Posted on 10/07/2011 5:03:50 AM PDT by Red_Devil 232
Good morning gardeners. Wow the first week of October! The garden has been officially put to rest and my compost pile has been tilled into the garden and is now depleted. It’s going to need a lot of leaves, grass clippings and other plant materials to build it back up for next years garden. The leaves on the trees here in East Central Mississippi have awhile yet before they turn color and start to fall in quantity so I am letting about half of my grass clippings turn brown before adding them to the compost pile and mixing them with the green clippings.
Now it is time for a “Blast From The Past”. Thanks to Freeper SunkenCiv for the lead to this news story. It is an article about how a Food archaeologist in Arizona is saving plants that were used as a food source thousands of years ago. Not only is he saving the seeds and plants, “he also has made his academic work edible, encouraging home cooks and award-winning chefs to actually use these culinary archaeological finds.” Read the article here: Food archaeologist gives new life to nearly extinct grains, veggies
If you are a gardener or you are just starting out and are in need of advice or just encouragement please feel free to join in and enjoy the friendly discussion. Our Freeper community is full of gardeners, each with varying interests and skill levels from Master Gardener to novice.
I hope all your Summer gardens did well this year and your Fall gardens prosper.
The audio of your You Tube was both funny and disgusting. The video was just a bunch of green streaks! But, thanks anyway. ;^)
You use eggs in your bread? I think that yeast raised bread is tricky, unless you have a sure fire recipe. I’d try them in a “quick” (raised with Baking Powder or soda and eggs) bread first.
LOL-I wonder if they also have jelly roll and cream-puff seeds?
I thought the video was a hoot! When he grabbed the cleaver and called it his “pocket knife”... I LOL! Thanks for making me laugh!!
In South Florida, The Growing Season is just beginning. It is taking DAYS to clear the weeds out of my planting beds to start my Napa, Bok Choy, Arugula, Green Beans, and fresh new Herbs.
However, the banana trees, Mango Trees, and Avocado Trees have been flourishing all summer and are taller than me now. I expect some magnificent tropical fruits in the spring!
I have several new trees I have planted from seeds and they are over a foot tall now. Fig, papaya, grapes, kiwi, and more mango and avocado (From the seed in the middle of the fruit).
I have a compost pile too but it is getting very big.
Ah well, some of the tribes built mounds that are HUGE, but mine is famous for having 27 words for SNOW. LOL
Last week was cold and rainy, so I pulled all the tender ornamentals from the shade garden. Calidium and elephant ear bulbs are drying in the sun room.
Been finding a bunch of praying mantis and their nests in the backyard. If those things grew six more inches, I'd be very afraid. Found a youtube video of one eating a snake alive! Yikes!
Benderville had a unusual 3+ inches of rain from Sunday to Thursday morning and the deer hunters and river fishermen are probably calling in sick this morning and heading east. Still getting Diva Cucumbers and the pumpkin vines are still healthy. I pulled the last of the cornstalks yesterday and will pull the rest of the Marigolds to shred after we get back from Costco. We have fog right now but it should burn off by noon. The Dahlias took a beating from the rain but we will prune them and we will get more flowers before they are completely gone...
I think my gardening is over for the year. It snowed yesterday and got down to 28F last night. It will be colder tonight and more snow today and Saturday.
The recipe I use for bread calls for one egg per 3 cups flour (one loaf). If anybody has problems with bread falling or not rising in the second stage rise period, I have learned that the first rise that usually calls for the doubling of the dough is critical. Don’t exceed the doubling of the dough at this stage I use a clear plastic measuring cup - 8 cup capacity for the first rise. When I put my dough in, it always reads 750ml (one loaf) and once it rises to 1500 ml it is doubled. Ready for the punch down and a second rise in the bread pan. The info on the first rise came from King Arthur Flour company. I had called their troubleshooting hot line after I was having a problem with my bread not rising in the second rise and collapsing in the oven. That is when I got the 8 cup measuring cup. Have never had a problem since I started using it.
We have had great weather this week. Perfect fall days. Unfortunately, I had to spend a great deal of time indoors ensuring that my granddaughter got caught up on her school work. Monday, the teacher sent home a note that 14 books and tests were due by Thursday, and she only had finished 2.
Well, long story short, we got it done.
Back to gardening: I got the winter lettuce planted. Covered it with a row cover for protection. Next morning all kinds of sunken in places, guess the squirrels played tag on it. We finally have a bunch of green tomatoes. I check every morning, and pick any that have a slight blush, wrap them in paper, and let them ripen.
