Fall Plantings

Fall crops that came from spring plants that went to seed, they just so happened to arrange themselves perfectly.

The nights are getting cooler, days shorter, and the mountains in Colorado have already received their first snow.  This can only mean one thing:  winter is right around the corner and we want to try and squeak in some fall crops before the first frost of the year arrives.

Making Pickles

Freshly made pickles, ready to go in the fridge.

Refrigerator pickles are where it's at!

Wait, you don't know what refrigerator pickles are?  Don't worry, neither did I until a few years ago.  Refrigerator pickles are simply pickles that you make and store in your handy dandy refrigerator instead of canning.  You let the convenience of our modern world take over the majority of the preservation process so you can avoid timely canning.  It's also great if you're just lazy.

Preserve Food: Quickly & Easily

Single day vegetable harvest in early August of 2021, 21.57 lbs (9.78 kilos)

Are you ready for this?  I can teach you how to quickly and easily preserve your vegetables for the winter in a single blog post.  Are you sure you're ready for this? I don't think you are...

Throughout the summer you should constantly be thinking, “How can I preserve this for the winter?”  for any produce that you have abundance of.  Preserving some items are obvious, if you have excess tomatoes, you make tomato sauce, put the sauce in jars and freeze.  Boom, easy.  The not so obvious veggies appear to be tough to preserve but really it’s quite simple, you blanch and freeze them.

Harvesting Squash & Squash Flowers

Your garden is now likely growing out of control, you look at it each day and wonder, “What have I done?”

Welcome to the wild world that is gardening!  Squash are probably the most interesting and most beneficial vegetable that you can grow.  Each squash plant can provide an abundance of food for you and your family.  Off a single pumpkin plant you can easily get several 15 to 30 pound pumpkins (pumpkins are edible by the way).  Zucchini are the most commonly grown squash and usually the most prolific.  How do you know when to harvest your squash?

The easy answer is whenever they look like they’re ready to eat!  When they get to a size that looks good to you, pick them and eat them.  For a less vague answer, go with the size that you normally see those vegetables at when you go to the farmer’s market or your favorite local farm.

Zucchini can be eaten at any size, no matter how small or big.  The texture and taste does change as the vegetable changes though.  When they are small, they’ll be more tender and not as hard.  The larger they get they get harder and more bitter.  Both have their own uses in the kitchen.

Various summer squashes, freshly harvested and ready to eat.