Covered head to toe in a veritable space suit and feeling very chilled out and curious, I recently had my first encounter with honeybees. My friend Stacey has two colonies that take up residence in the green twin towers at the top of Cathy and Kaj’s market garden near Erin. They’ve been gorging on blooms all spring and summer and in a few weeks Stacey will extract their divine honey from cells like the ones above.
This is Stacey’s second year with her own hives. She took a beekeeping course at Everdale a few years ago, started with one hive last year, and knocked the socks off her CBC colleagues with her delicious raw honey. Stacey’s bees make the most flavourful honey I’ve ever tasted. And I’m not the only one who thinks so - it’s prize-winning honey.
I got her last jar nine months ago and have been savouring it slooooowly. I don’t put it on toast. I don’t add it to tea or pair it with peanut butter. I lick it off a spoon and let the flavours linger. This gold is so sacred to me that when friends come to visit I’ve been known to tuck it in dark corners of the cupboard and leave decoy jars of sub-standard honey at eye level. That’s horrible, isn’t it?! When I’m feeling generous I do share a spoonful (I only have a 125 ml jar after all) and everyone agrees it’s phenomenal honey.
Good thing more is on the way. This will be full of honey soon if it isn’t already.
And this is full of brood - the baby-making chamber. Stacey leaves enough honey in her hives for the bees to live on throughout the winter so she doesn’t have to feed them sugar water.
This year I’ve put in a large order of honey to sustain me through the winter (and my friends if they’re lucky, or I’m not looking).
I’ve been adding almost daily to overflowing baskets of ruby red Juliets. Friends and family are sent home with armfuls. Neighbors who stroll past me watering my flower beds in the evening ask me about my tomatoes and I send them home with handfulls too. These red fruit have brought smiles when most needed.
This has been a particularly stressful week at Gothic Cottage. I felt like a caretaker of an infant and a toddler, without the added advantage of diapers for cats. An incontinent Yoshi has struggled through much pain and left me struggling to find enough newsprint to line the floor. He relieved himself all over Vancouver Island’s Splendid Other Coast, Tilda Swinton, and Fashion’s Fall Fling with Splatter Prints. In the midst of the incontinence chaos Chika was hit by a car and is nursing wounded legs and trauma to her bladder.
Ashley’s arrival on Friday couldn’t have been better timed. With fresh news from the vet that there was one more drug which may save Yoshi’s life and Chika loved up on kitty ecstasy, I could relax a little bit. Stacey tipped me off last week to the Rebar cookbook’s slow roast tomato recipe - perfect for roma type tomatoes and so easy. The tomatoes cooked through the washing of floors, the laundering of bedding, the cleaning of litter, a visit to the vets, and a pick up at the train station. They were in the oven a little too long at over four hours but I had faith in my Juliets.
I also had the perfect test subject in my old pal Ashley - she’s not a tomato fan and she’s an amateur cook. Ashley knows good food and I wanted to treat her to something tasty. Anyone who brings me a $35 bottle of knockout Norman Hardie pinot noir straight from Norm’s winery in Prince Edward County is going to be treated to fine food! For a starter I stacked the shriveled but brilliantly deep red roasted Juliets atop homemade garlic crostini and humous. And for the main I just tossed a good serving of the toms into a simple pasta dish with garlic braised green beans, chickpeas, olive oil, lemon juice and grated Parmesan.
And the verdict? Ashley couldn’t believe that there was no sugar or honey added to the tomatoes. She couldn’t believe that they came from my garden. She couldn’t stop saying how delicious they were. And we hadn’t even started the main course yet.
We ate Juliet garlic crostini again last night and now back in Toronto, Ashley has a travel-friendly portion of my Juliets roasting in her oven as I write. I think I found a winner. These little flavour bombs are the best way I’ve found to put Juliets to bed, and all the better if you’re inundated with distractions and in need of a gourmet hit at home.
10 tomatoes, halved (I used enough halved Juliets to fill two baking sheets and found the following portions sufficient for this quantity of tomatoes)
¼ cup (60 mL) extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp (5 mL) salt
¼ tsp (1.2 mL) cracked pepper
2 tbsp (30 mL) minced thyme or rosemary
1. Pre-heat oven to 250 F. Slice tomatoes in half and arrange, cut side up, on a parchment-lined baking tray. Brush lightly with olive oil and sprinkle with salt, pepper and chopped fresh herbs.
2. Roast tomatoes for up to 4 hours, or until they are visibly dehydrated yet still meaty. Cool and refrigerate for up to one week.
Rebar’s Garlic Crostini
1 baguette, plain, wholegrain or sourdough
¼ cup (60 mL) extra virgin olive oil
2 garlic cloves
Pre-heat oven to 350 F. Slice baguette ½” thick on the bias. Arrange on a baking tray and brush with oil. Bake until golden (5-10 minutes). Cut garlic cloves in half and rub the cut side of the clove on the toasted bread.
THE GOOD: my friends, neighbours and I have been feasting on tomatoes from my garden for the last two weeks.
