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Earl Aagaard’s opinions about everything that interests him. Og also enjoys gardening, travel, reading, woodbutchery, and lots of other stuff.

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Monday, August 30, 2010

NEW HARVEST!!

Another red-letter day, as we picked our first STRAWBERRY!!
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There’s another (small one) on the plant, getting pink at the moment….plus a couple of flowers that look like they’ll produce berries of their own, if we can keep things going long enough.

We cut this one up to share among three - the consensus was that it was definitely a strawberry, although not a terribly SWEET one!

This is Bend gardening, I’m afraid….one of each thing.

Posted by Earl on 08/30 at 05:47 PM
Family Matters • GARDENING •

Monday, August 23, 2010

MY OWN PICKLING CUCUMBER

It’s probably says something significant about gardening in Bend that I’m posting the harvest of a single pickling cucumber!!
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Posted by Earl on 08/23 at 10:54 AM
Family Matters • GARDENING •

Monday, August 16, 2010

PEACHES FOR THE FREEZER

For most of the spring, every peach I bought (and I kept buying - hope springs eternal) turned out to be a CLINGSTONE PEACH, a variety I’ve been familiar with (and highly unimpressed by) mainly as commercially canned peaches - halves or slices.

Then, out by Home Depot a couple of weeks ago, I stopped at the stand by the exit of the shopping center, where a family from THE DALLES has been selling fruit this spring. I’ve bought cherries (two kinds and wonderful) and apricots (not so wonderful, though better and cheaper than the markets) from them, and this time they had peaches that looked familiar - I asked if they were cling or freestone. They were RED HAVEN PEACHES, a freestone variety I’m not all that familiar with, as the Central Valley was pretty well solid with FAYE ELBERTA peaches, which must really be suited for that area. Anyhow, I bought a couple of pounds of his Red Havens for $1.50/pound, and they were wonderful
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Posted by Earl on 08/16 at 06:14 PM
Family Matters • COOKING •

Sunday, August 15, 2010

FIRST (MAJOR) HARVEST…..

Well, the title seems to denigrate the basil harvest pictured and described in THIS POST ON COOKING - if you’re really keen, you can scroll down and have a look. But, wonderful as basil is, it’s “leaves”...and a garden ought to be producing fruits of one kind or another….even in Bend.
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I’d been pretty confident of a zucchini for some time….but the first couple must not have been properly pollinated, because after a few days of promise, the end turned yellow and the entire fruit withered…..
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However, a few days ago, I was out looking at the little yellow tomato flowers I could see from the kitchen window, and caught a glimpse of darkness at the base of the zucchini plant….when I checked, here is what I found:
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Not just decorative, either….it was delicious!!

Posted by Earl on 08/15 at 11:07 PM
Family Matters • GARDENING •

Monday, August 09, 2010

BEEF JERKY FROM YOUR OWN KITCHEN

BEEF JERKY holds a very special place in my list of comestibles. Partly because it just tastes SO GOOD, and also because of the associations with my youth. I don’t recall it EVER appearing at our home….but I had a paper route (delivering the SANTA ROSA PRESS DEMOCRAT around UKIAH, CALIFORNIA from a couple of months before I turned 12 until five or six months after my 13th birthday, when I broke my arm climbing around on the rocks of Indian Caves (apparently not called that anymore, as I can find no reference to it on the Web) in YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK.
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Posted by Earl on 08/09 at 08:46 PM
Family Matters • COOKING •

Sunday, August 08, 2010

COOKING IN BEND - UPDATED with PESTO and ROMESCO

Since retirement, I’ve had a lot more time to do things that have always interested me. I was always able to make time for canning and freezing things – applesauce was always the big one, and the whole family got involved in cutting up the year’s apples, and once they were cooked, in processing them through the “SQUEEZO” STRAINER, and BOY! am I ever glad I got mine in 1972….maybe Craig’s List, or your local thrift stores, or even garage sales, are better places to look for yours. Or, go with a KNOCK-OFF, and save some money that way. Of course, you don’t HAVE to get this type of strainer - I made 60 quarts of applesauce last fall without mine.

Anyhow, this post is just to show some of the stuff I’ve been cooking – and I guess I’ll include a link to the recipes each time…. So, first:
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Posted by Earl on 08/08 at 12:24 AM
Family Matters • COOKING •

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