Of the summer crops the last ones that are still producing large quantities are the peppers. The Bishops Cap chillies have been really prolific and I am regularly picking Purple Beauty and the occasional California Wonder capsicum.
Aside from the capsicums and chillies the majority of my harvests this week were herbs. Lots of parsley, basil and mint. I will get parsley throughout winter, mint through some it but the basil will finish soon so I am making as much use of it as I can before it goes.
Not all of this weeks harvests were plant life. This is a yabbie. For those unfamiliar with them they are a freshwater crustacean, kind of like a large prawn. As kids we used to go yabbying in dams using a bit of bacon on a string as bait. This one though was caught in my parents dam in a yabbie pot (very similar to a cray pot). I was keen to throw him back as there was only one (it’s nearing the end of the season) but Mr 3 insisted that he was cooked and eaten.
Slightly more conventional harvests came in to form of some zucchini flowers. About a month ago I hard pruned my zucchini plant but left a baby branch that I found underneath the main plant. It has since grown and started producing zucchinis although they don’t seem to be pollinating properly so I am picking them at baby stage with the flowers attached.
Todays lunch saw the flowers stuffed with a cheese and herb mix and baked in the oven. Really good.
My final harvest this week was the first of the tamarillos. The tree has about a quarter to a third of the fruits on it compared with last year. I think this is due to a combination of rodents eating some, less fruit set as a the tree took a while to recover from last years cooler winter and perhaps simply that the tree is getting older. Tamarillos have a fairly short productive life.
As always Daphne is hosting Harvest Mondays – head over to check out some great pickings this week.
Liz, a great harvest as usual. I suddenly have a hankering for yabbies, haven’t had them for years. We used to go yabbying often as a kid in Western Victoria, but as the drought dried up all our spots we gave it up. I will have to remember to take the kids at least once when they’re a bit older (especially if we’re in the country).
If you end up anywhere near where I grew up I’ll let you know the best spots.
Never heard of yappy, learned something new, thanks. That’s beautiful tamarillo.
While we are all harvesting green, you are harvesting all kinds of red. And a yabby to boot! Ha ha, cute!
It’s funny how the seasons colour code themselves isn’t it?
Nice harvest of peppers, goingg to be months away for me. The yabbies are interesting, look like our crayfish/crawfish/crawdads from the South. I assume they exist around here in NE but are not harvested.
I had crawfish when we visited Louisiana and I think you’re right the flavour is similar.
Everything looks so fresh and yum! The yabby looks good too. ;D I hope my peppers are more productive this year. Seeing all of yours just reminds me how little I actually got from my peppers in 2012.
They can be a bit hit and miss can’t they. Hope yours do better this year.
I am still yet to taste that intriguing fruit. Tamarillo will grow here, too – so I should find one somewhere. Your baskets are quite lovely, including your crustaean. 😉
I would definitely seek one out – having said that I reckon only about 50% of the people I’ve given them too have liked them, but those that do tend to love them.
Those yabbies look just like the crayfish in the US. I’ve only had them once in my life. Beautiful basket. I love zucchini when they are tiny like that. I often have to pick them that way myself late in the season when they won’t set anymore.
Having eaten a few I think I’ve decided that I like the zucchini best that size.
I hope you had lots of herbs and chillis with your yabby – on its own it would have been a rather meagre meal!
It was brunch and Mr 3 ate most of him in the end.
Those peppers and chillies look great, My peppers are still producing well and wondering whether its worth digging them up and putting them into pots before our first frost arrives.
Many an afternoon was spent in the hot summer sun fishing yabbies…….we would haul them home and help mum peel them(I didn’t like watching them cook) and then they would be dipped in batter and fried and eaten with vinegar and salt…..
I’ve never had them in batter – that would be lovely…I can’t watch them cook either.
Those bishop caps are so cute. I am growing a few different types of chilli this year but they are all surprises because they were given to me by my neighbour. I never know if they are going to be super dooper hot or just a little bit hot.
I like a mixture of chillies, its fun to see what they’re like.
What a delicious looking collection of peppers! It seems strange that mine are still at the seedling stage here in the UK and you are enjoying eating yours 😉 I’d not heard of a yabbie before, but I’m sure he was tasty mixed in with your homegrown produce.
And in a few months it will be the other way round.
Ah, lots of yabbying memories being evoked! Lazy summer days as a young girl trailing lines in the dam – sometimes getting a nibble, sometimes not. Dad rubbing his hands together when a good haul was had.
Some of my capsicum are slowly turning red – at last! I’m loving ’em. Lots of chillis too. I made some sambal oelek with the jalepenos and it turned out really well. I used a cross between your recipe and another I found. It’s not as ‘deadly’ (but still with a good kick) as sambal oelek made with the hotter chillis. I’m rather fond of jalepenos.
Its strange how late capsicums are in our climate. I always see blogs from the US where they get tomatoes and capsicums to ripen at much the same time.
I envy you the tamarillos. I’m not going to get a single one this year. After dutifully keeping the water up to my two largest trees during the summer, for some reason all the flowers dropped off. Maybe those really hot days stressed them out…I don’t know. Must wait patiently for next year I suppose.
Perhaps the reduction of my crop compared with last year was heat stress too. There is always next year isn’t there.
Yabbies! At first I thought it was a lobster, what a wonderful catch! Did Mr3 like eating it?
He kind of did – it was mid morning when we cooked it so it probably isn’t the ideal brunch but he did eat most of it.
What a variety of harvests you had this week! I always learn something new from your posts.. never heard of a yabbie. They do look like what we call crawdads here. We use to catch them as kids, but never actually ate one. Also, I love the shape of those bishop caps, so adorable!
I’m trying to think back and remember eating the yabbies I caught as a kid and do you know I can’t. Not sure if this is because we didn’t eat them, I didn’t eat them or I just can’t remember.
So a yabbie is like a craw dad, or as they sometimes say in Alabama, a crayfish? We can see a reservoir and dam from our front yard but I’ve never had the guts to try and catch anything other than the small craw dads the kids catch and release on the sandy banks.
There could be lovely big ones lurking in the middle – good on try and catch some – you know you want to, unless of course like me you struggle with the whole cooking them thing.