All I Can Do Here: 2014

Monday, 26 May 2014

Working hard, and hardly working

I've had a productive few weeks, while still managing to put off way too many things that need to get done. Turns out being injured means you prioritize...but for me that means the things I always put off just keep getting put off for longer and longer.

*sigh* I'm going to have to pull up my socks and just get the darn laundry done! ....Wednesday.

Anyways, catching up.

The community garden plot is coming along really well so far. I've gotten almost all the planting done! So far the plot has (* next to seedlings I started):

-Zucchini*
-Cucumber* (although it may die it was perking up as of the last time I was over there...fingers crossed. I did plant 2 new seeds in hopes that if the original kicked the bucket the new ones would germinate. I could potentially end up with 4 cucumber plants sharing the spot. Yeep!)
-Patti pan squash (a kind of zucchini)*
-Hubbard Squash*
-Sugar Pumpkin*
-3 Bloody Butcher tomatoes*
-2 Black Krim tomatoes*
-1 Cherry tomato*
-1 Lemon Boy tomato (yay free seedlings! :) )
-2 Jalapeno peppers*
-2 Bell peppers* (these seedlings were poor to start and are decidedly behind the two best jalapenos)
-6 Brussel sprouts
-4 Asparagus (which won't be harvest-able for at least a year)
-6 green leaf lettuce (which just would NOT start from seed for me...:( )
-6 bright lights chard (ish...there were definitely a few extra plants in there but I certainly won't be complaining! I LOVE chard!)
-10 corn stalks (very experimental...I'm excited to see if it'll work)
-4 celery (I'm interested to see how these store-bought starts compare to my home seeded survivor. I planted 2 store bought right near my home grown one in my home garden so I can compare)
-Walla walla onion sets (I'm planting a single row all around the perimeter of my garden in homes of dissuading pests...between that and the marigold I still need to get in I'm hoping it'll discourage many of the bugs)
-Yellow onion bulbs
-seeded sprouting broccoli (probably too late, but we'll see Maybe I'll get a late crop)
-seeded lettuce, 2 varieties

Garden pictures!

Corn
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The back of the plot.
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Left to right: Rhubarb (came with the plot, I have two BIG ones), asparagus, hubbard squash, sugar pumpkin, zucchini. The cucumber is sort of in between the rows.
Tomatoes, then peppers.

The whole plot, just after the first bunch of planting (forgive the sad-looking plants, there was more weeding and soil prep than I'd thought so the starts had to sit in the sun while we worked.)
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Artsy shot of the broccoli starts - courtesy of my sister who took the pics
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I still have to seed carrots, radishes, and beets. I'm planning to line the path in the middle of the garden with rows, as a sort of growing border. I'll do either 2-3 carrots/radishes, or 1 beet. Hopefully I'll get that done this weekend coming up. Then all I have left is mulching around the larger plants and down the walkway! Hopefully that will minimize my weeding and also improve the soil for next year.

All in all I'm counting the seed starting adventure as a success!

Notes for next year:

-Plant fewer tomatoes!
-Plant tomatoes later!
-Plant fewer squash - then the ones I plant will have more room under the light and more attention (besides, I prefer zucchini and cucumbers anyways!)

Tuesday, 6 May 2014

Strawberries on sale!

I found an amazing sale on strawberries at the local grocery store, $6 for a flat! Since we're almost out of low-sugar jam, and there's a recipe I've been dying to try for months now I got two flats.

Last night I made strawberry kiwi no-pectin jam. This is a method I used last year as well, and the results are amazing. Super flavorful, not too sweet, and much more natural than other options. It's also really versatile, you can do just about anything with it.

I originally read about it on Erica's blog Northwest Edible, one of my favorite blogs to follow. Specifically, I've loved Erica's can-o-rama posts (totally doing my own can-o-rama this year!). I took the basic method for low sugar, no pectin jam she has, and I have plans to try some of her wet and dry 'zing' ideas later this year.

Strawberry Kiwi Jam

*Note: I did double the recipe, and it lengthens the boiling time needed. You need to boil the fruit until a spoon pulled through the center leaves a trail that slowly fills in. It makes a softer set of jam than you might be used to, but I really prefer it.

