How did Julie do this?!?!

Seriously, how did Julie (from Julie and Julia fame) manage to blog daily for a year?  I just listened to her book on tape on my drive home for my high school reunion 2 weeks ago. That’s right ladies and gentlemen, I just celebrated my 10 year high school reunion.  It was a cute book, entertaining if nothing else.  The amount of butter used during her year-long attempt is staggering.  I also went to see the movie this past weekend with my mom and cousins – not really like the book, but again cute.  Meryl Streep did a great job, I forgot a few times that I wasn’t really watching Julia Child on the screen, especially when she was doing the old school tv shows.  Anyway, this woman, Julie Powell, decided to cook all 524 recipes in Julia Child’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking in one year.  And at the same time she would blog about her efforts.  I can’t manage to update this thing 2x a month…

I told Lisa (lisa has chickens) that we should do the same thing as Julie – write a book about our blogs: a combination of us impatiently waiting for the other to post, her chickens, our gardens, our cooking attempts, Lisa’s wedding, helping plan it, our lives, etc.  You know, the same thing we’ve probably talked about before, at other times of our lives. Yet, the reality is that we’re both way too unmotivated to do this.  Any free time on our parts is spent on our respective projects.  Can we really add another? 

I’m sure we’ll keep you updated on our book process.  We’ll get to it by the time we’re 60 – at the same time we’re both retired and running our dream shop, a la ‘the epicurious cow/beas of bloomsbury’.  In sum: organic everything, savory and sweet foods cooked on premises, local produce, cows and chickens in the backyard, wine and beer selection, cool and different food items from random places, local cheeses, etc etc etc… Yesserie, we’ll do it! 

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

Anyway, back to the garden.  Here’s my first Jet Star tomato harvest:

First harvest of the bigguns

Also, I should include the picture of the same tomato cluster I’ve included before – as ripened perfect tomatoes… I’m such a proud mommy.

So red

Do you remember how one of the first posts I talked about how I picked Jet Stars because they resisted splitting?  At least now they wait until they’re ripe to split, and it’s one out of every 5-8 that split.  At least that’s an improvement. 

The sad thing is that I picked these the night before I left for vacation to Martha’s Vineyard.  Chris got to eat the first ones.  Yet, he doesn’t really like tomatoes – he eats them because they’re good for him, not because the taste of garden-riped tomatoes is one of the best tastes on the planet.  Blasphemy, I know.  But I couldn’t let them just rot while I was away.  His comment on his meal: they were good, juicy, tangy.  I suppose it’s better than: Meh.

The post-vacation harvest:

Look at these beauties!  I picked so many veggies.  9, count em 9 jalapeno peppers!  I left three on the plant too. Lisa is supposed to be sending me a recipe to pickle my peppers so I can have them forever.  Yay pickled peppers – Lisa this is a hint for you, just so you know.  I also picked 6 Jet Stars, 2 giant marconis, and one ginormous green pepper. 

pretty little things

don't they look like a pair of elf shoes?

check out that pepper - it's the same size as my table salt container!

I have an amazing piece of land that yields me these wonders.  Pretty tasty stuff.

And now onto the artistic portion of the evening.  I took this sans flash in the fading light.  Feel free to ooohh and ahhhh over it like I do.

just after the rain shower

And that’s all.  Till next time!

I am a blogging laggard

Hello all,

The batteries in my camera have died and I have not managed to buy some more yet.  The sad thing is my garden is so pretty right now.  The Jet Stars are just starting to turn red.  It seems fate that the tomato bunch I took a picture of first for the blog are the ones turning red first.  YAY!!  I have an immense amount of grape tomatoes now – this weekend I picked a bunch for omelets and in the afternoon, picked newly ripened ones for a salad for dinner.  It’s amazing how fast they can ripen.  Granted, the ones I pick at night were partially ripe (read: orange) in the morning.  But I do have to share with you my revelation about grape tomato picking: the ones that are ripe fall off in your hands when you think about picking them.  This knowledge is very useful to me when I try to pick them after dark for a late dinner. 

My two bell pepper plants are producing nicely (and still flowering!) - they look totally different.  The Giant Marconis are slender and the other plant is producing typical sweet bell pepper fruits.  I’ve harvested some GMs already and they have a thin, yet very crisp and bright tasting flesh – it’s a bit different than the regulars.  The jalapenos man, WOW spicy! Lisa, remember how Grandma would send us jalapenos in the mail? You mentioned to me that they were the spiciest peppers wou’ve had.  I seasoned my eggs this morning with 1/4 tsp of chopped, seeded jalapenos and my lips were on fire!  My fingers were still burning, 36 hours later.  I’m impressed.  I do need to find a good use for them or give them away.  Can I freeze them?  Maybe slice them and freeze them single layer on a sheet and freezer bag them till needed?

My beans are past eating at this point. Any produced are very fibrous and not so tasty.  I should pull them, right?  I’m thinking of replanting and going for a fall crop.  What do you all think?

My volunteer tomato plants are officially cherries!!  They must be leftovers from last year.  They are sweeter than the grapes – more dainty.  Girlie tomatoes.  The grapes are definitely manly – so says me.  I don’t know why, but they are my male tomatoes – they spread out and take over. Don’t ask.  Makes sense to me.

I’ll add pictures when I get batteries.  Thanks for your comments!