Growing Gazpacho

One of my annual edible-garden goals is to grow gazpacho.  Since it's hard to actually grow soup, I'll stick with growing all the soup's ingredients.  Something I've not yet managed to do, though many years I come fairly close.

Here's today's harvest:

un-processed gazpaho

A few notes about that photo.
1.  The garlic, obviously, was not harvested today.  It wasn't even grown by me (my first gazpacho failure of the year: my garlic didn't bulb), but given to me by a friend. 
2.  See those nearly-black peppers?  They're the first carnival peppers I've picked this season
3.  Where'd that cucumber come from?  Didn't I rip out my monstrous volunteer last week?  Yes, yes I did.  But I have another volunteer, growing up the other side of the trellis arch.  This is the second of three cukes it has produced so far.  It won't get to 35, but it is making up for slow production with quality.  This cuke picture might just be the tastiest cucumber I've ever eaten (and those other 35 were pretty darn good). I'm not kidding.
4.  I tried growing onions this year, without success.  And my chives in a pot got rather dried up this summer; they're just starting to come back (you can see two little bits I snipped off, resting on the garlic).  So instead of my usual onion and chive ingredients, I'm using the green and white parts of some bunching onions, pictured.
5.  That's not nearly enough tomatoes for gazpacho.  Fortunately I have a friend with excess.
6.  I forgot to plant chervil this year (in fact, I've never planted chervil).  So the herb mix in today's gazpacho is basil, parsley, green onion (in place of chives), and tarragon.

How do I turn that into gazpacho?  I use a recipe I developed many years ago after a wonderfully yummy trip to Spain (where, in Sevilla, I tasted my first gazpacho:  I was hooked).  Upon my return home, I visited the local library (the interwebs weren't the bountiful resource of modern days) and checked out every book with a gazpacho recipe.  I could tell that none of the recipes was going to give me what I had tasted in Andalusia, but I was able to pull elements from this one and that one to get a pretty close approximation to what I wanted.  I've been using this recipe ever since.

Here's the basic recipe, with notes:
In a food processor, combine and process the herbs (about 1/2 cup packed.  My herb mix gets closer to a cup) and a clove or two of garlic.  Add 1/2 c olive oil and 1/4 c red vinegar (full disclosure:  I don't ever expect these to come from my garden) and process.  Add peeled, seeded, cored, chopped veggies (a small onion, 1/2 cucumber, the equivalent of a large bell pepper, and the equivalent of 4 large tomatoes). (Another disclosure:  I no longer go through the extra steps of peeling and seeding the tomatoes.  It's not worth it).  Process until evenly lumpy.  Add up to 3c of tomato juice and process to mix (at this point I have to take the soup out of the processor, and put it in a bowl with an immersion blender - my food processor isn't large enough to handle the full amount).

Serve garnished with chopped veggies and optional hard-boiled egg pieces (something else that will never come from my garden).

Cucumber Collapse

My volunteer cucumber has outperformed all expectations.  That's not hard to do when expectations were zero.  It was a volunteer after all.  But it outperformed any cucumber I've ever actually planted, too.

It was quite a vigorous vine.  Not growing tall, but spreading out everywhere, especially across the garden path and onto the patio.

Cucumber vine growing everywhere

Two cukes growing on the patio

But this volunteer was not invincible.  As cucumbers in my yard (and in the region in general) always do, it suffered from bacterial wilt.  Actually, a lifespan to mid-August is pretty good.


While it was producing, I harvested 34 cucumbers from July 6 to August 17.  One day last week there were 11 cucumbers in my kitchen.  I gave some away, but I ate most of them.  I averaged consuming half a cucumber per day.  While cucumbers are my favorite summer vegetable, sometimes the daunting task of eating the 6 or so cukes on my counter felt like a bit much.  But I persevered.

And today I took down the vine. I found four almost-cukes, ones that started rotting on dead vines before they were ripe.

Rotting cukes

Well, actually that pickle-looking one on the right hadn't started rotting yet, but it wasn't going to grow any more.

Now that the cucumber vine is gone, I can see just how much the scarlet runner beans were growing up in the same space.  I'm amazed they did so well.  Still no beans, though.

And as I was cleaning up the garden this evening, I found, hidden amongst the peppers and basil, one more edible cucumber.

Number thrity-five

Make that 35 cukes for my vigorous volunteer.

August 2012 Blooms

I'm determined to post my photos on Bloom Day this month, even though my garden has been less than showy this summer.

I think the most interesting blooms at the moment are in the veggie garden.  I have a new volunteer cucumber that's flowering and fruiting;

Here are the scarlet runner beans I couldn't show off Monday:

This pattypan squash is growing big, but that flower hasn't even opened yet.  I can' say I understand how that works.

On the flower front, I have some lantana still in its nursery pot.  But since I let the lantana plant in my pot out front dry up and die, I'll use this as a replacement.  If I ever get around to potting it up, that is.

Joe Pye Weed are starting to open up. I love the pink billowy flower clusters.

