Today’s harvest includes a healthy bunch of semi-ripe tomatoes (and there’s plenty more where these came from).  I’m rooting cuttings from the healthiest vines to see how long I can keep them growing indoors through the winter.

There are also loads of yet-to-be-harvested purple-podded pole beans.  Half of them are still purple, and the other half are now mostly brown.  It’ll probably take a few hours to collect all the rest of the bean pods from the vines!

We have a couple handfuls of small jalapeños and sweet green peppers remaining.  Now that the plants are slowly dying back, I’m finding spring-sown parsley and lettuce that are thriving in the cool weather.

Pictured here is the first (and tiniest) of our pumpkins.  Three others are about two or three times this size, but only one is safely within the fence.  The exposed pumpkins will likely be claimed by the husky once they ripen.  (He’s been pulling and eating the rainbow carrots from of the cold frame, and harvests all the tomatoes that grown outside the fence.  I’ve learned to deliberately plant vegetables he likes around the yard so he can help himself all summer.

Also shown are the honeycrisp apples and a couple bananas from the local farm stand this morning (where I also grabbed some bigger pumpkins, and learned that they will be selling live Christmas trees this season).

The biggest colander is full of counter-ripened tomatoes for this weekend’s pasta sauce.  And the fragrant bunch of flowers include marigolds, peppermint, chives, nasturtiums, clovers, dandelions, lavender, and fireweed curls.

Next I’ll begin culling the tomatoes from the cold frames to make way for cold season vegetables.  My favorite cold weather crops for the cold frame include cilantro, lettuce, spinach, and other greens, as well as radishes, onions, and carrots.  This year I’ll also be including cauliflower and broccoli, and I’m considering an experiment with winter squash.

Happy autumn everyone!

If you’re wondering where I’ve been all summer, the answer is simple: out in the garden.  Autumn is my favorite season, but learning to grow food has vastly broadened my appreciation of the warm, sunny growing months.

Despite my goals to be more a more diligent blogger for 2009, I have instead focused the majority of my time on writing fiction and poetry, and growing food and flowers.

Kind thanks to reader Diana Hunt for encouraging me to get back to business at AppleJade.  To start us off, here’s a quick peek at what I was doing out in the garden during June, July, and August…

In June we were smitten with strawberries.  These plants have been growing here without any help from me for nearly 10 years.  They have happily consumed a sizable chunk of the vegetable patch, and this autumn many of them will be relocating to new beds which are being established in the rockier and less-hospitable parts of the yard.  My reasoning is that the strawberries are so hardy and so happy to propagate that they should make excellent (and tasty) pioneers.

The corn plants grew steadily through June and July, and I really should dedicate an entire separate post to what they accomplished this year by creating so much food out of so little soil.  We ate sweet, healthy corn all through the month of August.

Pumpkins had a slow start, and I think we now have three pie-worthy squash out there which are just beginning to turn orange.  My plan for next spring is to start the squash in the cold frame as I did with the corn, and then transplant when it’s warm enough in May.  This was a successful approach for the corn harvest, so hopefully pumpkins and other squash won’t mind the transplant method.  Pumpkins will definitely have a post of their own so you can see their progress and learn about their flowers.

Sunflowers dominated the scene all around the yard this year.  We collected almost all the seeds from our Pennsylvania sunflowers, and those seeds waited patiently from 2007 to be planted here in western Washington this year and subsequently bloom upwards of eight feet.  They’re just finishing now.  I managed to get three of the largest seed-heads indoors to finish drying, but the rest have been claimed by the busy blue Steller’s jays (Cyanocitta stelleri).  As with corn and pumpkins, the sunflowers deserve a post of their own to show just how much they accomplished this season.  (And yes, that’s me, standing in front of some of the corn and sunflowers just before the first flowers opened.  The purple-pink blush behind the corn is from the foxglove (genus Digitalis) and fireweed (Epilobium angustifolium) two of my favorite local wildflowers, coming in to full summer bloom.)

Marigolds, lettuce, cilantro, beans, and many others have boomed throughout the garden and pop up just about everywhere.  I moved all the arugula and other greens out of the cold frames when they went to seed, and let the plants finish in the cooler corners of the fenced-in vegetable garden.  They should be dropping those seeds very soon now thanks to the wind and rain, which will hopefully result in a fresh crop.

