From our Farm Store

Yukon Gold Potatoes & Brussels Sprouts


Got these fresh organic veggies yesterday at our local Farm Store. They just looked so good and fresh in my colander that I had to take a photo and share them with you. Also got some fresh leeks. The potatoes and leeks will be made into soup. The Brussels will be (and already have been) eaten lightly stir fried or steamed. Nice and fresh. Lovely veggies.

I am so grateful for our local organic farmers and their membership market store. Looking forward to Spring and my own garden veggies too.


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Late Winter Greens

Kale & China Choy ~ cold weather greens

We've had sooooo much rain, cold weather and mud around here this winter that I haven't had a chance yet to get out to my main veggie garden to weed and till the soil in preparation for Spring planting. The chore still needs to be done, but will be done later this year than usual.

I did, however, have the pleasure of harvesting some very late winter greenery from that same garden bed last week. Seen in the photo above are some crunchy kale (I forget the exact variety that I planted) and some juicy China Choy cabbage which is similar to bok choy, but not quite as sturdy. When fully mature like these are, both greens are great used in stir fries, soups, stews or simply steamed. When younger and more tender, they are very nice in fresh green salads.

I used some of the kale as an addition to a stir fry dinner a few days ago. Very tasty and also nutritious. I believe that kale in particular contains high amounts of lutein, which is supposed to be very good for eye and heart health.

I will plant more of each of these greens, among others, this Spring after I get a chance to work the soil and prepare the seed beds. Still way too muddy and wet out there today. Maybe next week...




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Winter Green & Cornbread

Green Pumpkin & Parsley

It has been warm for several days and then cold at night, and now it is finally getting colder during the day and very cold at night. My porch thermometer reads 44 degrees F as I type this.

I plucked this last sweet little pie pumpkin from my garden about a week ago. I kept waiting for it to turn orange first, but I couldn't let it sit out there in the cold weather any longer. I brought it inside in the hopes that it would ripen indoors. It is doing just that, although very slowly. There are some flecks of orange on it and I placed him with his orange colored sisters hoping their ripeness would "rub off" a little on his green little self. There below is my whole pumpkin family for this season.


Small, sweet & tender pie pumpkins


So with the weather getting much colder now, I figured I'd better harvest the last little green bell pepper from my garden. I had left the plant in the ground due to the extended warm weather and because it had a pepper growing on it. It was fairly protected in my raised bed garden, blocked from cold north winds by the back wall of my house. The nights have been getting far too cold for a hot summer crop like bell peppers! Reports of temps in the 30's made me concerned that this little green pepper gem would shrivel up and be culinarily useless, so today I plucked it right off the plant and brought it inside with a brief stop on my porch for a photo op with her neighboring parsley plant.


Green Bell Pepper & Parsley Harvest

My parsley plants are still growing strong, and I bet if I protect them with a cold frame for the winter, they will last right through until spring and keep on producing for me. I use parsley in so many things, not just as a pretty garnish. I like to put a healthy handful in my green salads and I love to cook with it. It is very nutritious.

To change the subject slightly from green garden things to warm food for cold days, take a look at the nice cornbread I baked in my cast iron skillet a couple of weeks ago. I had never used this skillet for baking before, and I am very pleased with the results. The cornbread was delicious!


Delicious hot homemade cornbread

I just had to show it to you. Now I made myself hungry. I guess I should go make myself dinner now. No cornbread in the house though. Guess I'll make a sandwich...

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Sage Wisdom

Fresh Sage Harvest


Well, freshly picked culinary sage anyway, if not wisdom. My hands and my kitchen smell like fresh sage right now. I have just come inside (it's getting dark out there already!) from harvesting a whole basket full of fresh culinary sage, salvia officinalis, also known as common sage.



It is a perennial herb that I planted several years ago in one of my herb gardens. I do cover it with a cold frame in winter, as we get snow and cold temperatures here in the foothills, but it survives just fine and comes back to its bushy self each spring and summer. It has purple flowers on tall spikes when I allow it to flower. I've read that it's not a good idea to let your leafy herbs flower as the flowering process takes the energy and nutrition away from the leaves.



I don't use sage as an herb in my cooking very often, as its strong taste is a bit overpowering for me in the foods I eat. Some people like it paired with chicken or in poultry stuffing. I do like it mixed with other herbs in soft goat cheese. I also use it as an ingredient in an herb tea mixture that I create this time of year to have on hand for cold and flu season. Mixed with catnip and some other sweeter tasting herbs and spices like cinnamon sticks, licorice root and citrus peel, it makes a wonderful decongestant and astringent tea. Steep it with boiling water and drink it as hot as you can stand it.

