Turnips, Peas and Strawberry Shortcake

It is officially summer vacation for me.  Actually I've been on vacation for a week.  I made detailed lists of stuff I planned to do with all my extra time, but that first week I was utterly lethargic.  Hopefully this week will be more productive.  At least the garden has been productive even when I'm not!

I had my first turnip harvest of the year this week.  Those aphids that covered my peas several weeks ago have now moved on to the turnips.  Hopefully since they are mostly mature, the aphids won't have a big impact.  These turnips went on to get cooked (in my Instant Pot, which was way faster than boiling them on the stove top) and then mashed with some butter and salt.

I've also been harvesting plenty of greens.  Salads are being eaten at multiple meals a day here.  I need to get some summer lettuce started soon, since I have a feeling the spring lettuce is going to begin bolting.

I've also been picking and eating kale and Swiss chard.  I made a quiche with some greens and also some greens and cheese hand pies.  They end up in my breakfast every morning with eggs.

Peas have been abundant this week.  I only took a picture of some of the snowpeas, but there were lots of shelling peas as well.  We eat these raw out of the shell.  I keep thinking I'll have enough to freeze, but every day we end up eating all of the tasty, fat peas.

As for the snowpeas, they ended up in a tofu stir fry. Yum!

The strawberries seem to be on the end of their spring production.  This will probably be the last big harvest for the year.  It was delicious while it lasted and I'm pretty sure I made up my investment in building a bed and buying strawberry plants in the first year.

For the strawberries last hurrah, I made strawberry shortcakes.  They were delicious and also quite photogenic!

It has been raining almost all day and the week is looking very wet.  I need to take advantage of all the rain to do lots and lots of weeding and also get peanuts planted.

That's all the harvests coming from my garden this week.  To see what others are harvesting, check out Harvest Monday on Our Happy Acres.

Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard... Turnip Time

I've had a steady supply of turnips for about two months.  I'm not drowning in them, but every week brings about two or three turnips.  Normally I boil them and mash them like potatoes and add a bit of butter with salt and pepper.  After a couple of weeks, it was time to try something new.

So this week, my recipe attempt is a turnip soufflé.  I have never made a souffle before and went into this recipe completely naive about the difficulties of falling soufflés.  I also decided to alter the recipe because I thought it required way too much butter.  I cut the butter in half, but didn't change the amount of flour and as I was cooking thought that this might be a problem.  I also replaced the heavy cream with 2% milk.  I'm posting the original recipe since I'm no soufflé expert.

Turnip Soufflé

SERVES 4 – 6

This recipe is from Clementine Paddleford's classic How America Eats (Scribner, 1960).

3 medium turnips, peeled, trimmed, and diced
4 tbsp. butter
4 tbsp. flour
1⁄3 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp. yellow onion, peeled and minced
Sea salt and freshly ground white pepper
4 eggs, separated


1. Preheat oven to 350°. Grease a 6-cup soufflé dish with 1 tsp. butter, dust with flour (tap out excess), and set aside.
2. Boil turnips in a pot of salted water over high heat until soft, 8–10 minutes; drain well and mash until smooth. Melt remaining butter in a medium pan over medium heat. Add flour and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes. Stir in cream and mashed turnips and cook until thick, about 5 minutes.
3. Add onions and salt and freshly ground white pepper to taste. Remove pot from heat and gradually stir in egg yolks. Transfer mixture to a large bowl and set aside.
4. Whisk egg whites in a large bowl until stiff peaks form, gently fold into turnip mixture, and spoon into prepared dish. Bake until puffed and golden, 35–40 minutes.

This is how mine turned out:

With a not so happy looking face in the center!  I am still no soufflé expert, but I thought it was fluffy and yummy.  I definitely don't taste turnips in this recipe, so if your tired of turnips and have a pile of them, you should try this recipe.

If you want to peak into other kitchens and see what others are cooking, head over to Thursday’s Kitchen Cupboard at the Gardener of Eden.

Harvest Monday

Not much harvest to report this week.  I pulled a couple of turnips to cook and mash with some stored potatoes to go with meatloaf (and lentil loaf for me, the vegetarian). 

There's more to harvest in the garden, but I just don't have time this week to cook. This is a nice thing about fall/ winter gardening- there is no hurry.  My lettuce, broccoli, radishes, and cabbage that could be harvested today will not bolt if I leave them for another day.  I'm enjoying the slow pace of cold weather gardening.  I don't get overwhelmed by produce that needs to be picked and put away now.  It's not a race to harvest before bolting or before veggies grow to overripe sizes.  Slow and steady is more my speed!

To see what others are harvesting check out Harvest Monday at Daphne's Dandelions.

Harvest Monday

This week we greeted our first frost here in South Carolina.  I've still been harvesting strawberries and I'm surprised that they are still producing, but no complaints!

 

I also harvested some peppers (covered during the cold nights) and some peas:

I have never grown turnips.  How do I know when to harvest??  They don't look as big as I thought they would be, but I don't want them getting woody. 

My main causality in the frost was the basil:

I've got plenty of pesto frozen and plenty of dried basil to get me through the winter months, so the frost wasn't a tragedy.  The basil is now my Halloween decor!

I hope everyone had a Happy Harvest Monday!  To see what others are harvesting check out Harvest Monday at Daphne's Dandelions.

Revisiting those October Garden Goals

A new month is sneaking up around the corner, so it's time to check on those October gardening goals.

• Clean-up garden:  I finally parted with the tomatoes, still have some paths to rid of weeds and grass.
• Harvest peanuts:  Peanuts are drying at the moment, one more week until roasting and eating!
• Dry herbs: Mint, basil, and oregano are currently drying in the potting shed.
• Plant garlic:  I didn't plan ahead with my garlic and did not order any, so I ended up going to the grocery store and buying a couple of organic garlic bulbs.  I've never grown garlic before and I'm hoping they will grow!
• Order bulbs: Sadly, bulbs did not fit into my budget this year.  I had some way too expensive car repairs (very angry at Toyota right now!!) and decided that flower bulbs were going to have to wait until next year :(
• Add compost: I got my alpaca manure and added it to the beds I cleared.  There will be more to do as the fall crops finish and I clear the eggplants and peppers. 
• Plant cover crops: I have three beds with cover crops growing.  Just planted the peanut beds with cover crops and hope they will germinate.  I had read about planting cover crops around fall crops.  I tried this with my brussel sprouts, but it seems the cover crops are taking over!  I do like the look of cover crops.  Nice to have something green instead of exposed dirt.

• Mulch:  The trees haven't dropped many of their leaves yet, so this is going to have to wait until next month.
• Make cold frame: I'm having two cold frames.  For one I am using the bottom of the trellis frame for the structure.  The other I assembled with plastic tubing and rebar.  I will be covering these with Agribon+ AG-19 row covers.  Hopefully this will work!

• Finish planting fall garden:  Fall garden planted!  I realized I've never grown turnips and even though they look smaller than I expected I'm afraid those lines might mean they are getting overripe.  Should I pull them??  

• Paint potting shed trim:  Definitely made progress, but not completely done.  One more side of trim to paint.

Not too shabby for October!  November should be a bit less busy, which is  good because I`m ready for a break!