2 cups cut strawberries (you can hull yours if you like, I think it's too much of a pain)

1 cup cut kiwis

1 1/4 cup sugar (I used 1 1/2 cups total in my double batch and it tastes perfect. Sweeten it to your own tastes.)

Juice from 1/2 a lemon (for the acidity...do NOT mess with this or it will affect the safety of your finished product. Fresh lemon is the best choice)

Combine your cut fruit and sugar in a bowl, then stir until it's quite syrupy.

Put the fruit mix into a wide saucepan (for more surface area to boil off the moisture quickly), and boil for 8-10 minutes stirring regularly.

As the jam is cooking down have your boiling water bath pot ready. Boil the jars, set the rings aside, and use a smaller pot for the lids. Don't boil your lids, put them in once the water has boiled and the heat is turned down.

To check if the jam is ready there are a few tests you can do; the one I mentioned above with the stirring spoon, a sheet test, or a plate test. See below for more info.

When you're satisfied with the set of your jam remove it from the heat and ladle it into the jars, leaving a 1/4 inch of head space.

Run a knife, or other flat utensil, along the inside of the jar to remove air bubbles, wipe the rim, then lid and band the jars. (My double batch made nearly three pint jars - since you can't process a 'near pint' that one is ours for eating immediately and went right into the fridge.)

Process in the boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Due to our altitude I processed mine for 20, so make sure to check here for your required processing times.

I tested some last night on toast and it was wonderful. I'm looking forward to repeating the process later this week with plain strawberry jam for our cupboard.

Testing the set of your jam

Plate test

The plate test is quite simple. I've used it before with good success.

As your jam is cooking place a small plate in the freezer, by the time you're ready to test your jam the plate should be well chilled.

To test the jam, remove it from the heat (or it will keep cooking as you test and could pass the level of set you want!), spoon a dollop of jam onto the plate. Wait a minute or so, then run your finger through the jam. If it makes a clean line that doesn't re-form you've got a pretty good set. You're ready to jar up the jam.

Sheet test

This is a bit trickier, and requires some practice. As the jam cooks use a spoon to get a dollop of jam. Tilt the spoon and let the jam slowly fall back into the pot. You're looking for it to fall in one smooth sheet, rather than as drips and dribbles.

I have used this method, but it's not as simple as a plate test and can be tricky.

I typically use a mix of the three methods outlines in this post, along with a taste test ;) (clean spoon of course!) to determine when it's at the texture I like. Remember that hot jam from the pot is runnier than it will be once set and cooled, so if you only do the sheet test keep that in mind.

Happy jamming :D

Sunday, 27 April 2014

More seedlings!

It's been a busy week in the seedlings-gardening department!

The last of the seedlings are starting to come up. I'm going to plug the Incredible Seed Company (incredibleseeds.ca) again because all of them are at a 100% germination rate! Not only that, but the seedlings look incredibly vigorous. Overnight they went from barely peeking, to being 2 inches tall, with fully spread first leaves. Craziness.

I hope they stay that healthy, because I'm beginning to worry about my tomatoes. Not that they're looking unhealthy, quite the opposite! I replanted all the tall and gangly-looking seedlings this morning to get them deeper into the pots. A few had very thick root balls, even beginning to be a bit root-bound. Hopefully I've averted a crisis by unpotting them, then planting them deeper in the same pots. I don't have anymore room under lights for bigger pots (except for the very biggest plant) and it's still much too cold outside. Needless to say my fingers are crossed for a very warm spring! Next year I'll plant them later.

Oh well, the good news is that it's only about half the tomato plants that have just taken off, the rest are growing at a more normal rate. I think I figured out why - the timer those lights were on wasn't set to 'timer', so the lights were on 24/7! Now that I've got them back on a more regular schedule I'm hoping they'll settle down a bit.

I'm also beginning to plan ahead for a bigger tomato crop this year. (Although since last year's 'crop' consisted of one big tomato and enough cherry tomatoes I could eat one a day for about 2 weeks that shouldn't be tough, lol). I think the big difference will be determinate vs indeterminate, and where i'm planning on planting them.