Sage, although not usually culinary sage, is also burned as incense. Some people use the burning sage "smudge" to clear the air, a room or a building of negative energy or evil spirits. I think that another type of sage is generally used for this purpose, but I have been known to burn my common sage from time to time. It does freshen the air, once the smoke clears!

I grow all of my herbs organically without chemicals or pesticides. These perennial herbs are very easy to grow and resist pests naturally.

This bunch of fresh sage will get tied into small bundles and hung to dry on my high tech herb drying line that I showed you this past August as part of my Garden Art post. I will likely use the dried sage in tea as well as in some new herbal bath products that I am thinking of creating for sale around the holidays.

Any of you have more suggestions for how to use a bunch of sage, dried or fresh?

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Mime Monday (well, almost)

Veggie Garden Greenery




Hawks Soar High in July Blue Sky

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Broccoli Bouquet

Broccoli in "Bloom"

My broccoli plants have been giving me beautiful plump green leaves all season, but only recently has it formed some flower heads for me to harvest. The unopened immature flower buds are the broccoli we see in the grocery stores. My homegrown broccoli produces many small flower heads and when I cut them off with my paring knife to harvest them, it encourages the plant to grow more side shoots with additional small flower heads on them. I sometimes wait too long to harvest the heads and then the little yellow broccoli flowers begin to open and attract the bees. It's still quite edible and tasty when this happens, but as in most flower stalks, the stems then become more fibrous and less tender.

I've only harvested 1/2 lb of broccoli heads so far, but more are forming out there. I try to allow the heads to grow as large as possible while still making sure they remain unopened, before I grab them for my dinner.

While I do enjoy eating the broccoli flower heads, I really get jazzed about growing my own broccoli in my garden. I consider it another one of the "2 for 1" vegetables that give me two crops for the effort of only growing one. You see, I also harvest and eat the beautiful deep green broccoli leaves! They are delicious in many dishes. Of course I use them as I would any DGLV (dark green leafy vegetable) such as chard, spinach, beet greens, collards etc, but they excel in other uses as well. My favorite thing to do with the broccoli leaves is to stuff them with meat and rice using my Mom's stuffed cabbage rolls recipe. They come out so tasty and tender, and I know they are very nutritious. I read in an organic gardening magazine many years ago that not only were the broccoli leaves edible, but also that they had more nutrients than the flower heads do. I was already growing them in my garden, so I ran outside right then and picked a few leaves, brought them into my kitchen and cooked them up. I was very pleased with their taste and performance and have been eating them ever since. It's a pity that you never see broccoli leaves for sale in the grocery stores. They are versatile and can be used in place of cabbage or even grape leaves. The smaller leaves are good raw in salads or slaws.

Grow your own broccoli. Eat the flowers, stems and leaves. Have fun. It's delicious.


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Bean There

2 lbs of freshpicked Green Beans~ first harvest of the season

I harvested the above Provider Snap Green Beans about a week ago. Since then I have picked twice again and have harvested a total of 4 1/2 pounds so far. They are delicous when raw and crunchy, lightly steamed, stir fried or boiled tender. I had some for dinner one night and the leftovers the next day as part of my green salad lunch with a nice vinaigrette dressing.

There are more beans waiting out there in the garden on the compact bushes. The more I pick them, the more they produce. These plants do not need a pole or trellis to climb. They grow to be about 18 inches tall and are heavy bean bearers. I plant them every summer and enjoy them for weeks.

Toward the end of summer I allow 2 or 3 plants to keep and mature their bean pods until they grow fat and start to turn a definite tan color meaning the beans inside are mature and drying. I then bring the pods inside and empty the purple beans out into a seed drying tray to keep for next year's planting. Each year my crop gets better. I think it is because the seeds adapt to the local climate and soil conditions and change for the better year after year.

That's what I've been doing in the garden this week. So how have you bean?

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

My Favorite Basil Pesto & More

Fresh Picked Sweet Basil

My basil plants are not that big this season, at least not yet, but I did manage to give my biggest plant an all over "haircut" and harvested enough leaves to make one batch of my favorite basil pesto so far. I usually make a batch of pesto and then freeze at least half of it in small plastic containers (recycled yogurt cups) to use later. It keeps very well in the freezer for quite a long time. My favorite way to enjoy it is on nice hot freshly boiled pasta. Bow tie pasta being my very favorite. I have also used it on pizza dough, sandwiches and in salad dressings.

