot is near the end of its Spring crops (turnips, beets, lettuce, and carrots), so I need to start making plans for that space as well.

Squash Bugs.  While Sabrina was weeding on Tuesday or Thursday, I found some squash bugs in her plot.  The adults were hiding in Rose’s cilantro and on Sabrina’s cosmos flowers.  This was her first exposure to the critters.   They had already killed a couple of her squash plants.  (I think they have also killed some of Mari’s plants, one of the boys’ plants and are working on Cassie’s).   I told her that this year I wanted to burn them out.  This works well for the eggs, but the adults – believe it or not – do not stand still to be burned alive.  Sabrina used her own lighter on the eggs, but opted to squash them with rocks and bricks.  While I chatted in the alley with Cathy, we could hear periodic screams coming from Sabrina’s plot as she discovered a new nest of squash bugs.  It was hysterical. 

Yesterday, Barb mentioned to me that she and Frank had seen some tell-tale squash bug eggs in the Garden.  They – like Charlie – decided to not grow squash in their plot this year.  I told her that I had noticed them, but I’m pretty philosophical about it this year.  2013 will be the first time in my adult life that I will be harvesting zucchini in August.  I planted my squash among my invasive chocolate mint plants and it seems to have disguised my squash plants from the bugs.  The only place where I seem to find them is where the leaves overhang Charlie’s plot (which is now so clean, there are no mint plants anywhere near the vicinity).   Fact is, I’m having trouble keeping up with my zucchini harvest.  I’ve also already harvested 2 delicatta squashes from my plot and am hoping for a couple of butternut and acorn squashes.  It’s almost surreal.

Ice Cream.  Speaking of my invasive mint, I gave some to Sabrina at the beginning of the season and she made ice cream with it yesterday.  I loaned her my ice cream maker on Thursday and she emailed me last night confirming my warning:  Most ice cream recipes are a lot of work.  My strawberry ice cream is easy to make, but I don’t make a real custard with it.   She’s not ready to try again anytime soon and will be returning my maker.   I can only imagine what she would have thought if I had loaned her a hand crank machine:-)

Dill and Water Guns.  The volunteer dill in the food pantry plot (left over from Rayna’s crop last year) is nearing the end of its useful life.  I doubt pantry clients will want it, so I’m going to pitch it soon.  Like this week.  So, faithful readers, if you want some dill head seeds to make dill pickles or to otherwise store, please stop by the SACG on Tuesday or Thursday evening and I will fill your bag with large seed heads.  We have dozens of plants.  However, be forewarned.  Thursday is also likely to be the Second Annual  Shootout at the CG Corral.  The kids have been waiting all summer for me to bring my super soaker water gun to the Garden.  However, with the exception of two weeks ago, it just hasn’t been hot enough.  They showed up yesterday with their new super soakers to attack me and I convinced them to give me until Thursday to get my old gun and make it a fair fight.  Assuming they remember this that long, the plants will be getting an unusual amount of water and the gardeners and other volunteers are likely to get wet, too.

Food Pantry Donations.   Finally, for what seems to be the third week in a row, I have been rained out again on Saturday.  Only this time, it was a heavy and sustained rain.  I’m not complaining; .75 inch is always welcome.  However, it made it a challenge to harvest and make a food pantry delivery.  Luckily, my neighbors, the Pipinos have an extra refrigerator which is usually empty.  I harvested over 30 pounds of vegetables yesterday and stored about half of them in their extra refrigerator so that I can deliver them to the food pantry when it is open today.   At this point in the season, we are 300% above our donations for this same time in 2012 and 2011.    Craziness.  This is what perfect growing weather will do.  Even Mari is over the moon with her harvest this year.  The only downside is that the weeds are a little more aggressive this year than in the past.

Upcoming Events.  Well, on Wednesday, some of us will be going to the ProMusica concert at the Franklin Park Conservatory. Thursday is our second annual water gun fight.  (BYOG and filled water balloons).  Be there or be dry.   

On Saturday – weather permitting – we will put the Garden into the final touches for the bike tour of near east side community gardens on Saturday, August 10 by Yea Bikes! and Local Matters.   We are thinking about scheduling a neighborhood litter pick up on the morning of Saturday, September 7.  (Kickoff for the  OSU/San Diego football game is not until 3:30 p.m. that afternoon).  The Children’s Parade starts at 11 a.m. and ends at the Hot Times Festival in Olde Towne East that same day. 