I've got plans to get a big load of rotted manure to finally (fingers crossed!) make my front bed an actual viable planting location. Since it's about the perfect place for tomatoes - other than the currently abysmal soil condition - I'm hoping things will do better this year.

In outside garden news there's a few good signs. The rhubarb that I've sadly mistreated the past few years (moving it twice in one year, the year after I transplanted a beat up rootball may have been a bit much) but it's up and looking more vigorous than ever. I'm debating putting a bucket over top of it, to see if I can force some nice big sweet stalks, but I may just leave it to grow this year. I am regretting building out catio (cat-patio) around it though...I wanted that extra foot for the cats to play in, and I didn't want to move the sad rhubarb for a THIRD time...but it'll be awfully awkward to protect it from the cats and then try to harvest it in a 4 foot high enclosure. Picture me constantly battling cats, hitting my head, and wielding a knife. Hmmm....If it does well this year maybe I'll split it and replant half in an easier to harvest location. I'll leave some to grow big for the kitty boys as a great bit of shade.

I've also been given hope by a few little bits of hopeful green. My chives, the ones that have never really taken off, are sprouting! This is the first year they've come up anywhere near this early, and I think they've already got more shoots this year than they had all last summer! Sure, they're small shoots right now, but they're there and that gives me hope for a great chive-season :)

I'm beginning to wonder if I didn't kill the asparagus though. I got a few plants for free (a 'come dig me up' ad on kijiji) and planted them in a sunny spot in the front yard. No shoots yet. I'm still keeping my fingers crossed, but I thought they were supposed to come up nice and early? I guess I'll just have to wait and see.

Last thing, I promise ;) its nice and sunny, my cloche is up, I've got black landscape fabric warming another strip of ground...I'm planting today! I'll be putting in radishes, spinach, and Swiss chard. Yay! :D

Overall...I'm SO ready for spring to get here!

Pics:
Green things!

The abused rhubarb

Cloched and covered rows

Sprouts

Seedlings

Jitxu helping with the cloche

Kitty prints - a definite sign of spring

Monday, 21 April 2014

Inspiration comes from predictable places

Tonight, as I flip through my possibly overdue library book (having no fines is seductive), im madly scribbling down recipe after recipe and working hard to convince myself I don't need a trip to the store and 3-4 hours of prep and canning. Its a hard sell.

Something about spring makes me want to DO things. Not useful things like cleaning my messy house, or...mostly that really, but outside things or cooking. I want to feel useful, get dirty, and enjoy the - literal - fruits of my labour.

I've spent the past few weeks feeling cheaply and healing as slowly as seems possible...but tonight I want to ignore my twinging thigh, aching ankle, and unsteady balance and get something done.

With that in mind I got out the library book that has had to wait until I could sit up long enough to take notes and got dinner on.

The smell of something yummy on helps my note taking skills...or something. I'm not picky, I'll take my motivation as it comes.

So, no gardening, but a recipe for yummy easy no-stove chicken. YMMV ;)

1 chopped up chicken (thighs, legs, wings, breasts - reserve carcass for pet food or stock)
1/2 an onion, rough chopped
3 stalks celery, rough chopped
3-4 cloves garlic, crushed (lazily)
Chicken stock 2 cups ish (enough to cover the chicken prices in your Dutch oven or pot)
1 can chopped tomatoes
1/2 cup preserve of your choice (I used grapefruit marmalade)

Cook onion, celery and garlic until they start to soften. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Put in chicken peices, pour on preserves, cover with broth and lid. Cook on med 10 minutes.

Add tomatoes and season as you like. Cook another 30 minutes or until cooked through.

Serve over rice.

I also have gotten my starter going again, finally...although with our oven broken its not working too hard.

Dont keep your starter next to hot pots, jyst so you know. Mine was there long enough for the pic and that's it.

Happy cooking and gardening :)

Makin stuff

Note: this is what I get for blogging from my phone! I thought this had been published weeks ago. Oh well, I guess today will be a two-fer.

As an update (and giveaway of how long ago this SHOULD have gone up) both pickles and mustard became edible this week and are AMAZING. We're half way through the jalapeno-dill jar already.

