Well this is what my bean bed looked like before I dealt with it yesterday. I have pole beans growing along the back of the bed under the trellis. I put in a bunch of Jacob's Cattle beans ages ago and they are growing well up near the fence. But in the front part was my spring spinach that wasn't doing anything and the volunteer dill that was taking over. I love to have my volunteer dill, but this was ridiculous. It wasn't a bunch of dill weed anymore, but a dill monster. It needed to be tamed.
So I weeded it all out and turned it under. Then planted my beans. I had leftovers from planting up the new house garden. So I used those Black Coco beans and Red Kidney beans. Beans are such easy plants. They come up and shade out the weeds. Dried beans don't even need to be harvested until the end of the summer and you can do it all at once when you pull out the plants. Between doing two gardens, I can really use easy about now. If you notice I didn't pull all the dill. I left some plants in for my pickles later in the year.
Since I pulled the dill, I had to harvest it right? I'll give you the harvest photo on Monday, but for now you get the dehydration photos. Usually I don't dehydrate so much. I needed two batches in the dehydrator. Part weeded out earlier in the week and part was weeded out yesterday.
Now I have a ton of dried dill which in spice terms is probably an ounce.
Your dried dill is nice and green. I have never used a dehydrator to dry my herbs. I either hang them in the kitchen or in brown paper bags. Does the dehydrator help keep the color? I always have a hard time keeping the color when drying parsley and basil.
ReplyDeleteI was worried for a second you just turned all that dill under! Phew! I'd be using it all for pickles, that's for sure!
ReplyDeleteYour dill looks so lush. Mine always looks so sparse -- like Charlie Brown dill.
ReplyDeleteThat reminds me, I still have to sow my dill . . .
ReplyDeleteThe bean bed is looking great now.
That looks great. I love having the dried spices on hand all year long. That much dill would last me forever!
ReplyDeleteNice work! The bed looks nice and tidy! Don't before and after pictures make you feel so accomplished? :)
ReplyDeleteYour bed looked about as weedy as mine before planting the beans. Except mine were truly full of weeds, no nice dill treat for me :-) How is the home selling going?
ReplyDeleteRobin, Yes the dehydrator helps keep the color. I do hang dry things occasionally and it tends not to be as high quality as the ones that I dehydrate. Mine is a cheapy dehydrator though. It has no temperature control and no fan. Someday I'd love one of the good expensive ones. Then I could even dry basil with ease (which is the hardest of the herbs for me and sometimes gets too hot and browns). BTW parsley in the dehydrator is easy and it stays very very green.
ReplyDeleteNatalie, If I have it I use fresh dill for pickles. Weirdly when I make cucumber salad I use the dried dill. I'm sure I'll be eating a lot of both this year.
Sylvana, those dill plants were about an inch apart. They are sparse if they are thinned so they aren't so close, but their nearness gives them the illusion of not being sparse.
michelle, I keep waiting for the dill at the other garden to come up. I planted a bit in front of the cukes. Nothing yet, but the cilantro germinated.
The Mom, I usually only do a small batch. This was huge. I'll have to eat a lot of cucumber salads to use it all up.
Megan, I love the before and after photos. Though what I really want is the photo of them all coming up in their rows.
Dan, my biggest weeds are the ones that I let self seed. I had a lot of Johnny-jump-ups in that bed too. I just hated pulling them. I rarely get that many seedlings from them. So far nothing is going on with the house.
I am still waiting for my dill to germinate and sprout up. The jar of dried dill looks wonderful. I go through alot of dried dill in a year because I use it on baked fish, in sauces, and as a seasoning for items like cucumber salads(just like you!). It's nice how you were able to reserve out some of the dill volunteers for later fresh use when the pickling season is upon you.
ReplyDeleteI sowed some dill and only got one plant!
ReplyDelete