SACG Annual Strawberry Pickin’ Expedition the Shortest Ever

This morning, a group of us from the Stoddart Avenue Community Garden went strawberry pickin’ at Hann’s Farm on Lockbourne Road south of Obetz.    We usually pick for 60-90 minutes, but this year we were done in less than 50 minutes because the strawberries were so plentiful.   While it took us a few minutes to find rows that were not already picked over during the weekend, our efforts were well rewarded in very short order.

Hope was a strawberry picking machine and probably picked the most of the group of us.  Zephyr and Ben were a little more engaged by their outdoor surroundings than in the actual picking itself.  All of us ended up with stained hands, and stains on our clothes from the plentiful ripe berries.  The boys ended up with stained chins as well, but we can only speculate how that happened  . . . . Rose was supposed to join us, but forgot.

I have a ton of extra boxes, but was distracted by my own and my neighbor’s cats while leaving this morning and forgot to pick up the stack of boxes on my breakfast room table that I had piled up for Cathy, Ben and Hope.  Luckily, Hann’s Farmer’s Market was selling sturdy plastic bags for ten cents.   Sabrina and Zephyr brought very nice wicker baskets which she lined with black napkins.

Cathy and I each bought more than $30 in strawberries.  She’s planning on lots of uses, including a strawberry-filled wedding cake and smoothies.  Sabrina is planning on making strawberry jam for the first time (so we discussed the best places to find recipes and the benefits of pectin over just adding blueberries).  Let’s face it, the predicted cool weather expected this week will make canning jam a breeze (compared to the heat wave we’ve had in past years).   I plant to make a batch of jam, will freeze some and will take a few pounds to Knitwits tomorrow evening.

To compare the costs, a pound of u-pick strawberries at Hann’s is $1.80/pound.  A pint at the Bexley Farmer’s Market is $3.50 to $4/pint depending on which booth you visit or $2 at Krogers (or 4 for $5 this week).  A pint weighs about 1.2 pounds, so about $2.15 if you pick the berries yourself.

While I’ve shared jamand ice cream recipes here before, this year I will focus on one of my favorite seasonable strawberry recipes:  Spinach and Strawberry Salad.  I can’t find my regular recipe (because I’ve been making this for more than a decade and can’t recall where I first saw it), so bear with me as I punt a little here.

1 pound fresh spinach, rinsed and well dried

1 quart trimmed and sliced strawberries

1/3 cup walnuts (or pecans)

½ cup crumbled blue cheese

½ cup olive oil

½ cup balsamic vinegar

¼ cup sliced red onions or chopped shallots

1/3 cup chopped bacon

1.       In a small bowl, combine the oil and vinegar.  Add the onions/shallots and strawberries.

2.      In a large bowl, combine the spinach, nuts and bacon.

3.      Add the strawberries and blue cheese to the large bowl shortly before serving.   Toss well.

You could add chicken if you feel a need for more protein.

This is the first time in a long while that my spinach crop has been respectable enough to make this salad from my own garden. 

SACG Annual Strawberry Pickin’ Expedition the Shortest Ever

This morning, a group of us from the Stoddart Avenue Community Garden went strawberry pickin’ at Hann’s Farm on Lockbourne Road south of Obetz.    We usually pick for 60-90 minutes, but this year we were done in less than 50 minutes because the strawberries were so plentiful.   While it took us a few minutes to find rows that were not already picked over during the weekend, our efforts were well rewarded in very short order.

Hope was a strawberry picking machine and probably picked the most of the group of us.  Zephyr and Ben were a little more engaged by their outdoor surroundings than in the actual picking itself.  All of us ended up with stained hands, and stains on our clothes from the plentiful ripe berries.  The boys ended up with stained chins as well, but we can only speculate how that happened  . . . . Rose was supposed to join us, but forgot.

I have a ton of extra boxes, but was distracted by my own and my neighbor’s cats while leaving this morning and forgot to pick up the stack of boxes on my breakfast room table that I had piled up for Cathy, Ben and Hope.  Luckily, Hann’s Farmer’s Market was selling sturdy plastic bags for ten cents.   Sabrina and Zephyr brought very nice wicker baskets which she lined with black napkins.