If I make them again...ok, ok. WHEN I make them again, I'll either use more jalapenos or let them sit longer. They've got great flavor but very little heat, after the last jar they're quite different. Due to being the last jar opened they had been marinating for an extra 3 months or so. Those things had kick!

Anyways, I highly recommend both recipes. Yum!

Enjoy ;)

No gardening update tonight I'm afraid...I've got some pretty big changes coming though so get ready for that next week.

Tonight I did something easy, satisfying, and delicious...in a while.

In both cases it's the second time I've made the recipe, and I tweaked a few things. We shall see how the difference translates to the finished product.

Mustard
A few months ago I stumbled across an article talking about how easy it was to make mustard. I'm all about easy, and since its also much cheaper AND tastier its a win all around.

I went and bought three kinds of mustard seeds; yellow, black and red. I got quite a bit, mostly because the spice market only had fairly large quantities, but I paid less than $20 for enough mustard seeds to easily last the two of us at least a year. Compare that to fancy artisan mustard from the store at $6-8 per tiny jar...yeah. Homemade wins.

I don't even know if I can even call this a recipe...

1 cup mustard seeds (I do a mix, 2/3 cup yellow, 1/3 cup mixed red and black)
1 cup vinegar (I'm using apple cider vinegar this time)
1/2 cup water

Mix everything together in a jar and let it sit, covered, on the counter 24-48 hours.
Blend it (I use my immersion blender, but a normal one would work too)
Add salt to taste.

Seriously easy. And SO good! The trick is that once its blended you leave it to sit on the counter a few more days. Taste it every day and when it's mellowed enough for you put it in the fridge. Last time it took about a week or so for it to mellow enough for me.

We've been putting it on everything and it's way better than store bought.

Pickles
This recipe is for fridge pickles. I tried it for the first time in August last year, because I wanted to make pickles and without a pressure cooker I was limited to fridge pickles...they turned out amazingly and didn't last nearly long enough.

When I saw local mini cukes on sale at the store I knew I'd found a solution to my craving...a long term solution.

This is another crazy easy recipe, but it requires more patience than the mustard recipe.

10 cups water
2 heads garlic
5 cups vinegar
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp pickling (coarse) salt
1 Tbsp each of: yellow mustard seeds, black peppercorns, dill seeds
Fresh dill sprigs

Boil water and peeled garlic 5 minutes
Add vinegar and salt, boil to dissolve salt
Wash 2 lbs cucumbers and halve or quarter lengthwise if desired
Using sanitized jars, divide the whole spices evenly between your jars, then divide the garlic into the jars. (I add a bit of fresh dill to the bottom of the jars to)
Put cucumbers into the jars, pack tightly
Coil a sprig of dill into the top of each jar, using it to wedge the cukes in tightly to prevent floating
Ladle in the brine to cover everything
Optional: add 2-3 slices of jalapeno pepper...dill, jalapeno and garlic pickles are AWESOME, which I know due to experimenting with the first batch.

Cover the jar tops with clean cloths, securing them with elastic, and let sit on the counter 3 days. Refrigerate 3 weeks...eat them all in one day ;)

One of the best things about fridge pickles is once you've eaten all the pickles you can reuse the brine with whatever veggies you want. Awesome.

Enjoy your delicious home made condiments! :)

Sunday, 20 April 2014

Thursday, 17 April 2014

Seed Starting - Update

It's been getting warmer here, MUCH warmer. All the snow in front of our house has melted, but there's still a depressing amount in the back yard on top of my garden. I did get my first peek at the dirt of the garden yesterday though. I feel a bit silly, but I was so happy to see that little bit of rich black earth.

I noticed something about the seedlings that I think is a bit strange and I can't quite explain. It's something I read about on another blog (Lights In My Basement) and thought to myself "No way. There's no reason that would happen...right?" Yeah. Turns out my gut instinct was way off on this one.

I started all my tomatoes at the same time. The same day, planted them all in one go.

They germinated quickly, and grew well. I noted in my last post that the Bloody Butcher seeds germinated the best, but the Cherry tomatoes were the hardiest looking, and that I had up-potted a few of each variety. Admittedly, at the time I did pick the strongest looking starts...but I don't know that that can entirely be the cause of what happened after I up-potted some.

