Monday, May 26, 2014

A bountiful harvest

Today we picked: 25 onions, 7 red potatoes, 18 little brown potatoes, 2 carrots, 1 zucchini, 2 cherry tomatoes and 1 peach! 

I almost feel like a gardener ;o





Onions
Planted:  March 16th
First Harvest: May 26th
Total harvested so far: 1

The onion tops had all fallen over about two weeks ago.  Dave was making spaghetti sauce, and lamented that we were out of onions.  So, I ran to the garden and picked two onions.  The first one I picked was sort of small, but the other was perfect!  I have slowly been harvesting them since then, and pulled out the last onions today.  Some are very small, and some are a little smaller than grocery store size.  What I learned was the size of the stalk seems to have little to do with the size of the onion attached to it.

According to the direction I have, I need to let them air for a day or two, and then store them in a dark cool place.  We'll see how that goes.

Radishes
Planted:  February 1st
First Harvest: I can't remember - weeks ago
Total harvested so far: maybe a dozen?

The radishes are done.  Some of them were pretty small, so I let them stay in the ground longer.  Turns out, once they get to a certain size, I guess the root part stops growing, and they put their energy into the flower and stalk.  Note for later, pull them earlier.  The last few I pulled I threw away because they had gotten a little gnarly.

Carrots
Planted:  February 1st
First Harvest: May 26th
Total harvested so far: 2
In pulling out the onions, I noticed that two carrots had a little orange showing near the top.  So we pulled them today.  They are definitely shorter than grocery store size.  The other thing I learned was I need to plant more, and spread them out waaaaay more.  In all, i probably only will get three or four carrots in total.  But still fun!

Red Potatoes
Planted:  February 15th
First Harvest: May 26th
Total harvested so far: 7

Rat Potatoes
Planted:  February 15th
First Harvest: May 26th
Total harvested so far: 26

I had to idea what to expect here.  Since we were pulling up the onions and carrots, I told Kyle we could try one potato plant.  He tugged and tugged on the plant, and got the stalk, but no potatoes.  Hmm, maybe none grew.  I dug down, and did find one potato!  How exciting!  And it was big, so we decided to pull up another, but this time, we dug down with a shovel to try and pull up the roots... and dug right into a huge potato, and then found another, and another.  Then we went back to the original potato and dug around and found one or two more.

I still don't know the ideal way to harvest potatoes without nicking them as I go.  But I still have lots of potato plants left in the ground.  From just pulling up four or five plants, I harvested 7 red potatoes and 18 little brown potatoes.  I'm thinking I am going to have more potatoes than we can eat.

Or maybe not!  Dave cubed up one of the red potatoes and browned it in butter for hashbrowns, and we all gobbled it up in about a minute, and the kids were begging for more!!

Cherry Tomatoes
Planted:  March 16th
First Harvest: May 24th
Total harvested so far: 3

So, I apparently purchased a variety of yellow cherry tomato. (Looking back at my notes, that must be the Yellow pear - guess I should have figured out they'd be yellow!)   I have picked three cherry tomatoes so far, and there are many more on the plant.  i should be getting a pile in a week or so.  The other tomatoes still are a few weeks before those get red -- probably right when we go away on vacation -- figures ;o)

Zucchini
Planted:  March 16th
First Harvest: May 26th
Total harvested so far: 1

I harvested my first zucchini today.  This is the only one growing, but I have blooms on many others.  It will be a race whether they can grow before the squash vine borer gets it this year!



Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Picking onions!

On January 18th, I planted a bunch of onions.  My first attempt at growing them.


Five months later, some of them seem large enough to pick.  I noticed that a few had bulges coming up out of the ground, and many of the stalks had fallen over - which I believe is a sign of time to harvest.

So, earlier this week, we were out of onions and I needed on for a recipe, so I went out and picked one of the bulging ones.  They are smaller than grocery store onions, but plenty large enough for cooking!

And they taste great :o)


I would definitely try these again.
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