Here's my favorite basil pesto recipe that I found long ago in the cookbook "The Frugal Gourmet Cooks Three Ancient Cuisines: China, Greece & Rome" by Jeff Smith. I modified the recipe just a bit.

Basil Pesto

(recipe can be halved or quartered successfully if you don’t have 4 cups basil)

4 Cups tightly packed fresh basil leaves, big stems removed
¼ Cup raw pine nuts, walnuts or almonds
½ Cup extra virgin olive oil, dark
At least 2 cloves of fresh garlic, crushed, more if desired
Season with black pepper or lemon pepper to taste
½ Cup grated parmesan or Romano cheese, or a blend of both

Put basil leaves in the food processor. Add the nuts, olive oil, garlic, and pepper seasoning. Process until all are chopped very fine and blended, but not really smooth. Remove pesto from processor and stir in the grated cheese. Serve on fresh hot pasta, in soups as a garnish, mix into mayo on sandwiches, salad dressings etc.

This recipe makes about 2 Cups of Pesto. Store it in the refrigerator for no more than a few days, covered. Freezes well and keeps for months in the freezer without losing taste.
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Stealth Veggies

While I was in here last night blogging and boasting about how prolific zucchini can be, my zucchini plants were stealthily growing huge specimens for me to find amongst their big leaves this morning. I picked 3 large zukes totalling 3 1/4 pounds. I swear none of them were out there yesterday! Here come the zucchinis...


Sneaky Zucchinis


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Lock Your Car Doors! Here Come the Zucchini!

First Zukes of the Season

I've been so busy caught up in the sweet fruit frenzy of blogging about apricot pie and ice cream, that I have fallen behind in my vegetable garden reports. Time to talk about some "hard core" summer veggies like zucchini, a type of summer squash.

While I was trying to think of a catchy title for this post, I remembered that my Mom, who grew up in New England, told me that up there the zucchini grew so prolifically that you had to lock your car doors otherwise your neighbors would fill your car with their extra zucchinis! Well, that's the story they tell up there in New England anyway. I've heard that story told about other parts of the US also, but I still think of my Mom when I think about growing zucchini.

Zucchini are usually very productive plants, and this season is starting out strong in my small garden. The photo above shows 1 1/4 lb each of dark green zucchini and my favorite light green Clarimore variety. I like the Clarimore for its beauty, but also for its mild tasting skin. I rarely peel zucchini. I prefer to eat them skins and all to get color and fiber in my meals. Both of these varieties of zuke came from the same seed packet. Renee's Garden Seeds offers packets that have 3 different kinds of zucchini in the same pack. Makes it very convenient to grow a few of each kind. I don't need more than 2 or 3 plants of each variety, so one pack of seeds works very well for me.

I also planted another variety of dark green zucchini from Peaceful Valley Garden Supply. So far it has not produced any edibles. I have faith that it will soon.

So today I had a vegetarian sandwich made with sourdough bread, lettuce, a slice of cheddar cheese and layers of very thinly sliced (I used my mandolin) light green raw zucchini. A little mayo, mustard and some seasoning, and it made a very tasty and nutrious lunch. If I had had a tomato in the house, I would have added a slice or two to the sandwich.

I was also busy later in the day turning another zucchini, this one much larger than those in the photo, into some delicious pureed zucchini soup. I got the soup zucchini as a gift from Hardware Bob, who received it as a gift from one of his customers. (he is always receiving gifts like that from his loyal customers)

This big zucchini was a dark green variety and weighed about 2 lbs! I peeled this one and then sauteed it with onions and garlic in olive oil and added in some vegetable broth and seasonings. I pureed it in the pot with one of those big immersion hand blenders and then finished the soup by stirring in a cup of rice milk. The recipe called for milk or cream, but I rarely have that around. I find that rice or soy milk works well. Today I actually added in a bit of half & half that I had left over from making ice cream the other day. It made for a delicious dinner. Satisfying yet light.


Zuke Soup ~ doesn't look like much in the photo, but tastes really good
(that's a garnish of fresh basil floating on top)

There are more zucchinis on the way! Lock your car doors....