The plants I moved into bigger pots are now easily double the size of the others...easily. They look stronger and healthier, have thick leaves, and lots of little hairs on the main stems. The starts that had to sit in the tiny cells stayed much smaller. I thought maybe it was because they had less room to root, but I up-potted another bunch of them the other day and their roots weren't more than one little tap root and a few off shoots. They weren't anywhere near reaching the edges of the pots.

Basically I have no idea why...but it does make me consider planting the next bunch of starts (the gourds, cucumber, zucchini, ect) right into my bigger pots (which may or may not be cheap white plastic cups...*cough* If I reuse them it's environmentally friendly, right?).

I have been bottom-watering all the starts as much as possible, the exception being anything very tiny or just repotted.

Despite the wild success of the tomato starts I'm equally thrilled with the other plants I've got going so far. The peppers, bell and jalapeno, are coming along nicely, and three of the 4 habanero seeds came up. I even up-potted the best looking of the habanero starts. I'll probably up-pot one more and then either offer the others to friends or toss them.

I'm really excited about the celery starts. they're still tiny tiny tiny...If I do them again next year I'll plant them MUCH earlier as I don't know if they'll be ready to transplant into the garden by the time the garden is ready for them. I have three and they're all doing pretty good. One is noticeably bigger than the other two, so we'll see how they all progress. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

The last thing I'll add is the salad mix is doing OK. I'm not crazy about it, I thought they would be growing better, but they're turning a bit leggy. I may end up just buying lettuce starts.. :( I'm not giving up on them yet and I'll definitely be doing an early planting straight into the garden as soon as I can work with it. I didn't have much luck with that last year, but maybe I'll try and cloche them to give them a bit of a boost.

Until next time ;)

Pictures to come - Post written April 10, 2014 (I should do another update pretty soon, and I've dawdled on this one long enough I thought I should date it for an accurate timeline ;) )

Thursday, 27 March 2014

Seed Starting 2014

This is my first year starting my garden from seeds. I decided to try it because it's cheaper (factor #1 for me), and I was unimpressed with the selection of heirloom starts locally. (Aka, there were none...)

So many of the big garden/cooking/sufficiency gardeners start from seeds and rave about it...I'll be honest. I wanted to jump on that band wagon.

So jump I did. Without my typical amount of research. Whoops.

Valuable lesson #1
Don't order seeds from the US if you live in Canada. :(

Luckily that was a very small order done as a test...still disappointing but not like I lost all the seeds for this year.

Lesson learned. I ordered the rest from a Canadian organic heirloom seed company (incredibleseeds.ca). and the results so far are stellar. I've only planted about half of the seedlings (stupid Canada's stupid late last freeze dates...*grumble grumble*) but those have done surprisingly well so far.

The repotted seedlings (back to front); cherry tomatoes, bloody butcher tomatoes, black krim tomatoes, jalapeno peppers, bell peppers, herbs.

Here's a bit of info on what I bought, why, and how it's done so far.

Tomatoes

I chose three varieties to plant:

Bloody Butcher Heirloom

ISC: 55 days. Heirloom Tomato Seeds. Indeterminate. An excellent early variety Bloody Butcher Heirloom Tomatoes start early and produce consistently until frost. Tomatoes form in clusters of five to nine on vigorous vines. Medium sized tomatoes with fantastic flavour. A good multi-purpose variety, excellent fresh and canned.

Why I picked them: The growing season here is really short (like...REALLY short), so something that starts quick and keeps going is a huge bonus. I also really love fresh tomatoes, I'll eat them like apples...but one of my goals is to can some of my own produce. Since these tomatoes are good for both fresh eating AND canning that's what I want.

Planting/seedlings: They are doing amazingly. I actually got more than 100% success with them coming up. Clearly I planted an extra few seeds by accident. I'm ok with that though. With luck I'll have 19 well-producing tomato plants this year :)

The plants are doing better now that they've been repotted once. I took some advice from another gardening blog and repotted them straight into fancy containers (*cough* red solo cup *cough*) that should do well until they're ready to go into the garden. I still have more to move, I did the most vigorous 5 plants, and the ones I moved definitely look to be improving quicker. I'm going to need more room in my indoor garden post haste!