THE BAD: Two weeks ago I also noticed the first stages of early blight on a few of my plants.
THE UGLY: It spread like wildfire and quickly engulfed almost every tomato plant.
Let’s backtrack here. A month ago I thought blight was an unlucky phenomenon of the damp UK. Nothing to worry about in our idyllic clime! And my babies had received good mothering right from day one so surely they were immune to such epidemics… You can imagine my horror upon discovering a blemish on one of my plants. And then two, no wait, three!
So I did what any city girl transplant surrounded by seasoned growers would do - I jumped online. Sure enough, a quick google search of blight provided quick diagnosis. Early blight first appears as brown target-like lesions which quickly engulf leaves and then entire tomato and potato plants. It also spreads from plant to plant quite rapidly. With this new knowledge I felt time bearing down on me. What to do?! My go-to gardening source at mytinyplot.co.uk recommended removing diseased plants so I ran out to the garden and hacked down the ugliest culprit, a Juliet (sorry Juliet, your time to die) at the base and chucked her in the bonfire pit. No time for romance.
Then I started pruning, really hard pruning, all the blemished leaves in sight with a pair of kitchen scissors. Spotty leaves and branches were flying as a sweat formed on my brow. I came as close as I’ve ever come to OCD and found myself obsessing over what I’d touched, which plant touched which, where I was spreading the plague. It had only been an hour and the blight already had its strangle hold on me.
I was not going down without a fight. Hands stained florescent yellow after the murder, a calm washed over me and I asked myself: what would Mike Mannix do? It was after dark at this point and not wanting to disturb I fired off a distress text. Mike would set things right.
The next morning a relief text came through from my farming guru:
Early blight is pretty common. Once a plant has it, it’s toast. I haven’t found a way around it, I usually leave ‘em. Different varieties are more or less susceptible, take note. Cutting off affected parts doesn’t get rid of it, but looks better. If you’re destroying, probably pull out the whole plant. If there’s early blight about, I dunno if removing the affected plants will make much of a difference, once it’s established. Some will get it, some won’t, or slowly. You could read up a bit online. Unless you’re using fungicides, it’s one of those wiggly things where there are lots of opinions and approaches, but you end up seeing for yourself… :)
Mike sends abstracts, not texts! Brilliant service. A wee bit late, but brilliant nonetheless! So I’d basically wasted my time and lost a bit of my mind in the garden the previous night. But I was still dogged with where the heck I’d gone wrong?!
Part of the problem could have been that I watered too much, the wrong way, at the wrong time.
Tomatoes have a voracious thirst when they’re growing and first transplanted. But as Mike guided me in an earlier epic text message, which I also sought out too late: … Oh yeah, one good rule is making sure to WATER well when certain crops like peas, cukes, etc, are flowering and fruiting. BUT, toms don’t need it unless it’s a drought. Think the more crisp veggies for that.
I committed a crucial error by watering at least every other day. For the first few weeks after their transplanting into the garden, I also watered from above which encourages a moist environment ideal for mould and disease. A drip line is best but if watering with a hose be careful to prevent spray back onto lower leaves. I have a long drip line but never got round to hooking it up. Tsk Tsk. And to make matters worse I also watered in the evening, thinking I was doing the toms a favour when I was really furthering along that damp climate. Luckily, I knew enough to prune lower leaves up to the first bundle of fruit so there was sufficient air circulation. The sun has also been prolific here this summer.
But it wasn’t enough. Sigh. Over the course of two weeks the blight turned my vivid green plants into a brown and yellow splattery Pollock painting. Much to my delight, however, I’ve been hauling massive numbers of virtually blemish-free tomatoes off all six varieties. And blight-scourged tomatoes are still edible - just don’t compost any part of them and definitely don’t plant toms in the same spot next year. Although shamefully ugly, the plants themselves are still sturdy and I’m certainly not watering them much. My friend Stacey also told me last week that everyone gets blight, and that it’s airborne. So no matter what good mothering I provide, at some point I have to relinquish control.
One thing I did know with certainty when I planted 30 tomato seeds last April - if I waited until I knew everything about veggie gardening to start a garden on my own I wouldn’t be gardening for years. As Mike says in one of his tomb texts: Experiment, observe, have fun Check!
What about your tomatoes? Did blight blow into your garden this year? How have you dealt with it? I’d love to add advice and gory, triumphant tales to my text archives… In the meantime, here’s hoping that you’re also enjoying the delicious fruits of your labour, even if they look rather hideous.
That’s a whole lotta tomato sauce, chili, and risotto! I haven’t counted them yet but this long row fared well in the Guelph loam. Thanks to my mom’s April 24th weeding and careful planting, I’m very chuffed with my first onion harvest. How did I know these bad boys were ready to be pulled from the ground?
When the tops get floppy and droop over they’re good to go. Wait for a sunny morning and pull onions by gripping the tops close to the base. Once free, lightly dust off large clumps of soil trying not to brush off the papery outer layers - these protect the onion so it keeps longer. Leave the plucked veg to dry in the sun for the rest of the day and it will be easier to gently remove clinging soil after the onions have dried out.
