It can be hard these days to find food you can trust.
We are all looking for food that will best nourish our bodies while least harming the environment. Food that hasn’t been sitting on a truck for days on end while its nutrients diminish to nothing.
We had the same difficulty finding the delicious fresh vegetables that we grew up eating, so we started growing our own.
Summer squash thriving in the no-till garden at Bird’s Nest Garden Farm
We have 30 years of veggie growing experience and it has been our pleasure to provide fresh veg to our community for the past 8 years.
2023 may see us pivoting towards completing long term projects on the farm and away from the constant vigilance required by annual vegetable production. We’ll see what this winter brings as we map out our plans.
Pear tree blossoms are a welcome sign that spring is has arrived and lots of delicious seasonal flavours await.
I used our last homegrown carrots last weekend. They were purple carrots–a variety called Starburst–that I dug out of the garden in January. I put them into a curry that got slammed into the oven so I could get back to transplanting Swiss chard. Hours later, those carrots were still pretty tasty, as was the curry.
Carrots dug from the garden January 22, 2017. Deliciously sweet!
Seasonal eating has been on trend for a while now. It’s something we are encouraged to explore to benefit our health, and the health of the planet. Growing most of our own vegetables here means we’ve really embraced seasonal eating. Maybe we are embracing it just a little too much, according to certain family members.
Hand watering seems romantic in the spring. The romance wears off by July.
Post written by Peter
Mmm. Sundried tomatoes. Concentrated yumminess that tasted so good in our pasta salad. We grew ‘em, harvested ‘em, froze ‘em and a year later, ate ‘em. In between, we watered them and then, via drying, de-watered them.
It seems a little silly to take water out of something you put water into, but if you don’t get the water into them when they need it, you won’t have anything to take water out of later. If you put a greenhouse roof over tomatoes, you better get the water into them that the roof is keeping out.
I got water into them one warm morning in early July. After a lengthy and jumbled episode of sweatily hoisting hoses, and painstakingly pouring pails of water, I resolved that a little water automation would go a long way to reducing Erin’s workload. And mine.
The question was: how to automate? I already collected water off of the greenhouse roof. While it was enough to use on a few potted plants periodically, they barely survived the unpredictability of the precipitation. And a greenhouse is just a big pot topped with a moisture exclusion membrane. Continue reading “Godzilla Zukes versus Tiny Tomatoes”
Spinach starting to come to life after a long winter
There is a time in late February when a little switch in my head clicks over and I am no longer content with the cabbage slaws that have gotten me though the winter. I want greens: vibrant, lively greens, on my plate and they better be fresh.
Nothing in the local grocery can satisfy my craving. Occasionally, I try the hermetically sealed packs of salad greens and spinach from California. Green, yes. Lifeless, also yes.
Last week, the spinach that overwintered in our raised bed under cover finally was of a size that we could pick it. Also, five of last year’s red oak leaf lettuces were shooting new growth. I gingerly picked the largest leaves from both, thinning where I could. I brought the pickings into the house like the Holy Grail. A quick rinse and we had a proper salad featuring our own hard cooked eggs. It was heavenly.
There is nothing that can compare with freshly picked salad greens given a quick rinse and tossed with your favourite dressing. At some point though, I do look for another way to prepare spinach. One of my favourite ways is to lightly blanch it and toss with a sesame and soy sauce dressing. This is also a favourite of my daughter who has become my dressing chef. See the recipe here.
The spinach that survives the winter is ready to bolt as soon as the weather warms up, which could be any day now. It will be several weeks until the new spinach seedlings are of a size that we can start picking. We will enjoy this abundance while we have it.
A tasty picking of spinach from the garden over the weekend. Look at the size of those leaves!