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Peas on Earth

Fresh Snow Peas ~ 1 lb

Today I picked over one pound of fresh crisp snow peas from my garden. Even with my homemade twine trellis for the snow peas to climb, the heavy pea pods were making the tall plants fall over. I picked the peas that were ready and then spent some time securing the plants to the trellis with some of that stretchy green garden tape. I need to make sure I don't wait so long to pick more snow peas. I know that I need to pick them every few days to keep the peas producing more edible crunchy pods.

I like them raw, cold and crisp in salads or just directly out of the refrigerator as a snack. I also enjoy eating them in one of my quick stir fry dinners as I did tonight. See the photo below.


Dinner Stir Fry with Fresh Snow Peas

What are your favorite ways to eat snow peas? Any good snow pea recipes you'd like to share with me?

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Bolting Greens

Beets, Carrots & Snow Peas ~ a field of green

The weather is hot and sunny, and my garden is growing like crazy. The greens have been keeping me busy tending them. I need to harvest their leaves every couple of days before they get too large or else they will start to taste bitter. Also, the hot weather signals the greens that their growing season is almost over (they prefer cooler weather) so the little green leafy plants start to send up tall flower stalks in an effort to reproduce and continue their life cycle. Smart little greens. The act of flowering like this when the hot weather hits is called bolting. A term that was unfamiliar to me until I started this vegetable garden here in the mountains about 10 years ago. I read about bolting in several of my gardening books.


Colorful Red Flower Stalk on Bolting Swiss Chard

Greens that bolt start to put all of their life energy and nutrients into the flower stalks and resulting seeds for the next generation of plants. Because of this, the green leafy parts start to become bitter tasting and usually are smaller, which is not good for those of us who like to eat the grean leafy parts of lettuce, mesclun, Swiss Chard, spinach, cabbage, bok choy etc.


Tall Stalks of White Flowers on the Arugula (part of the mesclun salad greens)

There are ways to slow this bolting process down a bit, but nature will always have her way eventually. You can provide more shade for the green plants, thus keeping them a bit cooler and tricking them into thinking that their growing season is extended. You can snip off the flower stalks as they form, forcing the plant to produce more stalks. This method works well with green leafy herbs, but doesn't delay the green veggies very long. They are quick to recover and send up more flower stalks.


Yellow Flowers on the China Choy Cabbage

So today, I harvested a bunch of greens from my garden. I did my usual snipping off of individual outer leaves and left the plant in the ground to produce more leaves, and I also thinned them out by pulling up whole plants by the roots. That gave them more air circulation to prevent rot and slugs and other creepy crawlies from making themselves at home in my salad greens.

I brought in 1 lb of Swiss Chard (a combination of the Bright Lights variety and Fordhook Green), 1 3/4 lb of mixed mesclun and baby lettuce, and 1 1/4 lb of China Choy (like baby bok choy). They are soaking in bowls of cool water rejuvenating their crispness as I type this.

I guess I will be eating fresh green salads and lots of stir fry dinners for awhile. Good and healthy.




© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Green Garden Report

Upper Veggie Garden ~ June 6, 2008

It's been a busy week for me. Not sure what I did this week, but I haven't had time to post anything new in this blog. The garden photo above was taken a week ago. The garden has grown quite a bit since then. Especially the greens and the summer squash.


Summer Squash ~ June 6, 2008

The summer squash, (dark green zucchini, light green zuke, and yellow crookneck squash) shown in the photo above are almost twice that size today.

A few days ago I harvested 1lb of Swiss Chard, 1/2 lb of China Choy cabbage and 3/4 lb of mesclun salad greens. I have plenty more to harvest still in the garden. Our weather has been warming up, so the garden is growing much faster now. I must pick the green leafy things about every two days to keep up with the growth. The salad greens will get bitter if I let them get too big.

Hopefully, I will have plenty of greens for weeks to come, however, tonight I noticed my cabbage and broccoli had lots of holes in their leaves that weren't there yesterday. On closer examination with the light from the flashlight (yes, I was wandering around after dark watching my garden grow) I saw many earwigs and a few little green worms all happily munching on my beautiful leafy greens. I immediately went into the house and mixed up a concoction of soapy water and hot sauce in a spray bottle and came out and sprayed the hell heck out of the plants. I then watched the earwigs and worms try to bail out. I captured several and threw them out of my garden bed. I hope the hot sauce spray really works to warn them to stay away from my food. I'll check the garden again in the morning to see what they left for me to eat.