Mine are sun bathing in the garden right now, enjoying their last afternoon in the open air before the next phase of their life - storage in the cellar.
Everything is growing except weeds, which are almost decimated (for now) thanks to a recent session with the Ho-Mi Digger. It’s not a fully rounded-out garden with all bases covered but when I planted it I had the winter months in mind. Rows of mason jars gleaming brilliant red, bags of sweet peas in the freezer, and a basket brimming with onions in the cellar. I must admit though, a plan did not precede this garden. It unfolded as weed-free real estate became available. Not a method I’d recommend but well suited to my free-spirited bent.
Baby Matinas! Grow grow grow little beauties. I love how this year’s garden has taken shape, but it’s the tomatoes I’m rooting for and pampering most.
Such a sweet sight is this, for a farm girl who skips dinner to weed her garden.
I’ve been away. Five days in Nashville for work. Two days in Toronto for play. A couple of weeks ago before I fled for Tennessee I was weeding and thinning baby carrots under a full moon. Yesterday evening I treated myself to a yoga class, and when I returned after eight o’clock full of energy I struck out to wage war on weeds.
My weapon of choice: the Lee Valley Tools super weeder.
My opposition: a mix of five weeds, each with unique strengths. One creeps and clings, one gets tall fast, one spreads along the ground, one has tap roots that reach China, and one pricks and stings with a vengeance.
I had already showered after yoga but the feels-like-40-degree-heat was still lingering from the day and in no time it felt like I was back in the hot yoga studio. As I quickened the pace to race the fading daylight, sweat mixed with dirt and soon swatted mosquitoes joined the cakey mix. I was so fixated on the weed war that when I realized I’d missed dinner I reached for snowpeas instead of going inside to fix something. Sound familiar?
Have you ever felt like a crazed gardener? I crossed that threshold last night.
And then it started to rain. Oh did it ever feel good to hear the rain coming - first on the trees, then in the field, then on the roof of the barn, then on my caked-up skin. What a fantastic sensation to hear the intensity of the rain swell, fade, swell. And so refreshing. I didn’t care that my gardening gloves were thick with mud. I kept going, soaking up the rain and the respite from mosquitoes. I finished a row of weeding and then did some more for good measure. At this point the hard rain had tapered off to a trickle but I decided my veggies needed more of a drink after such a hot day.
Oh has locavore garden ever needed attention over the last couple of weeks.
Every spare moment was spent dashing out with tools in hand to get dirty in the sunshine. It’s so easy to get overwhelmed this time of year when veggies (and weeds, and lawn - sigh!) are going great guns. But I’ve been amazed at what can be accomplished in 15 minutes… or an hour that feels like 15 minutes.
Thinning carrots planted in April was long overdue. I have a small row of hand-seeded Scarlet Nantes, which germinated so well it crushed me to create a carrot war zone. I just pretended they were weeds and wow it feels good to rip them from the soil! I’m very tactile and I love the sensation of pulling little fronds at the roots - a natural born carrot killer. When the conditions are right, thinning carrots is a joy. Be sure to water the soil first for ease of pulling, and leave 2-4 cm spacing. Ideally, this should be tackled when greens are much shorter than mine here. Repeat 3-4 weeks later and leave 4-8 cm spacing.
These are the first root veggies I’ve tackled on my own. If all goes well I’ll be adding lots of potatoes, purple carrots, beets, and - my favourite - parsnips next year. Does anyone know where I can get delicious organic seed potatoes?
Twenty two tomato plants found a new home in locavore garden last weekend.
On a hot, sunny Saturday Tori, Nancy and I tackled a weedy garden and prepped beds for my nomadic seedlings. These leggy wonders were growing at an astonishing rate and I never could have made such progress in their stealthy move had it not been for the heft and cheerful willingness of my garden companions.
In my clogs and gardening gloves, Nancy got straight to work on weeding duty while I raked composted sheep manure into well turned soil. Beds plotted with popsicle sticks - 24″ spacing with 6′ between rows -we then dug deep holes for the tall toms, which got a generous handful of organic tomato food (4-6-8 in pellet form) before being watered in and finally covered up to their top leaves.
They really were so tall, especially the early Juliets and Yellow Pears, which doubled in size to monster seedlings in just a few days. I think they benefited from the organic plant food (2-1-3) I gave them every second watering after potting them up.
In the garden now, next to the onions, peas and carrots are a mix of heirloom and organic Brandywine Red, Grightmire’s Pride, Black Krim, Matina, Juliet, and Yellow Pear. The 11 remaining plants will go to friends and family, with maybe just a couple more finding corner real estate in my garden.
Tori and Nancy were a fantastic help. And really, it’s such fun to knock off 22 plants in a couple of hours with lively company!
Nancy was quick to comment on how therapeutic is was to work in someone else’s garden, where she didn’t have the stress of seeing all the work that was involved beyond what we’d finish that day. Yes, I still have much weeding to do but what a pleasure it is to admire the neat, weed-free rows of healthy tomatoes in the garden.
Check!
