Monday, November 3, 2014

Harvest Monday, 3 November 2014

I harvested broccoli twice. The first was some nice large side shoots from the spring planted broccoli. The second was from the summer planted broccoli. I couldn't believe how big that head was. The stem was two inches in diameter. I've eaten half of it so far, but I ate the stem first as it is my favorite. I peel it to get to the tender middle. It is so good.

Since a freeze was predicted last night, I made sure to have all the chard picked. Technically it is hardy, but it doesn't do much growing when it gets cold and the leaves get limp. And that freeze that was predicted? My weather station (which is 8' above the ground) said that it only got to 34F. At ground level I had the one bed that is uncovered and without plants freeze and the puddles in the road are frozen too. Interestingly enough we didn't get a frost last night. So we still haven't had a frost but we have had freeze which is weird.

I've been slowly working through the kale, trying to pick the lower leaves off before they get too old to eat. It is slow work as there are aphids on some of them and my kale is curly kale. They are the only reliably hardy kales over the winter here so those are what I plant. But they are a pain when it comes to aphids as they are hard to wash. I've taken to doing it in front of the TV, so I can take my time at it. Interestingly enough the aphids come in clumps, but there are very very few single ones. So they are at least a bit easier to spot in all those ruffles. I picked two bags this last week. I ought to get a couple more this week. As I process them I eat what I want for that night and freeze the rest for winter.

My one normal harvest basket had three baby zucchini that hadn't set, but I was pulling out the plants. I also had a huge green onion. I picked another one later in the week. I picked more carrots too, but didn't photograph them. The cabbages were all that I could salvage from the eight Early Jersey plants I had. They were planted too early so they ended up bolting while I was on vacation. One cabbage was beautiful and didn't bolt. I ate the others last week and I'll eat that one this week.

  • Alliums: 0.56 lbs
  • Broccoli: 2.61 lbs
  • Carrots: 2.87 lbs
  • Greens: 9.24 lbs
  • Herbs: 0.05 lbs
  • Squash, Summer: 0.33 lbs
  • Weekly Total: 15.65 lbs
  • Yearly Total: 658.48 lbs
  • Yearly Tally: $1137.13

Harvest Monday is a day to show off your harvests, how you are saving your harvest, or how you are using your harvest. If you have a harvest you want to show off, add your name and link to Mr Linky below.

18 comments:

  1. Great harvest for this time of year. That sure is a gorgeous head of broccoli bet it was real sweet . I too peel my broccoli stem, I laughed when I read you ate the stem first because it is your favorite, my daughter is the opposite, saves her favorite for last.

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  2. That is some big broccoli! I eat the stem too but I can't say it is my favorite. Too bad about the cabbage bolting though.

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  3. Beautiful harvests, especially for November. That broccoli is incredible - your side shoots are bigger than my main heads!

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  4. That is some great looking broccoli, I didn't bother with fall planted broccoli so all I have are small shoots. And I have no cabbage, so yours looks great to me.

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  5. I'm a wee bit jealous of your ability to grow broccoli. In our Northern California garden, we have a lot of trouble with bolting. Well, that and snails.

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  6. When harvests dwindle, we show even a few of something. Scarcity increases the value. What type of weather station do you have? Looks like it links to your page.

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    1. I have a vantage vue. And yes I've connected it to weather underground so I can see all the historical data online. And we can see the info if we aren't at home.

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  7. Aphids are the worst!! We had them so bad this year that we actually lost several plants to them and just tossed a bunch of kale because it was so covered in them. It was a bad year for them for us. Your harvests are looking great!!

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  8. How strange to have icy puddles and no frost.

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  9. What a great harvest! I'm sad to think that I didn't start my fall garden in time to get much from it, so yours looks especially delicious.

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  10. That's a big head of broccoli, I cannot grow brassicas in spring, they always bolt and full of aphids.

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  11. daphne, can you please tell me how you freeze your kale? do you cook it first? i can;t eat it quick enough and freezing may be a good trick.
    yes, and hate the grey aphids too. a real pain to get out of the tight curls. grrrr.
    ps love that brocolli!!

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    1. I blanch it for three minutes in boiling water then immediately put in ice water to cool down. Then pack in single serving bags and freeze.

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  12. Great broccoli, mine was v small and has already bolted!

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  13. We didn't plant broccoli but now I wish we did. Looks great.

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  14. Wonderful harvest, as always. You must have freezers full of veggies by now! Ditto on the broccoli - I'm envious as mine always tends to bolt.

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  15. That one head of broccoli is amazing! Nice little basket of goodies too for this time of year. We have been on vacation but thankfully I didn't lose things in the cold frame from the frost. No one here to put the cover down so thought I might lose things. Nancy

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  16. This is definitely Brassica Season! We had our first frost of the year today, about a month later than normal. Maybe that will sort out the blessed Whitefly on my Brussels Sprouts.

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