Tomatoes grew strong, vibrant, and healthy all season, but left me with a plethora of green fruits.  They have only just begun to ripen, and as a result many of them are coming indoors as soon as they begin to to show yellow or pink where they can finish among the warmth of the kitchen.  I’ll continue to keep them ripening outdoors until the tomato plants finally turn brown – which I’m guessing isn’t too far in the future.

For now, I’ll leave you with a nasturtium, another friendly flower which can be found just about everywhere around the garden.  While all parts of nasturtiums are edible, I’ve resisted collecting too many flowers or seeds for dinners in the hopes that the plants will successfully re-seed themselves for next summer.  I’ll let you know my success when they reemerge next June.

Since my first bread machine post I’ve enjoyed the chance to successfully prepare several loaves of bread. I’ve learned a few troubleshooting techniques, and I’ve settled in to a comfortable groove which begins each Monday with bread baking among my other week-starting activities.

My very first loaf tasted nice enough, but it rose high and then fell in the middle. At first, I wasn’t sure what to think, but then I remembered that the clear, simple user manual includes a useful table at the back: the Troubleshooting Guide. Listed there are several recommendations for adjustments in ingredients, portions, and techniques in order to correct ill-fated bread loaves. I have since reduced the water in my recipes by a few tablespoons, and my loaves come out perfect every time.

I started with the simple white bread recipe offered in the manual, and quickly found that I prefer a modified version of the Italian Herb Bread recipe for my daily bread. This recipe uses olive oil rather than butter, no dry milk, and less sugar. Take out the herbs and add in garlic powder, onion powder, ginger, and nutmeg – all in tiny quantities - and I find myself with a simple loaf that easily accompanies most meals.

Now that I have an easy confidence with loaves, it’s time to try the next step: dough. The user manual for my bread machine includes simple techniques for dough making so that I can try my first homemade croissant: my goal for next week.

Ahead at AppleJade: cold frames have returned to Jade’s house, vegetables are sprouting on the fridge, and affordable home improvements are being planned. I look forward to sharing more!

For Christmas my mother provided me with an exciting kitchen tool: a bread machine.  (Thanks Mom!)

I’ve been trying to learn how to make breads and pastries for several years.  While I have finally mastered sauces, cookies, and many main course dishes, I seem to fail with most breads.  Perhaps it is because of my casual measuring methods.  Perhaps it’s my lacking upper-arm strength.  Ultimately, I’m inclined to believe that my real trouble with breads is that I haven’t had enough success to a) build confidence and b) understand the real mechanics of bread.

Mom knows I’ve been trying to learn to do things for myself in the kitchen, and most folks know that if there was ever a time to tighten the belt and save money, it’s now.  My goal with this new bread machine is to learn to successfully make homemade breads and other goodies that I would normally pay more to purchase prepared at the grocery store.

Shown here is my new ZOJIRUSHI Home Bake Supreme.  Mom knows her stuff:  this machine also makes jams, cake breads, sourdough starters, and bread doughs for pizza and such.  This morning under a dark 5am sky, I carefully combined the ingredients for a Basic White Bread in the prescribed order, and pushed “Start.”  This might not be the handmade, elbow-greased bread to which I ultimately aspire, but it’s a start.  Plus, my bread is being made while I get to work around the house… not a bad deal!

I’ll follow up to share my successes (or challenges) as I familiarize myself with my new bread machine.  Your comments and experiences are welcome!

Not Just for Vegetarians: Delicious Homestyle Cooking, the Meatless Way

by Geraldine Hartman

The book for today’s review was provided by: Geraldine Hartman, Veggies, Yarns and Tails

I write AppleJade because I honor the connection between kitchen, garden, and health.  Geraldine Hartman’s cookbook Not Just for Vegetarians extends the connection between vegetables and cooking to our relationships and traditions of friends and family, and our attitudes toward our food.  Healthy living incorporates more than the mere substance of our food, and Geraldine speaks to the soul of it.

