Winter Color
I just finished up an article for Northern Gardener about the winter garden. As I look through all my photos to find ones to accompany the article, I’m finding lots of great ideas of things I want to start planting/adding to my current garden. Specifically, I need to add plants with twigs/branches that are colorful during the drab winter months. I came across a few, some from my garden, others from Kingwood Center. The yellow/orange plant is a Coral Embers Willow.
I have a redtwig dogwood in my garden, and got a new yellow one last year. They’re easy to propagate, so I’ve been slowly making new shrubs to use in a mass planting.
What are some of your favorite plants for winter interest in the garden?
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Peppers to Dry
This year I grew two new varieties of peppers just for drying. We’ve eaten a few of them fresh, but they are two varieties specifically developed to dry. One is ‘Red Ember’ and the other ‘El Eden’, both from Johnny’s Seeds.
Since I only have one plant of each, I’m not keeping them separate. Both are getting trimmed and dried with plans to grind them into pepper powder. Neither pepper is very hot, so I’m hoping that mixing them will be a nice chili powder to use in the kitchen. So far, I’m pleased with both varieties and will continue to grow them each summer.
Do you grow any items to make spices from?
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Tomatoes….
I always plant a lot of tomatoes, mostly because we LOVE tomatoes. There are always cherry tomatoes, beefsteak tomatoes, drying tomatoes, canning tomatoes, and roma type tomatoes. They come in all colors, shapes, and sizes and we eat them with glutenous abandon for the two months they are in their prime. The ones we can’t eat fresh, are dried, roasted, canned, and turned into soups, sauces, and paste.
One of our favorite ways to preserve tomatoes is to roast them. I discovered the delicious jammy intensity of roasted tomatoes years ago when I made Roasted Tomato Passata from the River Cottage Preserves Handbook. Some of the batches of roasted tomatoes we put through a food mill, but many of them dont’ make it that far. We layer these tasty treat on toast in the morning. These also freeze well and can be used in frittatas and other recipes straight out of the freezer.
What garden bounty are you preserving this week?
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25 Piece Nugget
If you’ve been reading here for a while, you know I have chickens (ducks & turkeys as well). We keep a nice flock of layers and I sell or barter the extra eggs to help cover the cost of keeping birds. Our chicken flock has been ravaged by foxes this year, we lost 10 over the course of the summer (some were taken by an owl). They are all old and reaching the end of their lives, they no longer lay many eggs. Typically, I let a couple chickens hatch clutches each year, this year we lost our rooster early in the spring and didn’t have any fertilized eggs.
That led me to order chicks from McMurray Hatchery (which came highly recommended by many friends). I ordered 25 chicks: Andalusians, Rose Comb Brown Leghorns, Black Star, Whiting True Green, and Whiting True Blue. These should give me a nice mix of colored eggs, which all my egg customers LOVE (and I do as well).
Hopefully these little cuties will be full grown and laying eggs next spring.
What fun things are happening in your house/garden this week?
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Barnstormers Ball
This past Saturday, we went to the Barnstormers Ball at the Owl’s Head Transportation Museum. We wanted to go last year, but we were already booked by the time we found out about it. This year, we waited, and waited, and purchased tickets when we saw they went on sale. We got all gussied up, met the friends, and all headed down together.
I made a dress, hat, and clutch for myself, as well as hats for Mr Chiots (and a bowtie to match) and our neighbor Matt.
We had a great time and hope to do it in the future. Having a theme like this makes a regular event a little more fun. Finding period costumes was great fun, in fact I’m already thinking about what I’ll make to wear next year.
What fun things have you been doing lately?
