On My Mind.

Following Rhonda.

                                                                                                                                  By The River.

Taken at this wonderful Place.

The Thief And The Sunflowers.

 

Little Thief!

This was last year.

This is this year:

 

Little Thief The 2nd.

Now they are kind of cute and most definitely entertaining for the dogs, the toddler and the rest of us.
However.
They would win hands down any and all food competitions.
They really are rats with a furry tail.
Which I wouldn't care if,
They were not also comparable with the amount of food they eat.
I don't care if they eat the bird seeds.
But.
Could they please leave my Apricots and Sunflowers alone this Summer, thankyouverymuch.

Twirling Your Way To a Recipe.

And here is the recipe!

                                  Pork Chops with a Mushroom-Sorrel Sauce

Cook the pork chops on medium-high heat until they caramelize but not until cooked through. Remove them from the pan and add a sliced onion and the mushrooms of your choice. Cook until the onion is golden and the mushrooms are cooked almost all the way through. Add the Sorrel and cream. Cook for 2 minutes and add the pork chops to the sauce. Cook together for about 15 minutes.

I served it with steamed Potatoes.

Everybody loved it including the toddler.

The Fog and The Quince Tree.

While the week-end was beautiful, sunny and dry, today started with a thick blanket of fog.

Droplets on the Fig tree branches.

Foggy Morning.

 

                                                       Water collects on Laurel leaves from the Fog.

We spent most of the week-end finishing digging in the future vegetable garden and going to nurseries to find a Quince Tree.  This was not easy. But it's easier than trying to find the fruit for sale at the markets in the fall. I can't really explain this actually. Quinces are a very very popular fruit in so many cultures ( from Asia to Mexico...to Spain... Membrillo anyone?), are so incredibly easy to grow and taste so heavenly that I can't quite explain why they are not more popular in the States. Maybe because for most varieties it has to be cooked before you can eat it?

 The Quince, Cydonia oblonga, is related to Pears and Apples and when ripe is yellow with a white-gray fuzz all over that needs to be wiped before cooking. The trees are extremely beautiful in any season: superb blossoms in Spring, the leaves in Summer are a medium green with fine white-gray hairs or depending on the variety, a dark smooth green, making a great contrast with the multitude of yellow pear shaped fruits hanging heavily from the branches. In winter the gnarly silhouette of the tree makes for an interesting focal point in the garden.
The quince probably originated in Iran thousands of years ago. It is now widely cultivated in all the Mediterranean basin and in Asia as well as South America. There are many varieties of Quince Fruit Trees ( not to be confused with the flowering quince tree Chaenomeles); mine is the "Smyrna', is self fruiting (and heavily at that) and could be as high as 20 feet if we let it. But we won't... we'll pruning at a height of 10 to 12 feet so that the fruit is easy to pick and , considering its location, does not put too much shade in the vegetable garden.
Growing a Quince tree is very easy: they have shallow roots and will grow in almost any soil, including clay like mine.

                                                 The Shallow Roots of a Smyrna Quince tree.

They thrive in moist soil and a warm site and benefit from fertilizing from Spring to Summer with a Seaweed solution. Few pests and diseases bother them except maybe fireblight ( they are related to Apples and Pears ). If your tree is affected, cut off the branches at least 12 inches below the signs of disease. And plant them where they'll get plenty of air circulation.

I'll post pictures of our tree as the months go by... and I'll also write of the many many recipes using quinces.

Did you know that you can even use the seeds as a remedy for coughs, including pneumonia?

What's not to love? Maybe I should dedicate my tree to the Goddess of Love like the Ancients did.

The Mushroom In The Sorrel.

Following This Lady, this is on my mind... spring and a Sorrel Bread pudding...

A Beautiful Day and Poop.

This morning we went to the zoo and got a (really rare) treat of french fries with mustard

                                                                      Almost 2....

Baby Girl skipped her nap so we headed out to the garden, played in the sand box and worked on putting some of this compost full of good poop...

                                                           Leaves, poop and worms.

There, also known as the Future Potager II

                                                                              Potager The II.

And then, then, we drooled other This

                                                                                                       Drool Worthy.

All of this under that sky

                                                                                             January 2011

The Mud, The Seeds and a Gardener's Happy Spot.

No, no, no, nothing salacious going on...
This is a gardener's happy spot:

Seed catalogs. Show me a gardener that doesn't like them. In the past I have ordered happily from Johnny's Selected Seeds and Renee's seeds. I also bought seeds from the local nurseries as well as a frightening number of plants, flowers and vegetables ( and let's not forget the trees ). Let's just say that moderation is not my first, middle or last name.
And this year, for the first time, I received a catalog from Baker Creek.
Oh dear. It took me days of looking at the catalog, then an entire day of harassing my family with what about this one, or that one? And what about this!? Did you see the warts, that's so awesome, rhaaaa the agony we don't have enough room, I have to choose, I can't stand this, honey can we buy the house next door to get a bigger yard?

Or move where we can afford 10 acres?

Sadly we are not moving but I finally managed to finish the order at 12:30 am. Their website is great. I love the comments on the products and ordering was easy and smooth.
Now we'll just have to see and taste the results.
Saying that I'm excited is an understatement.