Daily Harvest

Just went out and grabbed this handful of goodies to make an omelette!

TriciaSoGarden

Early this morning I went over to take a look at the Melon St. Garden aka TriciaSoGarden. I feared the tomatoes might have taken over the world. The zucchini, cabbage, beans, peppers, and cucumbers have come along nicely! [EDIT: Later, she came home and chumped me.] :( 

Daily Harvest

For the last month I've had something to harvest almost daily. Plenty of cilantro, mint, and oregano. Lots and lots of broccoli. And now the carrots and tomatoes have started. Check out what I reaped today: oregano, a carrot, and some tomatoes.

Garden Update: Carrots Ready to Harvest

What Up Doc

I planted a row of carrot seeds April 16 and they have really grown nicely. I harvested two last night at sunset and took pictures of the first one. They came out thick and hardy! Very impressive. I should definitely plant carrots again next year and in future gardens. One row of carrots didn't take up much space and you hardly need any space between each carrot -- they grow straight down. I think they would do well in a container (a deep one). I grew mine in one straight row across the middle of the planter box next to the broccoli on one side, and a row of red onions on the other.

I cooked the carrots last night with potatoes, onions, and my first tomatoes harvested from the garden! I chopped the carrots and potatoes and boiled them first for a few minutes with water, oil, and spices -- curry powder, hot paprika, some fresh basil and cilantro from the garden -- then added a decent amount of brown sugar, onions, garlic, and lots of chopped tomatoes from the garden. I let the water cook off some, but it stayed wet from all the tomatoes and a little oily. Then I made a bold move -- I add a big squirt of ranch dressing! It came out really well. The brown sugar was crucial and the ranch gave it a tangy creaminess. Tremendous. I called it Sweet Ranch Curry.

Chicken Salad

What do you do with leftover chicken? Make chicken salad, which I learned upstate at the 'Let 'Em Ins' several years ago. And what a valuable lesson! Especially during the Summer grill-happy months when it seems like I grill chicken thighs a couple times a week. I almost always have 1 or 2 pieces of chicken left over, and I can use it to whip up an easy chicken salad for a lunch time sandwich. Cucumber and mayonnaise, along with the leftover chicken, make up the bulk of the recipe, so after those 3 main things you can generally make do with whatever you have on hand. Simply omit or substitute as you like.

Ingredients 

• 2 leftover grilled chicken thighs
• 1/4 Cup mayo
• 1/2 Cup diced cucumber (seedless) (or celery)
• 1 Tablespoon tangy horseradish
• 1/2 Tablespoon whole grain mustard
• 1/2 an avocado

Mix ingredients to make the chicken salad. I like to eat it on a kaiser roll with sliced cucumber. This yields 2-3 sandwiches

Joe Burger 2

I don't think I've actually posted my burger recipe on JoeSoCookbook yet. I started developing it about 2 years when I first got the grill. Generally speaking I love a very simple cheeseburger, made with high quality ground beef and maybe just a pinch of salt and pepper, maybe cumin or the classic onion soup mix burgers -- you know, easy, simple, delicious, and it makes everyone happy (well, except non-carnivores).

But then I also like to have a "different" kind of burger recipe in rotation -- something "interesting"  or  "exotic," something a little bit out there.  Something with weird ingredients stuffed in the middle. Something gooey or cheesy or spicy or strangely colorful. The original Joe Burger uses hot sauce, turmeric, and several other ingredients, and Joe Burger 2 kind of spins off of that basic approach. But the Joe Burger 2 gets a lot of its flavor from the garden, which I like. I have several fresh herbs that I don't know exactly what to do with, so adding them to burgers seemed like one obvious idea. I've only tried this once, so consider it a recipe in progress. Next time I may cut out the curry and rely more on the fresh herbs for flavor.

Ingredients

• 1 pound ground beef (3-4 burgers)
• 1/2 Tablespoon cumin
• 1/2 T. curry powder
• 1 T. hot sauce
• 1 T. worcestershire sauce
• 1/4 - 1/2 Cup fresh cilantro
• 1 T. fresh oregano
• 2-4 leaves fresh basil
• goat cheese (or other cheese, optional)

Mix ingredients and form into burgers. Grill to your liking and top with cheese. Enjoy burgers with your favorite toppings, such as avocado, banana peppers, siracha, whole grain mustard, etc.

fresh herbs and spices: cumin, curry, basil, cilantro, oregano

plus hot sauce and worcestershire sauce

mix ingredients

mix into the ground beef 

make into burgers

add fresh veggies to make a wholesome meal

broccoli, spinach, carrots, and green beans with sesame oil, salt, and pepper

steam the veggies for a 10 minutes or so

grill the burgers to your desired liking

topped with goat cheese

yeah buddy

Joe Burger 2 with goat cheese and banana peppers with steamed veggies

Juice!

Nothing fancy here, just some delicious juice. I ain't trying to cleanse. I ain't trying to fast. I don't want some gross green stuff. I just want sweet yummy juice. I used 2 red grapefruits, 4 minneolas, and 1 large apple. It yielded about a liter of juice!

Mmm citrussy 

love me some minneolas

perfect results -- filled about 2 of these glasses

Yard to Table

I've had the great fortune of harvesting a lot of herbs already, and now several heads of broccoli have reached their flowering point. Although the tiny little yellow broccoli flowers do look nice, you should eat it before they bloom! I harvested my first head last week and made the grilled broccoli that I've posted about on here. Then I harvested a monster head, bigger than mine, and steamed that over the last few days. Yesterday I harvested another big one and gave it to JJ, along with some fresh mint. I still have a stalk or 2 from the monster head, and a couple of the other plants already look ready. Some friends proposed a raspberry / broccoli swap, since they have a ton of raspberries. Awesome.

To prevent my herbs from flowering I need to constantly harvest some of the leaves and stems. If they start flowering it will end the growth cycle. I think that may have already happened with my basil. Oops. So I figure I should keep cutting and drying some of the leaves/stems. I have oregano, mint, cilantro, and oh so much mint. What they hell can you do with mint besides make mojitos? 

mint in the middle

cilantro on the right

First harvested head of broccoli

looking great

and from the other side

about to bloom, harvested just in time

marinated, grilled, and topped with goat cheese

love it

that's a big boy

yeah buddy

great looking tray of green stuff

maybe a good facebook cover photo

aaaand one more from the backside, baby