gardening

Coloured Cornmeal

/ Robinne Weiss / 1 Comment

Our beautiful Painted Mountain corn is fully dry. Today my son and I ground enough to make corn chips.

It ground quite nicely in our coffee grinder (well-cleaned, first). I was a bit disappointed to note that the interior of the kernels was white. The resulting cornmeal wasn’t the rosy colour I’d hoped. Instead it was flecked with colour–confetti cornmeal.

The resulting corn chips were delicious. Right out of the oven, the taste was reminiscent of popcorn, but fully cooled, the popcorn flavour diminished.

Were they better than corn chips made with commercial cornmeal? The jury is out. I think we need to do side-by-side taste testing to determine which is better. I suspect my family will be thrilled to oblige. We might just have to have a chip and dip party (ooh, this gets better and better).

Am I happy I planted Painted Mountain corn? Absolutely! My son is grinding the next batch of meal as I type, and we’re looking forward to trying it in all manner of dishes. Maybe the taste will be no different from commercial cornmeal, but we will know it came from our garden, and that will make it taste twice as good.

A Tale of Two Walnuts

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We have two walnut trees, both of them young. The older of the two gave us a few walnuts last year and one the year before. This year it gave us several good handfuls of nuts.

That’s not anywhere close to satisfying our annual walnut consumption. We put walnuts in granola, baked goods, burgers, tofu meatballs, and rice pilaf, among other things. We eat them as snacks, too, and I buy them in kilo-sized bags.

But walnuts here are all the mild English walnut (Juglans regia). They’re a good staple, but somewhat tame. Not something to feature in a dish.

Not like American walnuts (Juglans nigra). To me, these are the true walnuts–piney-flavoured and bitter, difficult to shell, with thick green husks that leave your fingers black. There aren’t many foods from the US that I miss anymore, but American walnuts are one of them.

When I was a kid, every Christmas my mother made walnut crescents–moon-shaped shortbread cookies packed with American walnuts and rolled in confectioner’s sugar. They melted on the tongue, and burst with nutty flavour. I made the mistake of making these with English walnuts once. They were vapid little sugar bombs. Not at all like real walnut crescents.

I have looked high and low for American walnuts here in New Zealand, with no luck. One time I saw a label in the grocery story saying “American walnuts”, and I was thrilled. Then I looked at what they were selling. The nuts weren’t American walnuts, they were English walnuts grown in America.

So I buy the cultured, mild-mannered English variety and dream of the wild, brash variety of my homeland.

Rich in Mushrooms

/ Robinne Weiss / 2 Comments

I come to the computer under the delightful glow of my third meal of wild mushrooms in the past two days. As I mentioned a few days ago, the recent deluge has brought all the fungi out to play.

Agaricus arvensis and Boletus edulis are this week’s two wild additions to our meals. Their rich, earthy flavours have topped burgers and adorned home made pasta (because how can you possibly serve such wonderful mushrooms on store-bought pasta?)

There’s no doubt I love these wild mushrooms for their flavours, but I also appreciate them for their provenance. There’s something satisfying and primal about foraging for dinner. And it becomes even more satisfying when you consider these mushrooms can retail for $40/lb ($88/kg) in the US, if you can get them at all.

I smile to think that the dinner we’ve just eaten might have easily cost $30 to $40 a plate in a restaurant. But with wild-picked mushrooms, vegetables from the garden, and home made pasta (made with eggs from our own chickens), we spent well under $1 per person (and we all had seconds, and there are leftovers for tomorrow’s lunch). It’s no wonder we feel far wealthier than we actually are.

Indeed, you’d be hard-pressed to buy such a meal at any price, with vegetables just minutes out of the garden, eggs laid today, and obscene quantities of gourmet mushrooms. I almost feel sorry for rich people. All they have is money.

 

Completing the Cycle

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Back in early December last year, I posted an update on the preying mantids on my rosemary bushes that I’ve been following since mid-winter, when they were eggs.

Well, I haven’t forgotten them, and I’m pleased to report that they are all grown up now, and laying eggs of their own.

On the one hand, I’m thrilled (as I am every year) to watch the entire life cycle play out in the garden.

On the other hand, I’m getting a little worried.

Last winter, I didn’t prune the rosemary bushes because the bees depend on their flowers in late winter. Then in the spring I couldn’t prune them because the preying mantids hatched out. All summer I waited and watched the mantids grow. The rosemary plants grew, too, engulfing a bench on one side, and the path on the other.

And now the mantids are laying their eggs on the very branches I need to prune off…

We may soon see just how big rosemary can grow here.

A Messy Life

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My not-so-straight edges.

I was working in Halswell today, and I went for a walk at lunchtime. I walked through some of the newer subdivisions, and after a time, I realised I had no idea where I was, though I’ve walked those same streets many times. I wasn’t worried. I wasn’t lost, I just couldn’t remember what street I was on.

Walking on, knowing I would find my location at the next street sign, I pondered why I was so lost in a place I knew reasonably well. I looked around me. It wasn’t a cookie-cutter neighbourhood, with row upon row of identical houses, but there was a sameness to every house, every yard. They were all perfect. The lawns were immaculately clipped, with not a single weed in any of them–more carpet than grass. The paths were edged as though with a ruler. The boxwood hedges were precisely cut and perfectly square–they could have been boxes, cleverly painted to look like plants.

Every house had perfect stonework, perfect paint, a smooth driveway leading to a perfectly hung garage door (operated, no doubt, by an electric opener that ran smoothly and quietly).

The houses, the yards, the streets looked like they had dropped straight from an architectural drawing. Devoid of all character, stripped of any indication real people actually lived there. They were sanitary, and soulless.

It’s no wonder I felt lost.

My home is not like that. My home is full of weeds, sprawling hedges in need of trimming, peeling paint and rotting weather boards. It’s full of paths edged by the grass creeping across their surface. Flowers that aren’t deadheaded, trees that need pruning. My home is alive and growing, taking on surprising forms, springing up in unexpected places.

And my life reflects the weedy lawns that make up my world. It is not a neatly clipped hedge, but a wild hedgerow, full of surprises. Sometimes good surprises like ripe blackberries, sometimes bad surprises like thistles. But it’s alive and exciting.

I think about the people who inhabit those sterile houses on sterile streets. Are their lives as neat and tidy as their yards? Are they as forgettable as the houses that all eventually look the same?

The thought makes me shudder. It’s true, my messy yard and my messy life make me work. I don’t often put my feet up. Some days are a struggle, and every day is long and busy. But my messy yard, my messy life is always growing, even in the midst of drought, or in the aftermath of herbicide overspray. There, in the mess are the seeds of something new, something exciting, something tough and resilient.

I did find my way out of the soulless subdivision. It was a relief to leave it behind, and a joy to come home to my rampant weeds, to a messy life in a messy yard, full of surprises, growth and life.

Apple Season

/ Robinne Weiss / 1 Comment

This year’s apple harvest was small, but unlike last year’s, it ripened on the tree instead of being blown off before it was ready, so the quality is good, even if the volume isn’t.

Truthfully, I’m thankful there aren’t too many apples to deal with. We’ve run out of canning jars and freezer space, so I’m not sure what I’d do with them if I had more.

So I’ve been considering how to process the fruits to encourage us to eat a lot of apples.

Naturally, apple pie is near the top of my list. Last year, with vast quantities of apples, I came across a particularly nice apple pie recipe that allows you to pack more fruit into a pie by pre-cooking the apples slightly. The recipe indicated it was a good way to avoid the empty space between fruit and upper crust that’s so common in apple pie, but I took it as an invitation to add more apples. And who could resist a thick, dense apple pie? Maybe with a little whipped cream?

Here’s the recipe, paraphrased from the 1997 edition of Joy of Cooking:

Make your favourite pie crust–enough for a double crust pie.

Roll out half the dough and fit it into a 9-inch (23 cm) pie pan. Roll out the other half of the dough. Refrigerate both until you’re ready to use them.

Peel, core and slice 3 pounds (about 1.5 kg) of apples. The recipe says you want 7 cups of slices–go for 8 cups.

Heat 3 tablespoons (40 g) unsalted butter in a wide skillet until sizzling. Add the apples and toss until glazed with butter. Reduce the heat to medium, cover, and cook, stirring frequently, until the apples are soft on the outside, but still slightly crunchy (5-7 minutes).

Stir in 3/4 cup of sugar, 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon, and 1/8 tsp salt.

Increase the heat to high and cook until the juices become thick and syrupy (about 3 minutes). Spread the apples on a baking sheet to cool to room temperature.

When cool, pour the apples into the bottom crust, add the top crust, cut steam vents, and bake 40-50 minutes at 425°F (220°C). Cool completely before serving.

Water Perspective

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“The weather’s been shocking! Where did our sunshine go?”

“I don’t know. All this rain is horrible.”

I listened to this conversation with a mixture of amusement and sadness. Amusement, because, though we’ve had seven days of off-and-on drizzle, it’s not been that bad. It’s not been cold or windy, just overcast with some light rain now and then.

Sadness because the conversation revealed how disconnected the speakers were from the desperate state of Canterbury at the moment. Three years of drought have left our streams dry, our groundwater depleted, and our land tinder-dry. The soil is dry as dust for as far down as you want to dig. This rain hasn’t even begun to bring us back to the soil moisture we should have. It has wet the top few centimetres of soil, no more.

The truth is, we need weeks and weeks of steady rain, just to bring us to where we should be at this time of year, then we need a nice wet winter to top us up.

Beachgoers have been spoiled with three years of clear skies and record high temperatures, but if it continues, there will be dire consequences for the region–a region that depends upon irrigated agriculture to fuel the economy. Not to mention the higher water bills, more frequent wildfires, rising electricity costs (because much of our power comes from hydro lakes), and fewer recreational opportunities.

While those of us involved in growing plants and raising livestock understand this intuitively, the majority of folks, living in town and paying little attention to more than the immediate weather conditions, are completely unaware.

It can’t be good, this lack of awareness. Our planet is facing such catastrophic climate change, that a lack of awareness of larger patterns in weather and climate can only lead to continued lack of action to address the issue, a continued blindness to the changes that to me are so clear and convincing.

Until we all understand that having nothing but beautiful beach days isn’t good, our fight against climate change is going to languish.

Ugniberry

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I’ve eaten some strange fruits over the years–sour, gritty nance; agua de manzana that tastes like a rose; the astringent cashew fruit… Few have been so delightful as Ugniberry. Ugni molinae, sometimes called New Zealand cranberry here, is native to South America where it flavours alcohol, is made into jam, and is eaten fresh.

I’ve heard it described as “rapidly addictive”, and I have to agree. Once you’ve eaten one, it’s hard to stop.

The fruit is blueberry-shaped and sized, apple-coloured, and flavoured like fruit salad. The flavour has hints of juniper, raspberry, blueberry, and strawberry. It’s a lingering flavour, changing and maturing, the juniper becoming more pronounced after you’ve swallowed.

The texture takes some getting used to–the skin is tough, with stiff little sepals, and the fruit is seedy. But by the time you’ve eaten three of the things, the odd texture is merely part of the experience.

My husband planted ugniberry a few years ago, and this year we are getting our first sizeable crop. I keep meaning to bake with them, because I think they’d make an incredible muffin, but they never last long enough…

Flying Saucers in the Garden!

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I’ve mentioned these wee beauties before, but they deserve their own post. This is my third year planting extraterrestrials in the garden. Flying Saucers is an unusually shaped variety of scallopini (aka patty pan squash), developed in 2000. Its exaggerated ribbing gives it a spiky appearance. I’m not sure it’s particularly UFO-shaped, but it is bizarre-looking.

Like all scallopini, Flying Saucers has a lovely, nutty flavour and a firm texture. It does well in stir-fries, soups, pasta–anywhere you would use zucchini.

The ribs are most dramatic on young fruits, so pick them small (5cm/2in diameter), for maximum visual effect. If you pick them small enough, you can cut them in ’rounds’ that look like stars. I’ve also seen them used to great visual effect cut in half, hollowed out, and stuffed, creating beautiful star-like stuffed squash.

The seed catalogues say they are more green, less yellow when nighttime temperatures are high. Our nights are always chilly, so I don’t know if that’s true–mine have just a touch of green on the ends.

Flying Saucers is my scallopini of choice, since I discovered it. How could I resist such a brilliant squash?

Painted Mountain Corn

/ Robinne Weiss / 1 Comment

Last year, I tried planting a coloured corn, but the rats ate it all. This year, with some protection for my seedlings, I managed a crop of Painted Mountain. Though it’s popular for autumn decoration in the US, I’d never grown it myself.

I wasn’t certain it would produce well. The plants are shorter and faster-maturing than sweet corn, and they looked stunted. They were beautiful in the garden, though–deep burgundy-coloured stems and light green leaves. Dark red silk peeking out of the husks.

The beauty didn’t stop in the garden. My daughter and I sat on the porch yesterday evening and husked the harvest, exclaiming as each new cob was revealed. It was like Christmas, never knowing what surprise would be in the next package. The variety of colours and arrangements of colours was amazing. I’d seen all this before, in the “Indian corn” my mother decorated with each fall, but there was something magical about seeing the diversity emerge from one small crop I’d grown myself.

I have no intention of using this corn for decoration. It is beautiful, and I will enjoy it as it dries, but it is destined for more interesting uses. Painted mountain is a starch corn. Once it’s dry, I’ll grind it into cornmeal.

I have visions of beautiful, coloured corn chips, red cornbread, rosy polenta…mmm…can’t wait until it’s dry.