Black Krim

http://incredibleseeds.ca/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_40&products_id=105

ISC: 75 days. Heirloom Tomato Seeds. Black Krim Heirloom Tomatoes are a rare purple-black tomato and is one of the best tasting you will ever try. Originally from the Isle of Krim in the Black Sea of the former Soviet Union. The dark, three inch fruit have a fantastic and intense taste perfect for anything that calls for a tomato. One of the best available.

Why I picked them: To be honest I got this for fun. I'm not expecting loads and loads of tomatoes from it, since 75 days is quite long to start...but I loved the pictures of the Black Krims on the website and thought it would be neat to see how they do. I'd love it if I got enough to can even one jar of Black Krim pasta sauce!

Planting/seedlings: I've gotten pretty good success from these; I planted 9 and 7 came up. I'm happy with that. They aren't as vigorous as the Bloody Butcher or the Cherry...but they're doing ok. I only repotted the biggest 3 seedlings and they're looking good as of last night.

Large Red Cherry Tomatoes

ISC: 80 days. Indeterminate vines. Large Red Cherry is a very prolific producer of one to two inch bright red cherry tomatoes. The deep red fruit are great for snacks and salads.

Why I picked them: I love cherry tomatoes. LOVE THEM. If I get any of these I'll be thrilled. Again, 80 days is a long start time, but I'm hopeful they'll do ok. I've had a lot of success with cherry tomatoes in the past (well, more than with the regular ones anyways, lol) and since this says it's prolific...I picked this one. We'll see how it does.

Planting/seedlings: These have the lowest germination rate - 6:9 - but the healthiest looking seedlings. They were the first ones to get their first set of true leaves, and were already working on the second set by the time I repotted them! Now they're still ahead of the others, and growing strong.

Peppers

I did plant three varieties, but bought one on a whim at a certain local mega-store...we shall see how they compare to the heirloom plants!

California Wonder Bell Peppers

75 days. California Wonder Sweet Bell Peppers are a top choice for northern gardeners producing very well in our climate. The fruit are large, have thick walls and are very tasty. The peppers can be picked when green or left on the plant until they turn bright red for a sweeter taste. They are hard to beat for fresh eating and also make for delicious stuffed peppers.

Why I picked them: It's like they wrote this just for me! at 75 days they're one of the shortest peppers I found, I'm really hope full I'll get a good set on them. Since one of my goals is to feed both the people AND the guinea pigs in the house these bell peppers were really important to me. (For those who don't know guinea pigs should eat 1/4 of a green pepper, or 1/8 of a red pepper EVERY DAY. Needless to say we go through a lot of peppers.)

I particularly like that they can be picked green or red, the more versatility the better.

Planting/seedlings: The peppers are all a little slower than the tomatoes, but they're still looking good. These germinated out at 7:9, which is great, and they're just working on the first set of true leaves. The 2 I repotted are doing well.

Jalapeno Peppers

73 days. The standard for nachos and salsas! Jalapeno Hot Peppers are 3 ½ inch long and have a spicy addictive flavour which has made them such a popular addition to so many recipes today. The vigorous 26 inch plants bear early and abundantly and are very easy to grow, ensuring a bumper crop. They are ready to pick when the peppers are dark green.

Why I picked them: Again, things that I love. Versatile in cooking, easy to grow, produces lots. I have a few jars of amazing pickles jalapenos I made last year...I bet they'll be even better with home-grown peppers! YUM!

Planting/seedlings: The jalapeno peppers didn't germinate as well as the bell peppers... 6:9, but they are healthier looking. The leaves look very different from the tomato starts, and I'm really interested to see how they do. I repotted 2 jalapeno peppers.

Habenero Peppers

Why I picked them: These are the ones I picked up from Wal-Mart. They are organic (or claim to be...), and I purchased and planted them late, so they haven't come up yet. I only planted them a few days ago, so we'll see what happens. If they don't work I won't be upset, but I'd like to compare them to the heirloom seeds.

Other

I thought I'd try a few new things this year...'cause starting my own seedlings wasn't enough to take on, lol.