Not Just for Vegetarians reads and functions with the friendliness of a neighbor or grandmother.  Indeed, Geraldine dedicates her book to members of her family, and there is a clear influence among her recipes of friends, traditions, and memories which help to sculpt each dish.  Geraldine tells us that in her journey to a vegetarian lifestyle she has found “that the vegetarian diet can be much more varied and interesting than the conventional ‘meat and potato’ menu.”

I began experimenting with Geraldine’s book by exploring the first segment: bread.  We enter her book as we enter our grandmother’s kitchen, with a warm loaf of bread cooling on the counter and filling the house with honeyed aromas.  I am still in the learning process with breads, but I had no trouble with her “Quickie Oatmeal Bread,” and I am slowly improving with “Grandmother Sabina’s Best Bread You’ve Ever Tasted!!!”

I wander her book like I wander my pantry, seeking out unexpected treasures tucked in the corners.  I do not look in the index for refried beans under “B” for beans; instead I find them under “M” for Main Dishes – “Homemade Refried Beans”.  The result is constant experimentation.  I need only to flip through the pages until I find something that sounds interesting, and I’m off to try something new.

Thus far, my attempts at all recipes have passed “The Yucky Test” in my home.  This says a lot for Geraldine’s down-to-earth, home-comfort style: anything which is too bland, too strangely textured, or too-rabbit-food will not pass muster on our table.  Geraldine’s recipes lend themselves to spicing and modification according to taste, and she offers numerous variation suggestions of her own within the pages.

Not Just for Vegetarians is more than a simple vegetarian cookbook.  Geraldine has crafted her book to be a friendly, helpful voice to inspire creativity and experimentation with healthy food.  Books like Not Just for Vegetarians help move us away from bland, packaged foods and back into the substance and soul of our kitchens.  Regardless of whether you live a vegetarian lifestyle, Geraldine’s Not Just for Vegetarians offers recipes that will delight everyone at your table.

To those just joining us from the Vegetarian Carnival, Welcome to AppleJade!

This week Jul of VeggieChic hosts the Vegetarian Carnival #13.  The Vegetarian Carnival is held approximately twice a month featuring blog posts around various themes associated with a vegetarian lifestyle.

Jul was kind enough to include a link to our cold frame discussions here at AppleJade.  While I am not a strict vegetarian, I enjoy vegetarian and vegan cuisine, and adore growing my own fresh foods year-round.  At AppleJade you can expect ongoing discussions about organic gardening and cooking as a part of our greater discussion about healthy lifestyles and goals.

If you would like to submit to the Vegetarian Carnival or volunteer to host a future carnival, be sure to visit the Vegetarian Carnival information page for more details.

The Festival of the Trees is a monthly blog carnival featuring posts about trees and forests.  The upcoming festival #21 is a special-edition festival featuring fruit trees and orchards.

Our hostess Peg at Orchards Forever has invited us to contribute our blog posts:

“I’d like to try and adhere to a theme of fruit trees and orchards… but virtually anything that is even loosely connected to that theme is welcome! Gardening and growing, horticulture, heirloom fruits, food and recipes, environmental and conservation issues, folklore and mythology, travel, what have you!”

If you like to blog about cooking, gardening, health, nutrition, the earth, or your own backyard, then this month you have a great excuse to share your posts about fruits and fruit trees!  Publish your blog posts and then send your links to Peg at amberapple [at] gmail [dot] com, or visit the Festival of the Trees coordinating blog for more details.

For the New Year I baked a carrot cake using the last of the carrots from the cold frame.  Moving the carrots gave some much needed light-and-breathing room to the baby greens, and we enjoyed an excellent cake.

The pictures here do not do justice to the treasure we found when I pulled up the old carrots – one mammoth carrot, which likely weighed a full pound, and was over an inch in diameter!  It comprised half of the 3 cups of shredded carrot needed for the recipe.

I used the “Best-Ever Carrot Cake” recipe in my copy of Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book 12th ed. (p.159), substituting in 1/4 cup of whole wheat flour.  I also added my own spices, which is something I enjoy.  For dishes like carrot cake or pumpkin pie, I find it hard to resist adding a pinch of ginger, a dash of nutmeg, and perhaps a touch of lemon.

