A very peculiar harvest … Isilme’s harvest report Friday evening
Yesterday I started to gather the runner beans. They’d been neglected whilst we had all the visitors and I knew most of them would be too tough to eat, so I really gathered them to get the actual beans out.
I didn’t quite realise how many beans we had. A handful of them are still okay to cook and we ate some last night with our chicken in white wine sauce.
In the end, I collected a large washing-up bowl full of beans – and haven’t even touched those in the front garden (which are only a few, actually, so it won’t make much difference). We’ll watch a film tonight and I’ll de-pod the beans instead of knitting socks.
As we had a frost last night, I thought it best to bring in all the tomatoes today. Sadly, most of them are still green. However, from past experience I know some of them will ripen. I will likely bottle those if we don’t eat them first – it depends on how many ripen at a time! If I do end up with a lot of green ones, I shall have to find something to do with them.
I made green tomato chutney one year. I still have some of it hanging around. I wasn’t that keen on it to be honest. I have heard of fried green tomatoes (there was a film of that title….) but I’m thinking that the bigger ones will ripen okay and the cherry ones probably won’t. Green tomato fritters? I’ll have to try something….
(I have sent a photo of all the tomatoes. That’s my Beloved’s brewing bucket in the background. I think there’s cider in there. Well, it will be cider eventually. However, since we’re not great cider drinkers, he will most likely turn it into cider vinegar. Good stuff!)
As I was going around the garden, I noticed the strawberries were still going strong. The pink-flowering strawberries are blooming again. And I noticed a strawberry plant in amongst the thyme (don’t know how it got there) that has produced strawberries, but they might not ripen.
I spotted a ripe one in one of the other pots. Sadly, the woodlice found it first and although it looked good at first, underneath it was eaten away. Sob! That was MY strawberry!
The flowers in our chimney are still looking good, and the pots in the driveway are colourful, but most of the other flowers are gone. Apart from the marigolds and, weirdly, the nasturtiums which have flowered all over again. You can eat nasturtiums…
We still have apples to bring in and will maybe do that next week. That is, if the jackdaws leave us any. They’re currently fighting over the Bramleys. But they can’t settle on the eating apple tree as it’s too difficult for them and all the branches are bent over due to the number of apples. It’s a pippin of some kind (not Cox’s) and the apples are gorgeous.
The raspberries are still bearing fruit, but they are usually fruiting until November anyway. But it’s odd about the strawberries. And all those tomatoes that have taken so long to develop! It’s crazy!
•My mother was fond of nasturtiums. Brief growing season here.
•Picked raspberries at my nieces out west early summer. Gobs of them. In Heaven. Ate more than I put in the basket which was full (so was I)! They do not grow here, way down here. Strawberries love it this way.
•Am I the only one who likes apple cider? Tart, of course.
•Fried green tomatoes are so so yum! Best fried in cornmeal. Can have a little egg wash if you need. Salt and pepper definitely…which is not not good for you. A myth that salt is bad for people….in my opinion and some nutritionist’s opinions too.
Could be that other things in diet is blamed on salt. I don’t stump my toe on it, but use it. A gift from God for good health, flavorful food as well as healing and relaxing bath soaks.
Yes, I really must try those fried green tomatoes! I do have cornmeal. What do you fry it in? Butter?
I take no notice of the salt myth. We love salt in our food. Not heaps, but enough to bring the flavour out. I do know that my Beloved took salt tablets with him when he went mountain climbing. Stops cramps and things like that too.
To be honest, if ‘them’ say we should not eat something, I automatically assume that it is very good for me and they are trying to undermine my health. We eat much red meat and such like. Besides we have a good excuse because the nutritionist who advised us when my Beloved was ill with his kidneys, specifically told me to give him red meat. He needed protein but also the iron because his red blood cells are not good. The red blood cells are under good control via the food he eats, so yay for that!
Indeed, on all you have said, Isilme!
Later about the ‘maters’!
Watching my team flail atm. They are not about team work but ‘me’ work and so their idiocy is quite noticeable. A fine example of our world …it is a microcosm of society.
Losing a game is one thing but throwing it away for ‘me me me’ is quite another. Unteachable self-grandstanders.
The players for college (uni) American football used to be fun on many levels. The players are now being paid. Need a better system for their pay.
It is the tail wagging the dog situation imho. Actually, it is money changers …the higher ups in the world…this world for now who run everything making the calls!
As for the players, if one wants the limelight then he/she should play individual sports like tennis or golf and go on to the pros.
I am so glad your beloved is doing better. It is nearing a year he became so ill, if I remember correctly. My Beloved, Cuddles, was very sick two years ago. Never really had been sick in our many years of marriage. It was close. He lost 25 pounds in no time. He was already slender, but not thin. He became gaunt. I have had the honour of fattening him up! He is now simply a step beyond slender again. Cuddly!
So proud for you and especially R.B. for not giving up. What a story. You two are quite a testament 🙏! You were/are vital to his healing.