Rosa Bianca Eggplant

http://incredibleseeds.ca/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1_24&products_id=323

73 days. Heirloom Eggplant Seeds. An Italian variety, Rosa Bianca Heirloom Eggplants have pink and white, rounded fruit. A very unique and beautiful variety, it does need heat and warmer nights to fruit well. If you have a warm spot in your garden along a wall, hot summer weather or a greenhouse it's a nice variety to try.

Why I picked them:I haven't eaten much eggplant...but I know I'm more likely to eat it if I grow it and these are just so darn pretty! I'm not holding out high hopes or anything, but I'll be happy if they do ok. I have a plan for where I want them to go :)

Planting/seedlings: They all came up! 6:6! I was thrilled to see they came up at all, since they were a good week behind the peppers and tomatoes. I haven't transplanted any of them yet, they were still too little...and I didn't have room. Something that will hopefully be remedied in a week or so.

Utah Celery

Utah celery is widely grown and disease resistant. It has tall stalks that are sweet and smooth with leafy tops. It is cold tolerant and long lasting.

Why I picked them: I'm a sucker for cold tolerant plants. I wanted to try celery last year, but without anyone selling seedlings I was out of luck. I've heard there's no comparison to store bought, so I'm curious to see how this works out for me.

Planting/seedlings: I've got 5:6 seedlings up. They're the tiniest little seedlings I've ever seen! The seeds were miniscule, so it makes sense...but I'm hoping the grow quick because at this point I'm a bit nervous about having planted them too late!

My set up is very basic (VERY basic), I have one short shelf, two three foot long fluorescent fixtures (too long for the shelf...whoops), and two seed starting trays. One is empty, the other holds the seedlings I haven't repotted yet.

I should have some things (visiting pets) moved out of my hobby (guinea pig/visiting pet/seed) room by the end of next week, so I'm planning on rigging a way to hang the lights and putting in a table. That should give e enough room to keep the seedlings all happy until spring gets here (whenever that happens....) and they get to go outside!

In a month I'm going to start worrying about setting up an easy hoop frame for the tomatoes, eggplants, and peppers. I want well producing plants, so I'll need to trap what little heat we get here. I'm also hoping to be able to rig up something so I can harden the plants off outside...without having to tramp up and down three flights of stairs with cats underfoot and delicate seedlings in my arms - twice a day! Not going to work.

Other than the herbs that's all I've got going on so far. Yay, long updates! XD

Thursday, 20 March 2014

I'm Back!

Alright, alright, it's been a while.

In my defense I've been crazy busy. Here's a brief update of my flurry of activity the last few months:

-New jobs! 2 of them since the beginning of January! (A non-profit group, and a library, YAY!)
-House guests, in the form of snakes! (They'll be here until the end of this month, and have been with us since the end of December.)
-I registered my business with the city :D This was especially big for me, as it makes my business (pet sitting, dog walking, and pet training) much more official.
-Setting new gardening and self-sufficiency goals. More on this below.
-Starting a bunch of house plants from cuttings (pictures to come at a later date ;) )
-Seed starting!

So I've been quite busy, as you can see.

Now, however, I want to write about self-sufficiency and what that means for me and this blog.

I feel like calling what I'm doing 'self-sufficiency' is a bit like cheating. I'm very much in the baby steps portion, but I am trying to work towards being a bit more reliant on myself and the items I can grow and make (preserve), as well as eating healthier and more locally.

Last year I had made a goal for myself that I was pretty nervous about, to tell the truth. I wanted to not buy any tomato sauce/canned tomatoes between August and January. Now, that seems like a teeny tiny goal to reach compared to some of the other bloggers and self-sufficiency buffs out there, but since I was working full time and canning only in my free time AND it was my first year making canned tomatoes...I felt it was going to be tough.

Well, good news. It's the middle of march and we STILL haven't bought any sauce or canned tomatoes! I am absolutely thrilled. Overall, it cost me about $40 ($1/lb tomatoes, I bought $30 lbs, plus cheap/free jars of kijiji, plus some lids) to make 5 jars of delicious salsa (definitely a recipe I'll be re-using. YUM!), and 8 jars of pasta sauce. Plus the FREE (my favorite price ;) ) 5-6 jars of tomato paste made from the waste products of the salsa and tomato sauce.