I was careful to use the finest side on my four-sided grater when shredding these carrots – if the carrot shreds are too heavy, they can sink through the cake. The cream cheese frosting was a snap, but unfortunately I made too much: remember that if you’re doing a single-layer rectangle cake instead of a two-layer round cake, you only need half the icing in the BHG recipe (p.171).

Note: If you’re looking for something different, Geraldine Hartman offers “Carrot Cake with a Twist” and “Cream Cheese Icing” from her book Not Just for Vegetarians (p.165), and she also likes “Sam’s Famous Carrot Cake” available at Allrecipes.com.

Coming up in February at AppleJade: we will talk more about cold frames and composting, continue our discussions on health and attitude, and we will also begin exploring the world of Geraldine Hartman’s Not Just for Vegetarians.  I’ll be posting once or twice per week – stay tuned.

If you worry about “holiday pounds” and looming “New Year’s Resolutions” to lose weight, you are not alone.  For many, the celebratory feasts of the winter season aren’t just about breaking bread, they’re about breaking diets with blissful indulgence.

Rather than set yourself up to disappoint and regret, why not try a different approach this year?  Winter feasts are celebrations – celebrations of harvests, of friendships, of community.  Essentially, the winter feasts are an affirmation of life when most life is in deep hibernation.

Feasts can also be an affirmation of health.  Here are a few ways that you can approach your holiday season with a healthy, happy attitude, and wrap a little nutrition in too!

Homemade Health

Whether you’re a master chef or a kitchen novice, you can always make simple, easy meals in your own home.  Connecting with your food can be an important part of developing your personal health and wellness.  Food nourishes our bodies – and its preparation nourishes our souls.

This season, make a little time to try a new recipe, or make something from scratch that you might normally purchase pre-made.  Got kids?  Forget about picture-perfect presentation, and bring those kids into the kitchen.  Cooking with your kids gives you a perfect chance to teach them about nutrition, help them build confidence, and give them a sense of ownership and participation in the family.

(Need some recipes?  Write me or a leave a comment, and I’ll post some delicious ideas!  OR: check out my “Homemade Pumpkin Pie from Scratch” post.)

Healthy Attitudes

We all know that holidays can be stressful, whether you like them or not.  At this season of giving, remember to set aside a little time, space, and/or money to give a little something to yourself!  If you’re feeling stressed or tired, stop what you’re doing for fifteen minutes, and give this a try:

Put on some warm clothes (if you’re living where it’s cold in winter).  Go outside, and find a quiet tree in your yard, or a local park or garden.  Park yourself under the tree, and watch the sky.  As those worries and frustrations bubble around in your head, think them through, and then watch them waft away with the clouds and the breeze.

I can’t guarantee that your problems will go away, that you’ll suddenly feel on top of the world, or that you’ll forget all the reasons you’re so hard on yourself.  What I can promise is that if you take a minute to do this, you’ll open a tiny little window in your brain… and if you listen carefully, you may hear the answer to any number of tough questions whispering through.

(Need some more ideas to help broaden your perspective?  Write me or leave a comment, and I’ll discuss other approaches to healthy attitudes.  Also, check out my post on Goal Setting.)

Adventurous Health

If that little taste of personal freedom gets you salivating, try taking it one step further.  Get away from your TV, your bills, and your normal routine.  Visit a local park, zoo, museum, or garden.  Try a new winter project!

You don’t need a fancy vacation to take you out of your element.  Many cities, counties, states, and provinces have websites these days which provide all kinds of ideas for things to do and see right in your area.  If you try to remember that “Healthy Attitude,” and keep that little window open, you may be surprised by what you find when you just take a look around your own neighborhood.

(Need some more ideas?  Write me or leave a comment, and I’ll post some fun suggestions.  Ever made a wreath before?  I’m going to show you how here at AppleJade).

Healthy Holidays is a huge topic, and these are just a handful of ideas.  If you want to hear more, let me hear from you!  What are your biggest challenges at the holidays?  What solutions have you found to help you navigate a happy, healthy path at such a busy time of year?

Until next time, good health to you!

This Thanksgiving I had the opportunity to make pumpkin pie from an actual pumpkin for the first time ever.  We grew several varieties of pumpkins in our garden this year, including Sugar pie pumpkins (which are smaller, and sweeter).

