The Garden Thread - September, 2025

September 1, 2025 | Diana in WI/Greeneyes in Memoriam

[FamiliarFace]

My Picture This app says it a Japanese Euonymus.

[Pollard]

Ctrl FL north of Orlando. Since it’s not coastal, the best sunsets were seen while overlooking a lake

[Liz]

CROCK POT CHOCOLATE CAKE / deliciously gooey
Mix box chocolate cake mix, 8 oz sour cream, pkg instant chocolate pudding, cup chocolate chips,
4 eggs, 3/4 cup oil, cup water. Pour into lightly greased 5qt crock pot, or Crock Pot Cake Bake pan. Cover. Cook 6-8 hours on low. Serve by scooping out of pot. Top w/ whipped cream or ice cream.

[daniel1212]

My Picture This app says it a Japanese Euonymus.

And DDG shows

[daniel1212]

Thanks. Research says... And local HD has Garden-Safe-2-oz-Take-Root-Rooting-Hormone

[daniel1212]

And HD has 2.5 qt. Golden Euonymus (Euonymus J. 'Aureo-marginatus') Evergreen Shrub with Yellow-Green Variegated Foliage (1-Each) for $16.

Maybe better option. But planting now with NR winter coming may not be best.

[Paul R.]

I’ve had some success with hormone powder, and also with liquid rooting solution. (I picked up a whole gallon of the stuff on clearance, a few years ago.)

Some plants have optimum points to make the cutting, and maybe even angles. Generally remove maybe 3/4 of the leaves and keep humidity high. One can use a bag, or I’ve used 2 liter soda bottles with the bottom cut out, and the cap loose (in winter) or removed if ambient humidity is higher. I’ve also used my tallest soda bottle “pots” inverted. (I’ve punched small holes in the bottom for use as pots.)

My starter “pot” is often a plastic drink cup found in the ditch*, which fits inside the soda bottle. Then when the plant has rooted and is (hopefully!) doing well, I transplant it into an intermediate size pot: I flip the soda bottle become a “cover” into a soda bottle “pot”.

*Which reminds me I need to “walk” the road that heads out to the East of this place: I’d walked out there yesterday to check downed branches and a downed road “curve” sign — It’s in pretty badly bashed up shape including a now “L” shaped post, and was carried ~ 25 feet from where it had been “planted”. In the process I found a LOT of new trash, about half of it discarded “Wendy’s” cups and so on, apparently from last weekend / mobile partygoers / lowlifes**. So, I need to go out there with at least a 13 gallon bag to do more pickup.

[Paul R.]

(OT from above post)

**These litterers need to be sentenced to a hefty fine and a week of picking up road trash on REALLY hot, humid, summer days. I did that sort of work for a few days in my late teens for the Youth Conservation Corps: Believe me, it cured any such tendencies in the kids in our work detail!

(Well, we also painted woodwork @ Garden of the Gods, swam @ Pounds Hollow Lake, cleared new trails, canoed @ Current River, had terrific cooks (the gals complained about the weight they were putting on!), learned a LOT (and some great stories) from the National Forest Rangers, ...a certain girl..., and had many fab adventures and times. Terrific memories...! A few minutes to half hour picking up roadside trash always brings them back, so, it’s certainly not the worst chore in the world. :-)

[Pollard]

Three main recipes for great northern beans, White Chili, Ham and Beans, Baked Beans. The Italian Sausage Soup recipe looks good and is a 100% dutch oven recipe. (This Italian sausage soup is loaded with veggies, white beans, and spinach for a hearty winter favorite.)

White/chicken chili doesn't interest me. I think I probably bought them with baked/bbq beans in mind for the smoker.

20 years ago we went for a drive west on Hwy 5 just to see what was out there. Stopped by a little home cooking restaurant and I had the white beans. They were none of the above typical recipes. They were really good, had no meat, did have tiny diced carrots and maybe something green, also diced but that's all I know.

Since it had no meat, I just did a search for vegetarian while beans and came across Provencal White Beans which I think might be it.

They were not orange at all so she used no tomato based ingredient and there was no cheese and if there were onions, they were diced very small and maybe cooked to the point of rendered but everything else looks like a match.

I see 3-4 lbs of white beans in bags but I'm pretty sure I have a LOT more in Sam's Club sized Folgers containers so I probably have enough for bbq baked/smoked beans and Provencal.

Yeah, just took a peak. One of the bags is navy beans. Then I have 3 of those big Folgers containers full of northern plus two 1 lb bags so maybe 7-8 lbs or more. One bag of kidney beans and probably 4-5 lbs plus several cans of pinto beans, a few lbs of red beans and a Folgers container of black beans. Them crazy preppers. Next time I hit walmart, I need to get a big bag of rice. We're almost out.

