Broccoli Still!

Mid October and still getting significant broccoli harvest!

Harvesting Continues

I just harvested my stevia plants and hung them up to dry this past weekend. And even into October I've continued to reap green peppers (just from 1 single plant), tomatoes, carrots, and the broccoli has kept on keeping on. One of my green peppers had a little tiny hole in it and I thought someone had moved in. I didn't find any critters inside, though, just clean fresh seeds and fruit.

Harvesting, Cooking, Freezing

I've done a lot of the following 3 things lately:

1. harvesting green peppers, tomatoes, carrots, broccoli, basil, and oregano
2. preparing them in various meals
3. storing and freezing them in mason jars

I made a big batch of plain (no meat) tomato sauce with about 10 tomatoes, and I have at least another dozen or two tomatoes ready to go. It made over 4 pints of sauce, most of which I froze in mason jars.

4 frozen pints of tomato sauce

The other day on a whim I thought I would try to throw together a pizza on a tortilla because I had the fresh sauce I had just made plus fresh basil and green peppers and a chunk of mozzarella in the fridge. So I made 1 pizza with the sauce,  cheese, and green peppers and the other with sliced tomatoes and basil instead of sauce. I think they would have turned out a lot better on a pizza crust, but the thin wheat tortilla worked adequately :-) I froze two of those as well.

I've had frozen pierogies from the Italian store for a couple of weeks and I finally got around to makeingthem into mason jar meals to freeze. I used carrots, broccoli, green peppers and herbs from the garden. I boiled the sliced carrots in broth and fresh dill and steamed the broccoli over top of it. I sliced and stir fried a couple green peppers with onions and then added the pierogies after I boiled them. I also heated up two cans of blacks beans with a couple of chopped tomatoes from the garden with butter and Old Bay seasoning. I layered them in 32 oz. mason jars as follows: veggies on the bottom; then the beans, which filled half the jar; 4 pierogies each with the peppers and onions; and a small pat of butter on top to keep it moist when reheated. It made 6 jars, which I let cool and then put in the freezer.

pierogi, beans, and veggies mason jar meals

I've also made dozens of salads in the mason jars. You layer them appropriately, with the dressing on the bottom, then heartier veggies, lighter veggies, cheese, other stuff, and greens on top. I made my own balsamic vinaigrette (1 part olive olive, 3 parts balsamic vinegar, plus brown sugar and garlic) and used as many veggies from the garden as possible. The mason jars have amazing preservation powers! The salads can stay in the fridge for a week without the green wilting. Some of the veggies soak in the dressing and the flavor really pops.

mason jar salads stay fresh for at least a week

I thought all the cilantro going around this time of year might taste good in hummus so I've experimented a few times with that: chick peas, olive oil, lots of cilantro, garlic, lime juice & sea salt.

cilantro hummus

Open for Business

I just divvied up this week's harvest into manageable packages to distribute among friends. Nice...

So. Much. BROCCOLI.

That ain't no cereal bowl!

Insane broccoli production! It just keeps growing! And growing! AND GROWING. I started with 12 little plants, and ended up pulling out a couple that struggled. So, with 9 or 10 broccoli plants I have had a constant harvest of fresh broccoli, daily, for over two months. I have a huge bowl full of fresh broccoli in the kitchen. I have a freezer packed full of plastic bags of chopped frozen broccoli. And I have given away at least 3 or 4 grocery-store-sized servings of broccoli to friends. I even game some to an enemy! Well, frienemy I guess. 

I used a variety called pacman broccoli from Bonnie Plants that I got at Home Depot. It has far surpassed my expectations and grown more successfully and productively than anything I've ever grown (and I've grown a plant or two in my life).

First it grows one giant head of broccoli. You cut it, and two more heads grow from the original stem. Cut those, and then you get four next time! Then eight! Ahhhhh more broccoli! 

WHAT TO MAKE?!?

Last night Cait made some chilli pepper oil ginger chicken and black bean dish, and we added broccoli florets at the end. It fit in perfectly. Earlier in the summer I grilled a lot of the broccoli. Recently I've frozen some of it and given a lot away. I want to make something like Adrienne made with the harvest I gave JJ. She made a creamy chicken and bowtie pasta with broccoli florets, which looked fabulous on Facebook. Someone suggested roasting at some point, which I need to try. Any other ideas?

Aje's chicken alfredo!

Cait's chili pepper chicken!