Harvest Monday – 16th Jan 2012

It has been significantly cooler this week – bordering on cold even (a relative thing I know but cold for summer….).  As a result the tomatoes have seemed less happy to produce fruit.  I did harvest a few though:

The trouble is that by the time the kids have eaten their fill there’s none left for me.  These plants had really better get a move on with production otherwise I might start to get quite upset with them…..

Fortunately though summer is not just about tomatoes.  Its also about cucumbers which continue to produce one every day or two.  Most of the cucumbers are going into salads or dips – Tzatiki being a personal favourite.

This week brought the first red capsicum of the year, pictured here with some mint, sorrel, a cucumber and some cayenne chillies.  I have been really pleased with the chillies as the heat is good and they have a good number on the plant which is now in its second year.

All these ingredients went into a salsa, which was nice but frankly lacked coriander which naturally enough has bolted and is no use to anyone any more.

The best thing about this weeks harvest was beans.  More Beanette and Jade beans and a lot more Royal Burgandy.  I don’t get enough to freeze but I do get some most days (this is one days harvest) which is enough to cover our needs over summer which is lovely.  These beans, and a few others, went into a South Indian dish called Green Beans Poriyal which is beans spiced with brown mustard seeds, cumin, chilli, urid dhal, asofeotida, coconut and curry leaves.  I served it with dhal and I plan to post the dhal recipe later this week.

Even more exciting were the first Tongues of Fire beans:

Very similar to a Borlotti bean and like them you only eat the inner bean; these were lovely with some onion, garlic and chilli.

I am really pleased with how most of my herbs are doing at the moment.  The Vietnamese Mint and Thai Basil are doing particularly well.  This week they, and some spring onions, provided last minute flavouring for a noodle soup.

Lastly we had another potatotastic week as I started harvesting from the large bed.  So far I’ve only dug up a few Kipfler plants from one end and have about 2kg of potatoes to show for it.

I think I could have left them a bit longer, but I needed some space for lettuce, so……well that and I can be really quite impatient.

Whilst I will reserve judgement on the bed for another post when I’ve dug it all up I would say that I’m pleased with the outcome so far, but I would say I think it could have done better if I’d layered the straw and manure a bit higher.

Want to see more harvests?  Head over to Daphne’s Dandelions for fabulous harvests from around the globe.