urban homestead

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Panisse Lettuce

September 10, 2016 Garden techniques, Tips & Tools

Yes, I couldn’t resist using this picture again! One of the benefits of participating in the City Harvest program is not just that I get free transplants in exchange for our donations, but more specifically that this pushes me to try new varieties of crops that I may not have grown otherwise. After years of farming, I have a personal list of my favorite varieties to grow. I know which types of lettuce do best in summer heat, the sweetest carrots, and the heaviest-producing tomatoes. This is great on the one hand, but in another sense can limit me from trying other, potentially even more amazing varieties.  When I got the...

Harvest season

September 6, 2016 Weekly Updates

It’s been tough keeping up with the garden work recently after getting sick twice in a week and a half. I didn’t even know that was possible! Even though the weather has cooled down significantly, meaning that growth and ripening have slowed some as well, this is also the time of year that both warm- and cool-season crops are coming in strong, hence our association with fall as harvest season. So even with slightly less summer crops to harvest, we’re still getting more than enough to eat, donate, and save for the winter.  With the cooling temperatures, however, it’s officially the end (or near end) to canning for the season. We have been...

Keeping on

August 20, 2016 Weekly Updates

The heat wave broke gradually over the course of this week. Although we’re still having typical hot summer weather, at least the humidity is down slightly and it’s been getting cooler at night. An additional help were a series of overnight rains, easing the need to water in the garden despite the heat. One thing that I have always loved about farming and gardening is the cyclical yet changing nature of the work. Just when you start to get really sick of a certain task, the seasons have begun to switch and it’s on to the next thing. I always am so excited for the first harvest of greens in the spring, but by...

Oven-dried cherry tomatoes

August 15, 2016 Freezing, In the Kitchen, Other recipes

Several years ago, while working at a farmers market, I learned from a customer about her method for drying Roma tomatoes in the oven and freezing them to use over the winter. Ever since, I’ve been dying to do the same, but never got around to it until this summer. Since we use most of our Roma tomatoes for canning and really needed another outlet for the cherry tomatoes (besides our mouths!), we decided to oven dry cherry tomatoes instead. The result was exceptional! This is a perfect technique to preserve cherry tomatoes for eating in the near future or for freezing to use in the winter. Even better, you can substitute these for...

Hot hot hot

August 14, 2016 Weekly Updates

We’re in the midst of a true summer heat wave, the kind where stepping outside feels like getting hit in the face with a wall of humidity. And the fact that it’s remaining quite warm and humid even at night means there’s really no relief. In the garden, this kind of weather has a few effects. First of all, the summer crops (tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, etc.) are ripening at lightning speed. Even the only remaining cucumber plant is managing to put out a nice cuke every other day! As a result, the kitchen has stayed busy, with pickled beets, canned tomato sauce, frozen cilantro, and several batches of oven-dried cherry tomatoes all...

Bacterial wilt

August 8, 2016 Diseases, Pests, Tips & Tools

Earlier this year, I talked a bit about cucumber beetles. You’ll find these little black-and-yellow striped or spotted bugs on plants in the cucurbit family like cucumbers and squash. While damage from the beetles to the leaves and fruit of these plants is in itself not that problematic, as the summer progresses these insects’ bites can transmit a season-ending disease for some cucurbits. If you’re a gardener, bacterial wilt is likely something you have seen before or may even be experiencing in your garden right now. This disease is transmitted from plant to plant when cucumber beetles bite and the bacteria can even overwinter in the beetles’ guts. Besides cucumber plants, bacterial wilt also...

Crazy days of summer

August 6, 2016 Canning, In the Kitchen, Weekly Updates

As every gardener knows, summer gets crazy! From mid-July through late August, it seems that everything is happening at once. The weeds are growing like mad and seem to reach the same size and intensity just days after the beds were cleared of them. At the same time that the summer harvest has ramped up to anxiety-provoking levels, the fall rounds of root crops and leafy greens need to be planted. And, to add to the craziness, all of that summer harvest has to be put to good use, either for immediate eating or through preserving for winter. It’s enough to make me wonder how women on homestead farms in...

A week away

July 31, 2016 In the Kitchen, Other recipes, Tips & Tools, Weekly Updates

Caleb and I took a short break this week, heading down to D.C. to visit my parents. Mike stayed home, so was able to take care of the garden, although with a week of successive heavy rain and thunderstorms, keeping things watered wasn’t much of an issue! At this point in the season, gardens become somewhat like pets, unable to be left alone for long without someone to take care of them. Most summer crops require harvesting multiple times a week to enable the plant to continue producing successfully, as opposed to concentrating its energy on going to seed. In terms of how often to harvest, here are the general guidelines I follow for...

Flea beetles

July 28, 2016 Pests, Tips & Tools

Flea beetles are one of those challenging pests that can quickly wreak havoc on crops and are also very difficult to eradicate once present. These tiny insects with their shiny black exoskeleton will jump away as soon as you get nearby, hence the name flea beetle. They go after many crops, but seem to particularly love arugula, the leaves of young eggplant, and the greens on turnips. The tiny holes they create in crops’ leaves are unsightly and can also diminish the plant’s ability to undergo photosynthesis, thereby decreasing growth and overall health. Once flea beetles have arrived, it can be quite challenging to get rid of them. When I was growing...

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