Harvest Monday

Slow and steady. Some of harvest from the last two weeks. I have not brought myself to pulling the tomato plants. The cucumbers are still producing which is amazing given my past experience. Okra has slowed down. It is getting too chilly for them. Swiss chard, red mustard and kale are kicking in. I am finally getting a few cayenne chilies to turn red and I froze a few cups of pesto. Fall is around the corner.

See some other harvests at Daphne's Dandelions.

Celebrating the Harvest

In the Jewish Religion and customs, we have a holiday that celebrates the harvest. It is called Sukkot. It is customary to build a sukkah (a temporary shelter that enables you to simultaneously, appreciate the natural world while acknowledging the fragility of the man made.)

For the first time in my life, we have built a sukkah. Actually my husband did the building but I took care of the walls and the roof. There are a slew of traditions that go along with the holiday like:
DECORATING it with fruits from the harvest -
EATING in the sukkah -
SLEEPING in the sukkah -
BLESSINGS - said specifically over an etrog (citrus fruit) and a lulav (date palm frond).

I am just excited to have such a beautiful and cozy sukkah.

Harvest Monday

This weekend we got down to 65° at night and the garden is slowing down in some areas, picking up in other areas.
I am not getting a lot of any specific crop but a steady small amount of everything. Keeps dinner on the table. Made a wonderful pot of gumbo this weekend and now have lettuce on a regular basis.  Lots of the plants have flowers and small fruits. Hopefully enough time to develop and ripen.

Daphne's has all the latest harvests. Check it out.

Okra - Must Mean Gumbo

The only other poster that I know that gets excited about okra is Debbie from Connecting the Dots. She posted  a few weeks ago on how Tomato plus Okra equals Gumbo. I had a very uncooperative garden this year and did not get my tomatoes at the same time that I got the okra. None the less, I have harvested 35 okra in the last week and thought that was enough to make a fine gumbo. I actually had enough tomatoes to use for the gumbo but had to resort to a little canned tomato sauce to add in there. For the future, I think I will freeze some homemade tomato sauce in ice cube trays for use in small amounts. I often need 4 tablespoons full.

I was cooking for a Jewish crowd and had to leave out any shellfish so I decided to make a jalapeno chicken sausage gumbo. The only thing in the pot that was not from the garden was the garlic, chicken sausage and 4 tablespoon of tomato sauce. The top picture is the roux, I love the color.

The ingredients were:
onions, garlic, okra, swiss chard, Anaheim pepper, cayenne peppers, parsley, tomatoes, and sausage. Check out Greenish Thumb for some other great recipes in the Garden to Table Challenge. The crowd loved it and it is all gone.

Lettuce Update

Back in August I posted on Small but Amazing Things. I had just planted lettuce seeds and marveled at how quickly they germinated. I have been enjoying lettuce from the bed for the last week or two and will be taking a salad to a pot luck tonight.

Sept 7th

August 9th

August 11th

I also have had a small tomato surge. The sungolds and juliets are producing a good bowl full a day. There are about 40–50 green tomatoes of various shapes and sizes on the plants and I am hoping they will have time to  ripen enough for picking.

All Shapes and Sizes

The cucumbers are going crazy and the okra are confused.