I know what Indiana summers are like, but often forget the intensity until they hit. So due to the heat and humidity that makes summer almost unbearable we are planning a midnight madness this weekend.
Using a halogen worklight we will do all of the dirty work that has pushed aside. Weeding and mulching will probably take most of the night. The cucumbers and squash are almost lost in the wilderness that is the garden.
We often talk how next year will be better because we are going to plant in raised beds and mulch heavily when we transplant. I hope this works. I am starting to feel lost in the weeds myself.

I have other interests in life besides food and football. I am also really into technology. It is a bit weird considering my ideas on how life should be, but I reckon everyone has a vice or three.

Due to my unbridled infatuation with technology, last summer I stood in line for an iPhone. Thanks to Apple and WordPress I am now able to blog from anywhere in the world. Especially the garden. I am very happy to have this ability as I often wanted to write a note to everyone, but couldn’t.

I think that I will enjoy being mobile and I hope you enjoy my newfound ability also.

For over a year now I’ve been planning and dreaming of making my own fermented pickles. Last fall I came across a recipe to make pickles, but it was for fresh pack pickles. After I tasted them, I knew something was wrong; this isn’t how the good pickles are supposed to be. So my adventure began…

I found out what I actually wanted was a fermented pickle. After searching across the internet, and finding new and interesting sites, I came to find out that pickling crocks are not Dollar Store items–especially if you have to have the heavy things shipped across a few states. I thought for sure that my dream was gone.
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Nothing much going on in the sauerkraut world… every other day it’s: unfold cloth cover, pull out weighted jar, pick off floating “stuff,” wash off jar, put back in, push down kraut, cover.

It smells, but almost in a good way, something like sauerkraut. I’m guessing I’m doing it right, since I’ve read that if it’s done wrong, it will just plain old stink like rot.
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We had another small harvest today! Submitted for your reading pleasure, our lovely story about pulling weeds, re-caging tomatoes and tying up limp peppers after a storm, and trying to figure out how exactly composting is supposed to work.

Saturday evening we had a little rain; from what I can tell via the internet, about four inches in two hours. This compounded with rather high winds and heavy green tomatoes proved that gravity is a force to be reckoned with.
We had our work cut out for us Sunday–well, it wasn’t too bad actually. There were perhaps seven plants that had fallen down with their cages. The bell pepper plants were all laying down (cage-less), and we had to put some steaks in the ground and tie them up.
After that we went ahead and did some regular maintenaince: pulled weeds, put down mulch, moved vines around, etc…
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You guessed it!  It’s time to harvest some cabbage!  Like I’ve said before, I want to give fermenting a try this year.  Our cabbage has come of age, and it’s time for it to take it’s place in my stomach the world.

Matt wants to take a few heads and boil them down with some sort of pork-like meat–we’ll have to get with him to find more out about that.  I am going to make sauerkraut out of some of it.  I’ve never done this before, but I’ve been reading up on it via that dangerous internet thing (I’ll share some of my more favorite sites on the subject at a later date).

So it beings: Diary of a Kraut; for the next two weeks (or however long the fermenting process takes) I will be documenting my prodigy as it zombifies into an undead treat for me.

The first thing I had to do was take five pounds of cabbage (it only took one head!) and slice, dice, and rip it up into a respectable size.  After that, I added three tablespoons of salt to the shredded cabbage.  I have to admit, I tasted it at this point and it was good enough to eat already!

As the water started seeping out of the cabbage, thanks to our friend osmosis, I transported my mess to a pickling crock.  Then I placed a plate on top of the mix and added a mason jar full of water for weight.  The plate and extra weight are there to push down and squeeze the water out of the cabbage.

The next 24 hours are very important to this process.  If enough water isn’t suqeezed out of the cabbage to cover it, then I will have to add a brine mixture to it so that it will halt the microbial action that I don’t want;  this will make a great home for Leuconostoc, Lactobacillus, and Pediococcus.

Stay tuned for the next update and we can watch this sauerkraut bloom together!
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Our town REALLY takes an interest in Independence Day. We supposedly have the largest parade in the state. So in order to get City Farm ready for the big day there was mowing to do and and alot of mulching around all of our tomatoes.  Thankfully we got it all done. Our tomatoes look really nice now that they are all mulched.

So today Derrick and I emptied the truck of sawdust.  I had no clue a pickup truck could hold so much. After we finished that we got cleaned up to go out for my birthday dinner.  I love being able to choose where we are going to eat.

I have never really had Quinn by myself.  I mean, sure, for an hour here or two there, but never a whole day. Until today.  Beth didn’t have enough time saved up to take my entire vacation with me.  Since she works in the financial field, Friday’s are generally the busiest day.   (more…)

I am ashamed to admit we let our tomatoes ever get into such a state of disarray.  There were weeds everywhere.  Some were even taller than our tomatoes.  So tonight Derrick and I picked weeds.  Probably two hours worth.  I guess it wasn’t quite a total loss though.  Derrick says he found some dill just growing among the weeds in our tomato row.  He also thinks he found some purslane whatever that stuff is. (more…)