Cathy and I each bought more than $30 in strawberries.  She’s planning on lots of uses, including a strawberry-filled wedding cake and smoothies.  Sabrina is planning on making strawberry jam for the first time (so we discussed the best places to find recipes and the benefits of pectin over just adding blueberries).  Let’s face it, the predicted cool weather expected this week will make canning jam a breeze (compared to the heat wave we’ve had in past years).   I plant to make a batch of jam, will freeze some and will take a few pounds to Knitwits tomorrow evening.

To compare the costs, a pound of u-pick strawberries at Hann’s is $1.80/pound.  A pint at the Bexley Farmer’s Market is $3.50 to $4/pint depending on which booth you visit or $2 at Krogers (or 4 for $5 this week).  A pint weighs about 1.2 pounds, so about $2.15 if you pick the berries yourself.

While I’ve shared jam and ice cream recipes here before, this year I will focus on one of my favorite seasonable strawberry recipes:  Spinach and Strawberry Salad.  I can’t find my regular recipe (because I’ve been making this for more than a decade and can’t recall where I first saw it), so bear with me as I punt a little here.

1 pound fresh spinach, rinsed and well dried

1 quart trimmed and sliced strawberries

1/3 cup walnuts (or pecans)

½ cup crumbled blue cheese

½ cup olive oil

½ cup balsamic vinegar

¼ cup sliced red onions or chopped shallots

1/3 cup chopped bacon

1.       In a small bowl, combine the oil and vinegar.  Add the onions/shallots and strawberries.

2.      In a large bowl, combine the spinach, nuts and bacon.

3.      Add the strawberries and blue cheese to the large bowl shortly before serving.   Toss well.

You could add chicken if you feel a need for more protein.

This is the first time in a long while that my spinach crop has been respectable enough to make this salad from my own garden. 

There’s Nothing About a Chilly and Cloudy Day That Can’t Be Fixed by Speedy Bean Soup

After tricking us into believing an early summer had arrived, Spring has returned with a vengeance this weekend and forced my seedlings back inside. Chilly, cloudy, damp and brrrrr. However, I put ¾ bag of dried white beans in my mini slow cooker last night before I went to bed. And when I returned from church, I heated up some olive oil with 2 cloves of chopped garlic in a sauce pan, added 12 ounces of cooked beans, topped it with chopped rosemary and freshly ground pepper, added a cup of chicken stock (that I made in December), brought it to a boil, simmered for 10 minutes and then pureed the soup with my magic wand. Oh nirvana. Just what the doctor ordered. Fast and hot. Makes 2 servings of 200 calories, 6 grams of dietary fiber and 16 grams of protein (but 19 grams of total carbohydrates).

I’ll marinate the rest of the beans in a Dijon vinaigrette and mix with artichoke hearts, black and green olives, and roasted red peppers and then add it to a lunch salad (of romaine and spinach) later in the week. Who can notice the clouds with cheerful and versatile beans on hand?

Of course, I’ll be planting beans like these in another week to 10 days just to ensure my continued happiness when winter returns next year.

There’s Nothing About a Chilly and Cloudy Day That Can’t Be Fixed by Speedy Bean Soup

After tricking us into believing an early summer had arrived, Spring has returned with a vengeance this weekend and forced my seedlings back inside. Chilly, cloudy, damp and brrrrr. However, I put ¾ bag of dried white beans in my mini slow cooker last night before I went to bed. And when I returned from church, I heated up some olive oil with 2 cloves of chopped garlic in a sauce pan, added 12 ounces of cooked beans, topped it with chopped rosemary and freshly ground pepper, added a cup of chicken stock (that I made in December), brought it to a boil, simmered for 10 minutes and then pureed the soup with my magic wand. Oh nirvana. Just what the doctor ordered. Fast and hot. Makes 2 servings of 200 calories, 6 grams of dietary fiber and 16 grams of protein (but 19 grams of total carbohydrates).