The persimmons are starting to ripen, but most are still hard. Still, I have learned how they look and feel, so every day I am able to get a few to eat. I found a recipe for persimmon candy that I will try this week or next.
Green beans are still putting out like crazy. This was our best crop this year. Hubby's corn is nearly ready to harvest. Soon I will begin putting my gardens to bed, and plant some winter wheat in some for harvest next spring.
If anyone knows how to process persimmon seeds for coffee, would you please let me know? I have done a search, but so far, no success on how to, just lots of articles saying you can, and confederates did it during the civil war. I can't seem to get the gel off the seeds, it's just like glue, but won't wash off. LOL. Have a great weekend. God Bless.
Roasting persimmon seeds is similar to roasting pumpkin seeds. Place the seeds on a cookie sheet. Roast the seeds for 30 minutes at 300 degrees Fahrenheit, stirring them every 10 minutes. Then grind them up in the coffee grinder and use as you would ground coffee. Can’t help you with the gel.
My mother in law made a yeast & egg bread every family get together for the last 30 years. It was great. We called it coffee can bread because she let it rise in 1 lb coffee cans and cooked it in them. It was also quick, because you just let it rise once.
You might try the trick used with tomato seeds to clean them up quickly use some Oxi-Clean in water and put the seeds in. I would start with just a couple of seeds to see what happens. Might work to get that gel off.
Thanks. I’ll try that -I was thinking that maybe if I put them in the oven at a low temp, till the gel dried, that maybe it would come off with friction. The seeds are so hard, I am not sure that a coffee grinder can process them without breaking.
I just read this week that the leaves make a great tea too. All these years, and who knew? Breakfast from a Persimmon tree! LOL.
Thanks for the tip, I'm going to get a container just for rising bread. I struggle with it every time it seems, so I'll take any help I can get.
For awhile last year I wasn't getting any rise at all. At one point I thought it was the yeast, but when I switched to a new jar the trouble remained, so that couldn't have been it. Or so I thought. Turns out I got two bum jars of yeast in a row.
The amaranth sounds interesting. I had looked it up on Wikipedia earlier. It certainly is a multipurpose plant, from the leaves to the seeds and the roots, with lots of healthy benefits.
Here is a link to the King Arthur 8 cup measuring cup I bought. I knew in this small town I would never find something like this.
http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/acrylic-measuring-cup-8-cup
My garden made it through some frosty nights (with a bit of help). The cold seems to have sent the tomatoes a clear message, though, they’ve grown more in the last few weeks than the entire summer up till now. Still trying to figure out why everything was so stunted this year. I wonder if it’s as simple as the paper and cardboard I used to line the bottom of the grow bed. If that didn’t break down as quickly as it was supposed to, the plants’ roots would have had trouble reaching the rich soil underneath. The dirt I filled those beds with was good, but it wasn’t meant to be the only soil they had.
I picked all the bean pods I could find after I noticed that the ripe one were going moldy because of all the rain. They’re supposed to stay on the vine until dry, but that isn’t happening this year, so I spread them out on newspapers inside. We’ll see how well they sprout next year.
My raspberries just don’t want to quit! It’s a tiny patch, but producing about 3/4 of a cup of berries every other day. I haven’t been able to pick them all due to my back acting up, but the ones that grow in easy reach are very sweet and tasty!
My strawberries are still covered in blossoms and unripe berries, but I found out why they never seemed to ripen. As soon as the berries get even the tiniest hint of pink to them, the local wildlife is eating them. A pity. When i transplant those to my land and have good fencing around them, I’ll have fresh strawberries from June until winter! I might even put a few in the greenhouse for a treat during the cold months.
I almost wound up being adopted by a dog this week. There was a huge racket that made it sound like someone was trying to break into the house, and when I went to investigate (armed, of course) I found a black lab in the backyard. He seemed young, but blind. He had somehow gotten through the fence, but couldn’t find his way back out, and he kept walking into the wall hard enough that the aluminum siding would rattle. That was the sound I’d heard. He didn’t react at all when I whistled to him, so I think he was deaf too. His face was all scratched and bleeding, but when he realized I was there (he bumped into me and could tell I wasn’t a wall) he just wagged his tail and let me pet him. He seemed really nice. I went in to get a bowl of water and some leftover chicken for him, but when I came back out he was gone.
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