I rotated them out a few years back or maybe several. Guess I better try small batches of what's in the containers to make sure they'll soften. Instead of soaking overnight, I'll quick soak method and cook today. I need to run to town this morning so I'll grab a few bags just in case or to restock what I'm rotating out. I've used baking soda with some old black beans before to get them to soften and it worked but I wasn't thrilled with the end results. Better to buy new as cheap as they are. Just looked at conversions and it looks like 1 lb of dried beans = three 15 oz cans of beans. Walmart 32 oz bag of GN beans works out to 38 cents a can equivalent and the cans are $0.92

Of course 40 seeds for $3.50 will grow you a lot of beans even cheaper - https://www.rareseeds.com/bean-good-mother-stallard Here you go, "making me" buy seeds LOL.

Need to hit Ace this morning and get nuts and washers to keep those round grates from sliding/falling. Would be a shame if I got clumsy and the new dutch oven fell. The washers are thin enough to bend on one side to make a pair of them curl around the grates and lock them in place.

Just pulled out the great northern beans and kitchen scale. I have 16 lbs in containers plus 1 lb in bag and 2 lb bag of Navy which will substitute for GN. Bags say best by 2022-2024 so those are fine so I don't need to buy any this morning. Just the spices and dark brown sugar I couldn't get yesterday due to registers going down. And with that, I'm off to town.

[Paul R.]

My one Opo plant that survived, produced one medium size fruit (saved for seeds), declined, and has now bounced back, is going nuts: I have to go back to it and “redirect” for about the 4th time in 10 days to keep it out of the Asian Squash and also a walkway. It’s also into a Mimosa tree, and I’m just gonna let the Opo do it’s thing, there, as that gets that part of the plant as much sunlight as it wants to climb for, once it’s over 15’ up. Will I get more fruits? Who knows!

I’ll hit it with a little more Super Phosphate & maybe a little diluted milk....

[Pollard]

Well nevermind; the Provencal White Beans recipe says nothing about tomato based ingredient. Must have gotten that from some bbq bean recipe. I’d say that was the recipe at the home cooking restaurant. Will have to try it sometime.

[Paul R.]

White chili does interest me, though, as beef prices are getting so high that we just can’t afford it unless we get lucky and find some on clearance / use by tomorrow, etc. But, I can only handle so much conventionally or Asian cooked chicken...

So, I did a Brave Search for “White Chili”, and immediately found this interesting discussion:

https://www.reddit.com/r/chili/comments/1ak5a2j/advice_for_white_chili/

Lots to keep me busy cooking, this winter!

I may have to try doing more with just “veggies as veggies” in the smoker, too. It always seems time & wood* is wasted, using it for just one meat dish...

*Not that I’m going to run short on wood, at least not hickory, anyway. I pulled probably 3 months supply, just out of the ~ 600 ft. of ditch involved in my “trash cleanup” posting, above...

(Yeah, I went a little onto our neighbor’s ditch, but, they never get out and clear / clean it up past the mowed lawn portion of their property. Nice enough but lazy ass woman...)

[FamiliarFace]

My family lived in the Orlando area for 4-5 years. First house was on Lake Lovely. Second house there was in Goldenrod on Lake Georgia. I was young when we were living there. Dad grew up with a lake view, so he always wanted that if he could. Yes, amazing sunsets!

[FamiliarFace]

I have never understood littering. Anybody who does that is as much trash as what they’re getting rid of.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I will see what I can see for you this month. ‘Facing North’ from the deck is a wall of Norway Spruce that is 50’ tall and three layers thick. Unless they are REALLY high in the sky, they will be blocked, but if I remember, I’ll head to the top of the hill for some viewing/photos.

Supposedly clear and cool for weeks to come, so it’s a good possibility! :)

[FamiliarFace]

I have a black and white chicken chili recipe from a friend that I’ll look for. I believe it uses fresh jalapeños in it for some zing.

Found it on the internet. It’s the same exact recipe ingredients so maybe where she got it from.

https://www.tyson.com/recipes/Black-and-White-Chicken-Chili

[Diana in Wisconsin]

I need some more detail on what it actually IS before I can tell you how to propagate it.

Is it a shrub? Is the stem ‘woody?’ or is it some sort of perennial that I’m not familiar with?

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Is it a variety of Euonymus? A landscape shrub?

https://gardenerspath.com/plants/ornamentals/best-euonymus-types/

[Diana in Wisconsin]

“Here you go, ‘making me’ buy seeds LOL.”

Well, it WAS my JOB for close to 20 years, so old habits die hard! :)

I printed out the ‘Provencal White Beans.’ That looks like a great Winter meal with some crusty bread and a slice of ham or a pork chop. It says it pairs well with lamb, but lamb is not a big ‘animal crop’ in our neck of the woods.

[Bon of Babble]

Beautiful plant - and most transplanting like that is experimentation - give and take and it may take several tries before it works.

I know that to be a hardy plant so it should take - maybe plant one cutting in potting soil, another in water and see how they do. Or do several. I’ve done this with many plants and usually one or more “takes.”

Ditto for grafting. I’ve seen grafted plumerias that were beautiful, different colored blooms on every branch. I asked one gardener how he did it and he told me he grafts many many branches and usually only one or two take.

That’s one of the beauties of gardening, it’s very fluid and flexible - and we are also beholden to the weather, which changes year to year (my figs this year are very very small, I think from us having an extra cool spring, they didn’t get the heat they need to ripen and plump up properly)