I’ll marinate the rest of the beans in a Dijon vinaigrette and mix with artichoke hearts, black and green olives, and roasted red peppers and then add it to a lunch salad (of romaine and spinach) later in the week. Who can notice the clouds with cheerful and versatile beans on hand?

Of course, I’ll be planting beans like these in another week to 10 days just to ensure my continued happiness when winter returns next year.

Winter Squash Winter Recipes

I am about to fall into a deep food coma from eating too much for lunch. (This is by way of explanation in case this article seems a little abrupt).

Faithful readers know that I like to grow or buy food cheap and preserve it to eat later. The last couple of weeks I’ve been putting my butternut squash to good use. (I bought it at Lynd’s in October for $1 per squash and it now sells at the grocery for $1/pound). I made vegetarian chili in November, squash soup just before Xmas and today I made squash and pepper quesadillas. Oh my.

Squash Soup
1. To chop your squash. Cut off the bottom so that it will be flat. Then take a serrated apple peeler/grater to scrape off the tough squash skin like you would peel a potato or apple. Scoop out the seeds and scrape out the stringy seed pod with a grapefruit spoon. Then chop up the orange squash flesh with a knife on the cutting board. The squash should be chopped into ½ inch pieces. There will be a lot of squash. You might want to save half of it for another recipe.
2. Cut up one onion and sauté it in the pot until it is soft. If you like ginger, add some grated ginger.
3. I generally roast the squash in the oven until it is soft, but you can also microwave it for about 9-10 minutes. (If you use the microwave, drain it the bowl before you move to the next step). You can also skip this step entirely and just spend more time at next step.
4. Mix the squash with a pint of chicken or vegetable stock on softened onions. I’ve even added the cooked pulp from one sweet potato. Simmer at medium heat until it’s very soft. You can even add a can of coconut milk to give it a tropical bounce.
5. When it is soft, you can puree it. I used to pour it into my blender, but one of my Xmas gifts to myself this year was a puree wand so that I can puree it in the pot. Excellent appliance.
6. Add herbs of your choice. I think thyme goes with everything.
7. Pour into a bowl and add a dollop of sour cream to serve.

Squash Quesadillas

I found a recipe in a 30-Minute Supper Magazine published by America’s Test Kitchen. I was a little dubious, but it the sweet squash compliments the spicy roasted peppers quite well.

1. To chop your squash. Cut off the bottom so that it will be flat. Then take a serrated apple peeler/grater to scrape off the tough squash skin like you would peel a potato or apple. Scoop out the seeds and scrape out the stringy seed pod with a grapefruit spoon. Then chop up the orange squash flesh with a knife on the cutting board. The squash should be chopped into ½ inch pieces. You only need one pound of chopped squash, which is one small or ½ large squash.
2. Microwave the squash in a covered bowl for 8 minutes. Drain. (I then threw this in the refrigerator and went to church and finished the recipe when I returned from the grocery store).
3. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. (I used cast iron, but you could use a non-stick). After the oil is shimmering, pour in the squash and cover with the splatter guard. Cook for about five minutes, stirring occasionally, until the squash starts to brown.
4. Throw in 4 roasted poblano peppers that you’ve already seeded and chopped. If you had a bad pepper harvest this year like I did, you can substitute a small can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (which you’ve also chopped). My substitution was a spicier than the original recipe contemplated.
5. Throw in a ½ chopped cilantro and mix. You can season with salt and pepper if you’re in the mood.
6. Transfer the squash mixture back to the bowl you previously used to microwave the squash in and wipe the skillet with a paper towel.
7. Place a tortilla on a plate and sprinkle an equal mixture of pepper jack and feta cheese over the left half of the tortilla – being sure to leave a ½ border around the edge. Top with a couple large scoops of the squash mixture and then fold over the right half of tortilla and press firmly. Repeat.
8. Place the two folded and filled tortillas in the empty skillet and cook until golden and crisp. (Pay attention here because it will not take more than two minutes). Flip with a spatula when you notice the cheese has melted and try not to lose any of the filling in the process.
9. Remove from skillet and place them on your plate or a cutting board.
10. Top with sour cream when you serve them.
11. Curl up for nap.

As I mentioned, my version was very spicy and required lots of cold liquid refreshment.

Makes 8 half quesadillas.

Like many orange foods, winter squash is high in Vitamin A.