Keeping up with the heat

With our 3rd week of over 100 degree temps here, all I seem to do is water, water, water and it's not enough. Cucumbers, squash and greens are all burning up. Crispy critters!

Tomatoes and peppers are doing well so far but the tomatoes are starting to stress. It finally rained this morning, which will help.

The 4 baby chicks we have left are doing fine now. Active, noisy and having fun.

We have a new addition to the farm, our oldest son Derek is back home from San Diego. California living is not all it's cracked up to be with a bankrupt state and high cost of living. He's here to find a job and learn to be a farmer. Today we organized and cleaned the chicken coop! The ladies are all doing well.

Steve just came to the back door with another black snake wrapped around his arm, found him trying to eat one of the eggs in the chicken coop! He's sending him to a new home!

Derek and I picked 12 tomatoes this morning and I'm going to make home made salsa.

Classic Salsa (Medium to hot)

6 large red tomatoes

2 tbsp olive oil

1/4 cup diced red onion

2 garlic cloves (minced)

2 tbsp lime juice

1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

1/2 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

1 diced Holy Mole Pepper, heat like a jalapeno but twice as long. (if not available use 2 jalapeno peppers)

Place all ingredients in Food Processer, pulse until done.

Derek has Crohn's Disease. I am lucky to have a garden full of veggies he can eat. Tonight's dinner, we had Maple Mustard glazed grilled chicken, with roasted steak fried potatoes and Crohn's safe Ratatouille.

Ratatouille:

4 small eggplants- size of tennis balls, chopped in bite size pieces

1 large sweet red pepper

2 large stalks of celery

1/2 can of black olives

1 clove of garlic

1/4 cup olive oil

Add olive oil and garlic to a heated saute pan, add 1 pinch of dried,crushed red pepper and cook until garlic starts to pop. Add eggplant, celery and red pepper pieces and saute for 5 minutes

then add the black olive and 1 teaspoon of each of these herbs: basil, thyme and oregano. Saute for another 3 minutes, then serve.

Heart Break in the Heat!

I have not posted in a while as we are still in mourning. Last weekend we lost 21 of our 6 week old chicks. A plaque of some disease wiped out the entire flock leaving only 5 seemingly healthy birds. Our farm vet thinks the heat lowered the chicks immunities and when one got sick it quickly spread. Steve stayed with the babies all weekend and is ever watchful still. They have been removed from the brooder coop to a temporary coop in the barn as we don't want our adult hens to catch the sickness. We are hoping the 5 will make it and be okay. No visible symptoms yet. I sure wish this heat would break. Even adults have difficulties making through a day in this 107 average temp at the farm this week.
I have been very distracted during this trying time and drove off to work on Tuesday with the watering system still going. Man, that will be some water bill this month! But the cucumbers and tomatoes are doing great! 4 types of heirlooms are doing the best, Lemon Boy, Brandywine, Russian Salad and Mr. Stripey.
The corn is finally starting to produce cobbs. It won't be long now! SH! Don't tell the raccoons!

Time to start sharing!

Heat index of 110 and I still have weeding to do. I began at 8:00 AM Saturday morning and didn't quit until 3:00PM. I felt kind of woozie! I guess I didn't drink enough water while I was out there in the sun! I weeded the eggplant and pepper beds. Thinned out another Collard bed and yes, now I have another 4lbs of collards to go wash, cook and freeze.

I stumbled over the beets as I was walking by and realized I had some for picking. Great! Another 2 lbs of beet greens to cook and beautiful beets to roast for dinner. See picture above.

Sunday, afternoon, with heat warnings in the news, Steve cut the lawn and trimmed some branches and I dug up one row of yukon gold potatoes. Packed them up in individual 2lb bags, ready to go to the office on Monday. I tilled the row of soil, added some worm castings and planted some Edamame and bush beans for my fall planting. Next weekend, I'll have the peas to dig up and will replant some Pak Choy and oriental long beans, maybe a few carrots too.

I started picking about 2 cucumbers a day so I will bring some of those to the office as well. See photo. I have burbless, or English cucumbers and fanfare, (just like the grocery store kind) fat, thicker peels and lots of water.

I am a calves liver fan from way back. And I had more, tender beet greens to cook. So, I made my favorite liver recipe: Calves Liver and onions in balsamic red wine sauce but I added the beet greens with the onions. Wow! It was mouth watering. Steve even said he liked it and beets and liver are his 2 LEAST favorite foods. The key is to mix fresh chopped Thyme to the flour when dredging the liver. Saute the liver in just a bit in butter, place on a platter and keep warm in a 250 degree oven. Add 1/2 cup red wine and 2 TBSP balsamic vinegar. Cook until reduced by half while scraping bits off bottom of pan. Then add the sliced onions to the pan and cook until opaque, then add the beet greens and cook for 2 more minutes. Add liver again and simmer for 5 minutes. Mouth watering! Really! Try it, you'll like it!

Hot, still hot and too much to do!

A long hot weekend but we got a lot done.

Friday, I fertilized the corn, pumpkins, beets and cauliflower with worm casting tea. Thinned the beets. Transplanted 4 large volunteer tomato plants and fertilized them with tea as well. Picked spinach, lettuce, zucchini, cucumbers, peas, and beans. Washed it all, cooked the spinach and froze it.

Saturday, thinned the carrots, thinned one of the collard beds and ended up with 6 lbs of collard greens to cook and freeze. The house smelled really strange after 3 hours of that.

Steve removed the heavy brush growing around the chicken coop and horse corrals. No we don't have horses, but we have a great set up for large animals. Someday! Cows? Pigs? Sheep? Alpaca's? Who Knows. I am reading up on all of them first!

Sunday, picked the above items in pictures. Assorted veggies and 5 lbs of potatoes.

Steve and I emptied and moved the garden shed, giving us about 20 feet of growing space for a new bed. We will use that to start our fall selections of Kale, Lettuce, bush beans and a few other varieties.

Monday, Steve woke me at 7:00AM with a cup of coffee. 67 degrees and only 65% humidity made it perfect for a good training bike ride. 10 quick miles down 223rd St. back at home in 43 minutes. Not too shabby but I have to knock off at least 5 minutes from my time.

I then organized my new shelves in the garden shed. Now I can find everything. Steve mowed the lawn (with our Kubota, pictured above) and by 3 PM we were very hot and sticky. A frosty Corona and a dip in the pool made the afternoon go by quickly and cool. I was falling asleep by 8:30PM.