I remember how proud I felt the first time I made pumpkin pie “from scratch” using canned pumpkin and canned condensed milk.  At the time, the concept of baking a pumpkin pie with an actual pumpkin seemed completely intangible – however appealing.

I’ve been teaching myself to cook for about 10 years, and I feel good about slowly navigating away from prepared foods and becoming comfortable with cooking in ways that our ancestors from just a few generations back may well have taken for granted.

Making your own pumpkin pie from scratch using a fresh pumpkin is WAY easier than it sounds, and it is loads of fun too.  Below are some simple steps to follow with pictures from my Thanksgiving last month.  (Note: this is a photo-heavy post.  If you have trouble loading the page, please let me know).

Homemade Pumpkin Pie from Fresh Pumpkin

Recipe

The Pumpkin Pie Recipe I used comes from Rebecca Wood’s Kitchen Dakini (an fantastic site – give yourself time to browse).

Wood also includes an excellent article Pumpkin Pie from Scratch, and includes a recipe for Roasted Pumpkin Seeds, as well as a simple crust recipe accompanying her Pumpkin Pie recipe. 

Directions

1.  Select your pumpkin

Select a fresh pumpkin for your pie.

Ours was about 10 inches (25.4 centimeters) in diameter.  In the first picture of this post you can see where this pumpkin grew – on a little dish in the garden next to the bird bath where I like to put seeds and crumbs of bread for the birds.

(Pay no attention to the time on the oven – we have a policy in our house that all clocks must never show the actual time).

2.  Prepare your pumpkin

Give your pumpkin a good wash (especially if you picked it at the grocery store).  Using a serrated knife (and possibly a strong friend), slice your pumpkin in half.

Scoop out the seeds and stringers and set that part aside (for roasted pumpkin seeds).

3.  Bake your pumpkin

I baked mine shell-side down for about an hour, although many recipes suggest baking them shell-side-up.  I don’t think it mattered – the pumpkin was still nice and hot and squishy when I was done.  This picture shows them flipped shell-side-up: I pushed on the shell so you can see how soft it became.

 4.  Scoop out your pumpkin

I scooped out the pumpkin with my icecream scoop.  It rolled right out like butter.  I know that many recipes suggest you blend the pumpkin with a food processor at this point.  I don’t own one (and the blender died in a margarita adventure this summer), but I don’t think it mattered – the pumpkin was as soft and smooth as if it had come right out of that can!

(Remember to compost the parts of the pumpkin you won’t use.  If you don’t compost and want to learn how, check back in the Spring – I’ll be posting easy-to-use compost information here at AppleJade).

5. Prepare your crust and your pie filling per the recipe directions

Crust: I stuck with my usual pie crust recipe from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book 12th ed. (but substituting in one half-cup of whole wheat flour for my own personal taste).

Filling: As mentioned above, I used Rebecca Wood’s Kitchen Dakini recipe for Pumpkin Pie.  During my initial search for pumpkin pie recipes online, I found that some folks needed more sugar in their pies than their recipes suggest.  Since I’m pretty sure my pumpkin was just a small Howden, and not an actual Sugar pie pumpkin (our husky got to the Sugar pies first), I added 3/4 cup of brown sugar to my recipe – the sweetness was just right.

I also did not use quite as much cream as the recipe requested.  If you’ve made pumpkin pie using canned components, it’s easy to gauge by sight whether the consistency is correct.  (By the way: fresh, heavy cream is sometimes called “whipping cream” – thanks Mom for the last minute help on that one!)

6. Bake and Party

Pop your pie in the oven and bake as directed.  Remember to cool completely, and for a delicious compliment, whip up what’s left of your fresh cream with some confectioner’s sugar and vanilla extract.

Meanwhile, enjoy your holiday, and remember to give thanks (regardless of the celebration) for the fruit of the Earth, the skill of your hands, and the power at your fingertips with an in-home stove and oven.  I might think I’m pretty cool for making a fresh pumpkin pie, but it’s not like I had to gather kindling, start a fire, and keep it stoked while my pie was baking, nor did I have to feed, muck, and milk the cow whose cream blessed my meal.

I think I’ll save that for next Thanksgiving…