The only thing I would change is that I wish I'd made more canned crushed tomatoes. They were sort of an after thought (which means I bought them from the grocery store rather than the farmer's market) and I made about 4 jars...and I wish we had a LOT more than that! Not only was it much easier than the sauce and salsa, I could use it in so many more things.

Other fun things that I did last year include the fridge pickles. Another recipe I'll be going back to this year. They were absolutely amazing, even if they did need more salt (I added more than the recipe called for, but it turns out we just like our pickles saltier!). Especially the single jar of jalapeno dill pickles. I don't know what it was, but man those were amazing. One jar was not enough, and the four big jars I made total barely made it into December.
That makes me want to look into a mini fridge to go in the basement so I can make many many more jars without having to worry about where to put them in our constantly over crowded main fridge! Anyone know where I can get a free mini fridge?

Unfortunately I have no idea what the cost of the pickles was, since I've completely forgotten what I paid and how many pickles I bought. Oh well. I am planning on keeping track better this year (yay blogging! lol) and since I have a lot of things I want to try that'll be important.

For my birthday I got something I've been oogling for YEARS. A pressure cooker! I know most of my friends would have unwrapped that and promptly smacked their significant others for such a gift...but I LOVE it. I haven't gotten to use it yet (maybe some cherry jam is in my future if I get a day off...) but I'm really looking forward to being able to make meat sauce for our spaghetti, non-fridge pickles, and a few other things. I just can't wait for spring!

My goals for this year are:

-Seed starting: Check! (Well, partially. The tomato seedlings are poking up, and eggplants and peppers are planted. I have to wait another few weeks before I can get the squashes and zucchinis started. Because Canada. That's why.)
-Growing enough to can some of my own produce
-Canning

tomato meat sauce!
plain spaghetti sauce
crushed tomatoes
non-fridge pickles
fridge pickles
meal-parts (aka Things We Will Use - rather than boat loads of jam and jelly which we don't go through all that fast...)
Canned peaches? (Costco has moved into our town...I'm hoping I can get a good enough deal on peaches this year to make this feasible)

-Freezing (rather than canning)

peas - home grown (shucked?)
beans - home grown
fruit (Why did I can so much fruit when I could have been canning veggies!? Can more veggies and freeze the fruit for later!

-Eating more locally, specifically buying local (and ideally organic/heritage breed) meats. With 4 local organic chickens in the freezer and 15lbs of local heritage pork, this is well on the way :)
-Improving the garden

BIG window boxes under the front window? It's such a sunny area, and completely wasted because of the crappy soil in the front bed :(
Improving the soil in the front bed (Composted horse manure? Sounds like a plan.)
Improving the soil everywhere (just can't get too much organic fertilizer :))

-Learning more about cold storage and cellaring. We've got some good spaces where we can store food, but I'll need to learn how to store everything I grow and can glean (free fruits and veggies? *fingers crossed*) so I can stretch our local/home grown stores further into the winter. I'd like to have potatoes, apples, carrots, onions, and garlic until January. And a few odd squashes too.
-Home made bread! I need to get back into this. I'm in the process of reinvigorating my starter (which I killed through neglect :( ) and once I do that I want to bake a loaf per week. Freeze what we don't use immediately for weeks when I just don't have time. (*cough* like this one...lol)

My goodness what a list!

I should add that I also want to blog about all these things. I originally intended to blog about books, my pets and animal behavior, and some gardening/preserving...but in my eternal search for more blogs to follow I've found there are none about gardening and preserving the harvest HERE. Where I live. Near Edmonton, AB.

There are a few out East in Ontario, but our climate here is so very different that it's not a ton of use. I find myself chuckling at the 'hard' winters in the states. You know, where they can still grow broccoli, kale, and other brassicas into February...when we're at -40 here?

I know a lot of places had completely ridiculous amounts of snow, I'm not trying to down play that. But you all still go to start your seeds in January. I planted mine this week. Mid March. that's a pretty serious climate difference.

So, as I bumble through, reading books and trying to gain knowledge I hope you'll follow along with me. Whoever else is out there in internet-land ;)

-Becky