 Out front, I have no idea what this plant is.  I got it in a swap last year, and promptly lost the tag.  But it is starting to bloom now.

Also in the front bed, the catmint is still blooming, and the bush clover is just getting started.

Rudbeckia usually carry the garden through the summer, but this year many of them have dried up.  Here's one in the front that's still showy.

In the 'what are you thinking' category, a few spring bloomers are confused.  Butterflyweed and penstemon are reblooming.

To see more August blooms, visit May Dreams Gardens.

also blooming:  echinacea, coreopsis, gaillardia, geranium, aster, balloon flower, boltonia, buddleia, crape myrtle, white rose, larkspur, liriope, zinnia, mums, tall phlox

More Cucumbers

Since July 5, I’ve picked 17 cucumbers (or thereabouts – I may have lost count) from my one volunteer cucumber vine.  Five I’ve given away, and the rest I’ve eaten all by myself.  I adore cucumbers, but this is getting to be a bit much. 

Just some of the haul

Most I’ve just sliced into cuke sticks and eaten plain.  The few times I’ve actually had some tomatoes I’ve made greek salad (cucumbers, tomatoes, feta, and greek dressing).

Look, tomatoes!  From large to small: black from tula, maremmano, black cherry, sungold

Dinner

 Last week I decided I had time to make tzatziki.  I love this sauce, and it’s easy to make, but it does take some time (mostly waiting).  Strain the yogurt for an hour or two.  Peel, seed, and chop the cuke, and squeeze out the juice.  Mince garlic and mint.  Mix together.  Voila! (How do you say ‘there you have it!’ in Greek?)

When I stopped at the store to but the plain yogurt and pita chips, I was inspired to go the whole way and make gyros.  So I bought lamb and beef and flatbread, and came home to google gyro recipes.  I found this one from Alton Brown.  (I used half lamb and half beef instead of all lamb, because all lamb is a bit too much for me.)  I didn’t take a picture of the finished gyros, but here’s a leftover plate I made when I’d run out of pitas.

pita-less gyro

I definitely plan to make this again.

July 2012 - Belated Blooms

I took some Bloom Day photos a day late (I was traveling on the 15th), but neglected to do anything with them.  So here, 10 days late, I'll show you what was blooming way back when.

The reality:  not much.  It's been hot and it's been dry, so there's not a lot to look at outside the veggie garden.  Coneflowers and Rudbeckia, my summer staples, have even been looking sad and wilty.  The annual rudbeckia dried up and called it quits.

The front garden is the star this month, if anything really stars in my seemingly barren yard.  Along the front walk are some zinnia.  I started these from seed and transplanted them in late spring.  I always wish I had more of them.  Perhaps I should try direct-sowing.

In the front bed, the self-seeded four-o'clocks are doing their thing, filling in the otherwise blank spaces.  Catmint is still blooming along also, if sporadically.

I have cannas in that bed also.  I grow them for their tropical foliage.  Mine have never flowered, and I've been okay with that.  So I was surprised to see this plain-leaved one in bloom.

Around back, phlox are brightening up the garage bed

The structure there was supposed to hold cucumbers.  Only one seed sprouted in that new location, and it hasn't done much.  That's okay, I have more cucumbers than I know what to do with, thanks to a volunteer in the main veggie garden.

Volunteer Cucumber

I've been away for about a week, and I'm really behind on posts (more behind than just that week).  I do intend to catch up sometime.  But something really exciting happened this evening that I have to share:  I found a cucumber!

OK, so one might expect to find a cucumber in a veggie garden.  I have them every year.  Why is this one so special? 

First, it is a volunteer cucumber.  Grew up all by itself.  I had several volunteers this year.  I accidentally weeded one.  I tried to transplant another (it died).  And the third one I just let be, even though is was growing next to the arbor where I'd planned to plant beans this year (crop rotation and all...).  Well, this one plant is trying to take over my whole garden.  I think it tripled in size in the week I was away.  (Sorry, it was too dark when I was out this evening to take a pic.) 

Second, I had no idea it was there.  Last week the vine had a bunch of flowers, and if I squinted just right I could pretend there were baby cucumbers behind some of the flowers.  Tonight I was happy to see actual cucumbers growing; some should be ready in a few days.  Then, as I moved some lower leaves to pull a weed, I saw a perfect, full-grown cuke:

I brought it inside, peeled and sliced it, and ate half of it right away.  It was delicious in that way the first cuke of the season always is.

Plus, it made me feel less guilty for eating all that fried chicken for dinner.

Cucumber

My veggie garden hasn't produced much this summer, but I have had a few cucumbers.

I planted three varieties this year: Marketmore (my tried-and-true) and Poinsett, both of which I started form seed; and one plant I got in a swap this spring. It was labeled white something-or-other, and I was instrigued that if might be white-skinned.

I picked the first two cucumbers last week. The "white" one is the larger, and the other is Poinsett. I picked a Marketmore a few days later, but no picture.

They are all yummy. I'd say it was a waste to plant the extra non-white cucumber, but that one vine is larger than all the others combined. I think it may be the one to keep me in cukes through the summer.