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Gathering Green

Lovely Fresh Greens in my Harvest Basket

Just a quick post to show you what I have been harvesting from my garden these past few days. Look at those fresh greens in my basket! From left to right in the basket are a few leaves of baby China Choy Cabbage, several ribs and leaves of Bright Lights Swiss Chard, and a whole mess (1/2 lb) of mixed spicy mesclun and delicate baby lettuces. To the far left on the table next to the basket are a few more radishes.

The baby cabbage is tender enough to eat raw in a green salad with the mixed salad greens or cooked in a nice fresh stir fry meal over rice. The chard is best lightly cooked as in a stir fry or perhaps steamed. Also good over rice. The mixed salad greens are great right out of the garden, but I like to bring all my garden greens in to rinse and refresh them in a bowl of water then drain and store in the fridge to keep them fresh and crisp.

So is your mouth watering yet? Good...

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Planting Seeds, Literally

Veggie Seed Packs

I am late planting my vegetable garden this year. So many things to do around here that I just get so far behind. Usually my "cold crops" get direct seeded into my main raised bed garden during the first week of April, but this year I delayed until just a couple of days ago. My excuse and my reason, was that I misplaced (still can't find it) my collection of various seeds that I have gathered over the past several years. I've looked all over my home and my storage spaces in the garage and in the sheds. Couldn't find my seed collection anywhere. So I had to order more seeds, fresh ones, from my favorite garden supply outlet Peaceful Valley Farm and Garden Supply

That took some time and then I took more time getting the seeds into the ground. I had many excuses. Too busy, too cold, wasn't in the mood, had to go out of town to see the new baby... lots of reasons/excuses.

Anyway, I finally got some of the seeds planted into my garden. You can see the variety of seeds that I planted in the seed packet photo above. I have planted carrots, radishes, two kinds of beets, spinach, several kinds of lettuce, mesclun, chard, cabbage, broccoli and snow peas so far.

Do you remember that purple onion that decided to start growing on my kitchen windowsill awhile back? Well, I carefully divided it up into four growing baby onion plants that then grew lots of roots in a jar of water on my patio table until I planted it amongst the beets and carrots this week. Onions and root crops are good companion plants. They encourage each other to grow.

I didn't include a picture of my garden in this post because, well, it just looks like a patch of dirt at this point, with a few onion tops showing. I'll post a photo later on in the season.

Now I need to get going on my warm weather crops. I am running out of time for them. Mother Nature does not want to wait for me!

I love my garden. I find solace there.


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Vernal Equinox

Seedlings Waiting ~ waiting for me!

According to my calendar, yesterday marked the Vernal Equinox, the first day of Spring. The season when the outdoors turns green and everything seems to bloom and grown in abundance.

Well, here I am sitting inside at my computer just having finished my second cup of strong green tea, (my caffeine of choice these days) and feeling a great need for some sunshine and warmth to penetrate my soul. So I gathered these recent photos of bright colors and sunshine from the world just outside my door and I am sharing them with you, my blog buddies, so that we can all celebrate Spring together. Some of you are still having wet and cold weather where you live, so it is my hope that these images of Spring will bring as much sunshine into your hearts as they did to mine.

When I am done with this post, I am going outside to nurture my soul with the real thing. Something I need to do a lot more of. For now, let me share a little bit of my Spring world with you.


Native Manzanita Trees in Bloom ~ Bees Buzzing, hear them?


Fruit Trees ~ planted a few years ago


The Old Girls ~ Red, Lucy & Barbara (still my Spring chicks!)


My Neighbor's Dog ~ through the wire fence ~ notice the blur where his tail is supposed to be. He's wagging it so hard that you can't even see it. He likes me.


Green Onion Pot on my porch ~ planted 6 years ago & still going strong


I love this shot. Makes me feel Spring in my heart & reminds me of Mom.


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Remember to wear your green today, be "green" in all that you do, and celebrate with some good Irish food and maybe green beer if you are into beer.

I will wear green today and cook a nice comforting crock pot dinner that is indicative of both sides of my heritage. I am making Lamb and Rice Stuffed Cabbage Rolls and serving it up hot with some home baked Cheddar Cheese & Garlic Bread. We likely will skip the green beer, but may color our wine or tea green. Maybe. Maybe not. I am both Greek (on my mother's side) and Irish/Scottish/English/Welsh (on my father's side) so the dinner recipe represents both sides of me.

May your day be a lucky and pleasant one for you all.

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket