baking... who knew..

In one of the many stories of infant loss that I've read lately a simple story about potatoes has stuck in my mind. I wish I could link to it, but I've lost the story in links - when I find it I will. This mother wrote about trying to make mashed potatoes some time after the death of her infant daughter..., she peeled the potatoes then stood there staring at them wondering what to do next.
That really summed it all up.. use it as an analogy if you like, something so simple as making mashed potatoes, and not 'forgetting' what to do..but just not even understanding what you're doing - in the middle of doing it.

We decided sometime in November that if we didn't host our Christmas party - which had been a hot topic since we bought the house..., well, since the last Christmas party... We couldn't imagine a quiet house over Christmas. The house was already too unusually quiet. It still bothers me if the kitchen radio isn't on 24/7.. silence makes me crazy. I feared if we didn't jump back in and do what we wanted to do.., that we never would. I think Rohan and I would have been okay with never participating in life again, but we couldn't do that to Hannah. 

I knew well enough not to take on cooking much. Erinn was contacted immediately for baking, Maltese for their awesome trays of everything, Rohan - all too eager to be distracted by cooking meat over fire, and me..., I thought I'd bake a bit. maybe make a pan of spanakopita. Which people might think I accomplished.. but, no... no, no. no...

The meltdowns in the kitchen the week prior were something off Jerry Springer. I could not for the life of me understand what 1/4 cup meant. Cup of what?!?! What the heck is a 1/4? It was like reading Chinese. Worse, these were recipes from my own blog, recipes I've done so many times that I've decided to record it.. (the foremost reason being for Hannah, her virtual cookbook of her family favourites, for when she moves away..which is coming sooner and quicker every day..)

I couldn't work my way through a sugar cookie recipe, I burned anything that got in the oven (I don't even know if any of the baking actually did - that was just dinner..).. Truffles. People might think truffles are challenging, but to any baker we know these things are actually stupid-easy: melt chocolate, cool chocolate, roll chocolate, dip chocolate... The failed attempts at this process are embarrassing, the successes were triumphant. No one ever knew of the tears that went into the 100 or so truffles that survived my shaking hand. 

I haven't followed a recipe for my 'standard pan o' spana' in years, but the night before the party there I was downloading recipes, not understanding, crying, ..and if it weren't for Rohan helping to translate we never would have had any of it. 

I used to love cooking, trying new recipes, trying my own experiments - in baking and cooking.. It's not something I've ever found difficult. Stressful sometimes, challenging in all the ways I love, but never difficult.

So to be stumped by a 1/4 cup was ...I still don't even know the right word. It's the closest I can come to understand someone with a brain injury - trying to re-learn a language.. How do you learn something you've known forever but have never seen before?

Since then I've had months of digestive upset, lack of appetite, lack of interest in food.. I've tried to cook - boiled down and burned chicken bones, burned sweet potatoes, burned toast, burned rice, ...I made pancakes one morning - messy by applauded for flavour... burned more toast... I've managed to heat frozen things, and I made banana bread once. That's about it.. 

Then come garden season, which (to me) ties in so closely with cooking. We're planning our vegetable beds, and the addition of a wood fired oven ...and with that came searches for bread recipes, and sour dough starters. Then I imagine the herbs we grow being added to those breads and baked in the backyard...and suddenly I'm reading as many recipes as I am garden blogs, 

and what comes of that..?!?!

Today, out of nowhere, I get the urge to bake, and a  Butter Pecan Cake and my favourite bread soon appear on my stovetop..neither of which I should consume right now with my tender system, but Hannah will enjoy them, (and R too...). 

The Butter Pecan Cake was posted by

Brule Creek Farms yesterday. 

Andrea's recipes are incredible...they're always successful, and full of flavour. I don't even want to eat cake right now, but this recipe make me want to bake cake. And I freaking did! I still can't believe it. Granted, it's still cooling on the stove, and it's a little toasty...but damn, I baked, and I didn't burn it to an inedible crisp. 

It was hard to not think of baking bread when reading the Brule Creek recipes. My sour dough starter will use their rye flour, so.. I made some bread. It hasn't been baked yet, so it could still be added to the burn list, but today's efforts are about the most I've accomplished in the kitchen in months, so I'm going to give the dough some hope.

Resources for School Gardens

Healthy Eating Makes the Grade ~ a Thunder Bay initiative

"The Healthy Eating Makes the Grade project involves a variety of sectors interested in improving student nutrition, from youth themselves to school staff, food producers and suppliers, and community organizations concerned about healthy eating. These partners have joined forces to increase support for school gardens, more healthy choices within and close to schools, and youth-led initiatives to encourage healthy eating."

For more on this project: 

Thunder Bay District Health Unit - Rescources

and HEMG on wiki

Three great teacher resources from wintergreenstudios.com: Three Sisters Gardens, Victory Gardens, and Spaghetti Gardens

From organicschools.com.au: everything from nutrition and germination to worm farming to seed saving and taking cuttings

Canadian Wildlife Foundation ~ Wild About Gardening

TD Friends of the Environment Foundation provides funding for environment and wildlife initiatives in schools across Canada such as compost programs, tree planting initiatives, school gardens, education programs for children, urban renewal projects, wildlife rehabilitation, and environmental clean-ups.

Wild Edible Plants of Northern Ontario

Dear Garden Diary,

my one and only sunflower
and Thunbergia

Lately when I spy on Laura's garden two fences away I am spied on back by dozens of sunflower faces. They're incredible and I'm more than a little garden-jealous. I have one - one sunflower ...I know I planted more seeds than one. That's just the way a garden grows sometimes. 

Laura's flowers have had me thinking..., next year's garden is going to have more spring, late summer & autumn flowers. Considering the seasons of garden we enjoy the garden most - planting season and fresh returns, and later reaping the harvest, the lushness of mature plants and vines gone wild....

I'm not going to spend too much time on mid-summer plants, little reason seeing as we're not here - but plan for when we return. In pots the ivy still looks nice long after annual blooms have faded, and the Coleus container is still brilliant. In the garden I have plans for a big cull; as sad as it makes me, I have to reconcile my desire for every favourite perennial and use the space more wisely. The delphiniums just have to go...somewhere, maybe the west side, maybe into the back lane...but as much as I love them, they are just too big. I had considered moving them to the little micro-climate garden by the back porch, but I have plans for tomatoes there next year - and delphiniums are too prone to mildew to have close to the tomatoes. I have some 'Crazy Daisy' Shasta Daisies also needing a better home - so we'll just have to see where the shuffle takes them. Also moving, (even if just a few inches): the Crimson Knautia, that weird mystery rose from Creekside that never really grew - to make room for the Monarda to shuffle over a bit. Once they're all moved and replanted (which I will do some time in October) I'll add in some spring tulips - a rainbow of colours and kinds dotting the east side perennial bed.

I wish we had more space. Every zucchini and cucumber we have grown (and still are growing) has been put to great use. I've only given a couple away... We've eaten a lot of zucchini (soup, bread, cake, muffins, more soup, grilled, in frittata, tossed with pasta... and you know what, I'm not even tired of it and excited there are some nice ones still coming. The cucumbers are the best I've ever grown - sweet, juicy, huge. I've made more tzatziki than we could consume, and the dogs have had their favourite treat fresh from the garden for months now. Sadly, with frost nearing I'll let them enjoy today's rain, and harvest soon..

Precious Claire waits patiently for a fresh bean treat.

The beans (also loved by the dogs) are so tasty, and have grown into a sturdy wall. Even the Grape Tomato is using the bean wall for support. The other tomatoes have suffered a bit from crowding and smothering by wild zucchini. As unmanageable as they can be, we can't have a garden without cucumbers and zucchini. Next year we're simply not going to plant so many vegetables. I know, I know...I'm the worst for it - working in greenhouses doesn't help. A plant addict to the end, R's not help either. I'm always so convinced I can find the room - and though I still stand by my claim that if we were here for the garden during the major growing period in July & August we would be able to train it to survive the crowd, the fact is we leave ...and a garden doesn't like being left.

It's easy enough to supplement through flexible CSA programs, I have to remember that. Our garden's size is perfect for a seasonal kitchen garden - not great for large guys like Brussels sprouts and potato plants. I could leave them out for more space and not miss them much. More use could be made of containers, sacks, and balconies, but again - unattended pots in a ridiculously hot back yard don't have the best survival rates. I leave spinach to the local farms also..I never have luck with spinach *shrug* 

Our leeks are beautiful, and even though the beets and carrots are few in number they're still pretty. 

Garden Soup
leeks, zucchini, kale, onions & beans from our garden
local carrots & Ontario celery

The Thunbergia has reached the railing of the back balcony, at more than 15 feet it's glorious and so reminiscent of what I've seen decorating Californian freeways. It seems indestructible and I think it scares my family. At ground level it is creeping in every direction, tendrilling up posts and hooks left around the garden, attaching to the nearby pots trellises. I'm not stopping it. I can't imagine not having one of these again next year - just too fun.
The micro-climate garden by the porch has only a few permanent residents: John Davis, some crazy chamomile, garlic chives and whatever thyme & lavender survive (they always get replanted if winter snuffs them out). Snowbirds include herbs rosemary, tarragon, and sage, mint in pots, this year some lemon verbena too. I can see a Thunbergia becoming a regular too.
This year is was home to ten foot tall peas. Next year, I'll plant only two tomatoes in the space - early (...with R's construction skills we're planning a removable greenhouse contraption), and keep the rest of the space for tall autumn cutting flowers. We can add basil between, and with all the other herbs I think that would make the space quite nice this time next year. :)

Garden Grown Wild

A zucchini has grown into the pine tree, and we have cucumbers appearing everywhere in a garden grown wild. The untamed cucumbers are the size of zucchini people joke about and try to give away. The dogs are loving the fresh garden cucumbers though, and I see a lot of tzatziki and tabouleh in our future.
Returning after more than a month of neglect I found some zucchini the size of Clifford, and made way for more. Thank goodness we have Cindy & Kevin coming to help us eat - and Thanksgiving not far away.  Cakes and muffins are going to feed our weekend guests.

The tomatoes are as abundant - as expected, nearly ripe. Soon we will be making sauces and salsas - and I can't wait. Beans, beets, basil, ..some carrots (though still not as many appeared as I would have hoped), but everything else is thriving. The kale and chard survived the caterpillars and are screaming for soup...yum; and of course our own Brussels Sprouts for Thanksgiving. I'll plant some autumn peas, radishes, and spinach if I ever get over the jet lag.

The fence R built can barely hold it all in. ...not that anything daring enough to grow through it will survive. Four legged nibblers will chew off anything that roams..


All the tomatoes require staking, and a little pruning..had we been here during their peak growth we could have controlled it, but now they're just out of control. Hopefully I can untangle them without losing too much. Next year when we go away I am organizing garden management ..

Clifford finds a shady spot under an Early Girl tomato
to lick the last bits of cucumber of his nose,
while Gromit searches for more.

The Thunbergia is climbing eagerly, 

nearly up to the back balcony railing; 

I can't quite capture how incredible it is.

hostas blooming

Morden Blush

a fork'd radish

radish
1 July 2012

...he was, for all the world, 

like a fork'd radish, 

with a head fantastically carved upon it with a knife

          King Henry IV. Part II. Act iii. Sc. 2.

FREE EBOOK 

The Plant-lore & Garden-craft of Shakespeare

by Henry Nicholson Ellacombe

Dear Garden Diary

We've been eating a lot of tomatoes.
R's been experimenting with homemade ketchup recipes,
which become experimental barbecue sauce recipes, for testing on our guests invited to Porkfest(s).
I've got salsa plans for the next abundant harvest; and, you know, nothing says welcome home like having our favourite tomato, basil, and feta salad fresh from our backyard since we've returned from Australia.
Garden, you've been tomatolicious this year.

Three weeks ago I saw my first Aussie bees.

lavender, Barbara's garden
Mildura, Victoria

Yesterday, R saw his first hummingbird.
It was beautiful as it hummed in and out of the blooms below us.
We had been standing on the back balcony, enjoying
(and sharing with the dogs)
some beans that have climbed to balcony floor.
(Any stalks that dared to go beyond that has been chewed loose by a dog.)
We were discussing the garden,
and its future plans,
when the hummingbird flew in to enjoy some scarlet runner blooms and thriving nasturtiums.

semi-double blossom
Mounding Nasturtiums
Buttercream

 As wonderful as it was to see, I felt a little sad for the little bird - because of what he could have enjoyed. Leaving the garden at high season makes keeping on top of things very difficult. There were a few Nicotiana blooms left, which he did find, but I know what he could have had - a hummingbird version of Porkfest. Without deadheading and feeding, most of the potted plants are overgrown and exhausted. It was a hot dry summer, and new plants suffered a little stress. There should be so much more still blooming.

I'll take what I can get though, especially the Nasturtiums. They've rambled their way under and through R's newly constructed back deck and make me smile.

The nasturtiums pop up everywhere in the garden, and make up a great deal of the jungle. The heaping, heavy tomato plants make up the rest. Peas went to the dogs, and apparently carrots now too...

Clifford enjoys a carrot.

The tomatoes remain ours, so far safe from the four legged family members.

As for the garden's future plans: they mostly involve finding new and better ways to separate human space and gardens from dogs. The dogs require space, and deserve some places of their own to run and play outside. The dogs need grass, and more than our downtown yard provides - well, the yard space would be plenty for the dogs if it weren't taken up by so much garden. We can't share it, and have to reclaim some clean human grass.
Strangely, our plans are to create even more garden space. There will be less human grass space, which will be fine: I just want some place to sit in clean grass, and smell my garden, not the dogs. Garden photography has been a precarious activity this summer, as the dogs have had free roam while the dog run is under construction (holding all the soil we had delivered in the early summer).

In the end, a new fence and a new construction project for R - and possibly some new tools. A sod cutter will be brought in to remove what's there, new soil will be added, the garden beds will be created and treated, composted and lasagna(ed) for the winter, and will be full of tomatoes, peppers, and rambling zucchini next year.
To make way for a much longed for wood fired pizza and bread oven, the Caragana will move to the new garden gate, and face the clean human grass. To make way for the garden gate the Potentilla and oat grass will be removed. Another garden gate and small fence will close off the side of the house and protect the side garden, currently full of blooming foxgloves.

The dogs will have a full grassy area within the dog run, and while we all love the basketball court it is sadly under-used - the dogs need that space more than we do right now. They'll also have free run of the newly named "dog forest" which will be lighter on junipers, allowing for great for leaping and dodging dogs. R also wants to widen the path to the dog run by moving all the rocks that line the dog forest back toward the fence. I think he's crazy, but will stand by my man.

Towering Tomatoes

tomato 'Early Girl'
7 July 2011

I once had a Grape Tomato grow nearly as tall as me, but this 'Early Girl' will definitely beat that record - and it's only the beginning of July! Already up to my eye level, this was one of the plants we brought home from Vanderwees Greenhouses well established in a giant pot. Transplanted into the warmest, sunniest corner of our small kitchen garden in early May, ...it's now a monster of a thing, with nearly ripe tomatoes tucked deep inside and baby ones scattered all over.
This plant may think of itself in an Audreyesque way, but I have other plans for it.

Got Rhubarb?

our rhubarb (a dog toy) and some ferns
south west garden 15 June 2011

It was a monster of a thing, our rhubarb, and I wanted to eat it.

The landlord next door was working on the shed just beyond the fence near our rhubarb plant yesterday, while his wife cut the grass.. . both watching me as I came charging out of the house with the largest knife we have. I earned a few worrisome looks while I took the photos, but once I started chopping the plant they went back to their business.

The rhubarb was taken down stalk by stalk.

I was going to make my mother's "Rhubarb Crunch" ~ a recipe she got from a 1970's Yankee magazine, and made for us regularly, a fond childhood memory. I followed the recipe, but I altered it slightly; the calls for canned cherry pie filling - I don't really like canned filling, so I decided to just add a couple cups of frozen raspberries into the simple syrup (sugar, water, cornstarch, and vanilla boiled) instead. It worked wonderfully (though I made and added way too much raspberry syrup to the rhubarb and crumble - not that anyone complained..).

Four cups diced rhubarb with plenty extra :)

Equal parts rolled oats, flour, and brown sugar. 

I grated in frozen butter rather than cutting it in, or melting it to form a crumbly dough. Half is used for the bottom, half is reserved for the top. (I like a crumbly crumble, so I always make extra.)

After filling the pan with the diced rhubarb, and pouring over the raspberry syrup, it was topped and baked for one hour at 350F. We served it with real whipped cream with vanilla.

yum

For more on RHUBARB check out:

Dear Garden Diary,

Where have all the irises gone, you ask? Well, I can not break them apart - they are so overgrown and so tightly grown together that no spade nor old kitchen knife can dissect them. I thought about sectioning them, but even that proved to be too much. Admittedly my arms are weakened, but with all else I am able to do now again, I should be able to free a few irises. sigh

I've moved the giant clumps to the side of the house, for R to attempt to break apart this weekend. I do desperately want to save and replant 20 of them (maybe more) in the large open space in front of the Wegeila, eastward from where they were before, a little closer to the fence.
They are a stunning blue, the perfect colour to break up the pinks and reds we have such an abundance of in that are (unlike the front garden which is home to too many blues and purples...)

rescued red 1                            rescued red 2

I've rescued the two red dayliles from the west evergreen garden, which can now become dog territory without worry for the flowers. My favourite of the two, rescued red 1, is planted near the spot where the Rudbeckia Goldsturm is mean to be (a few leaves have appeared but timidly and without the vigor that plant should have)... I may have to seek another rudbeckia plant. Rescued red 1 is a large-flowered cultivar with deep red velvety, ruffled petals with a yellow throat and eye. Rescued red 2 has more tapered petals in the same deep red, with just yellow in the eye of the flower. They're both late summer bloomers, appearing just as the peach and yellows ones are finishing their bloom on the east side of the garden. It should look nice now that they're all together on the same side, ...though I'll miss the balance the red blooms brought to the west side of the garden.

The name Hemerocallis comes from the 

Greek words ἡμέρα (hēmera) "day" 

and καλός (kalos) "beautiful".

I'll find a great bit of satisfaction adopting blooms and more for the west side's new side garden (I should come up with better names for the garden beds...this is getting confusing..). After a few thousand dollars in vet bills to remove rocks from a certain Basset's belly, R has removed every rock and pebble from the beds on the west side of the house along the walkway - creating two rather large, 26 foot long x 2 foot garden beds. One side, to the west of the walkway, we've filled with bags of triple mix and manure, but we'll be needing a truckload to finish the job (and repair the dog run). 

The tall, thinly leafed hosta nearest the corner is "Twilight Time", which we chose for H thinking vampires are all the rage, but I don't think she was nearly as excited as I was. Either way, it looks nice - and under are two lime leafed, small 'Gold Drop' hostas. Further along is another hosta, another rescued plant from dog territory. This one was hidden under the giant dogwood that's taking over the middle garden, and unknown to R until I mentioned it. It's a gorgeous hosta (the kind I usually fall for in the greenhouses) and will thrive in his new spot nicely. Near to that is a section of rescued red 2, which divided nicely during the move.

Hosta 'Gold Drop'

Taxonomists differ on the number of hosta species; there may be as many as 45. The genus may be broadly divided into three subgenera. Interspecific hybridization occurs since all the species have the same chromosome number (2n = 2x = 60); except H. ventricosa which is a natural tetraploid that sets seed through apomixis. Many Hosta formerly described as species taxonomically, have been reduced to cultivars; these often have their names conserved, and retain Latin names which resemble species names (e.g., H. 'Fortunei' ).

Getting back to the east side, other losses have created new space for ..apparently tomatoes. Yellow tomatoes to be exact, which fill both the space where there was once that nice two toned spurge plant, and an open area in front of the zucchini. Hoping that the zucchini catch the trellis on the fence and climb upward, my only concern would be if it caught a touch of mildew. It's a little tight in there with the tomato, but it's a sunny, hot (probably the sunniest of the whole garden) there so unless it gets damp from over crowning or too much water from above we should be good.

Black Beauty Zucchini Squash

COMPANION PLANTING:

Monarda is a great companion plant to grow with tomatoes, attracting pollinators and some predatory insects that help to minimize garden pests. Commonly understood as a food plant for the larvae of some Lepidoptera species and many Coleophora (moths), the plant is a favourite attraction for hummingbirds and bees. Also, the roots of the Monarda plant contain oils which are beneficial in deterring subterranean pests around small, susceptible vegetable crops. 

Monarda, (Bergamot, Bee Balm) and the East Garden