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All posts for the month October, 2012

Phoenix rising

Posted by gardenpathfood on October 17, 2012
Posted in: Autumn foods, Autumn jobs, Eating Seasons, Food, Spring foods, The plants in my garden, Winter Foods, Work Season. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Like a phoenix rising…well not from the ashes but I do decapitate them.

Commercially leeks are usually plucked out roots and all but I cut them off with a sharp knife just slightly below ground level, and they regrow. Normally I let those go to seed to produce babies somewhere in the garden.

Although my leeks, particularly the regrown ones are not as long as commercial leeks (look at the climate I live in), each one I cut usually provides the two of us us with all we need for an additional steamed vegetable.  Instead of letting this one go to seed, I will see if we can cOctober Gardenut it and go for a third use.

I love the look of leeks and onions in the garden.  They provide structure, colour and texture.

Even pure vegetable gardens can be amazingly  decorative and look so different at the change of season but I also love the look of edible plants in the decorative garden.  See my next post.

Parsley, Parsley everywhere

Posted by gardenpathfood on October 9, 2012
Posted in: Autumn foods, Eating Seasons, Food, Health, Links to other sites, Recipes, Spring foods, Spring Jobs, Summer foods, Summer Jobs, The plants in my garden, Winter Foods, Work Season. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

I’m told that you never let parsley go to seed, so every now and again it needs to be cut back, especially in spring.

Tabbouleh using quinoa

So, fighting off the mating brown snakes in the garden, I did that and then decided to make tabbouleh with the cuttings.

I’m not a great fan of tabbouleh usually, especially the commercial variety but I found this recipe  at http://allrecipes.com.au/recipe/4827/quinoa-tabbouleh.aspx

and it is really good.  It uses quinoa instead of burghul and quite a lot of lemon juice.

Parsley has a lot of health benefits including being full of anti-oxidents but you can find them out for yourself by visiting http://www.nutrition-and-you.com/parsley.html

Wholefoods in October

Posted by gardenpathfood on October 7, 2012
Posted in: Eating Seasons, Food, Recipes, Spring foods, The plants in my garden. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Today’s Haul

This was the basis for our dinner tonight.  All of these things are most definitely in season at home at the moment.  As my husbands says ‘Something that cooks up as dark and fresh looking as the silverbeet, has to be good for you.’

I usually add a tiny bit of fresh lemon juice to the kale and silverbeet after cooking since I like the tang that it adds.

This lovely fresh asparagus requires nothing of course and can be eaten raw in salads or very lightly steamed with the other greens.

We usually eat the leeks lightly steamed but I know a lot of people only eat them in casseroles.  We love them just as they are as a vegetable in their own right.

What do you do with leeks?

Kang Kong

Posted by gardenpathfood on October 6, 2012
Posted in: Eating Seasons, Links to other sites, Spring foods, Winter Jobs, Work Season. Tagged: , , , . 3 Comments

I have a water trough left over from the days of owning horses and it has just occurred to me that I can use it to grow some edible water plants.

I already grow water chestnuts in the pretty feed tubs we had for the horses so what else can I grow?

Fortunately I came across this great site (see below).  I’m thinking that Iwill give Kang kong or water spinach a go and maybe buy some little fish to keep the mozzies away. Not that I have any problems with mozzies in the water chestnuts.

http://permaculturepathways.blogspot.com.au/2011/01/get-started-growing-food-part-6-edible.html

These guys are based in Eudlo on the Sunshine Coast, whereas I am in Western Queensland but the water chestnuts do pretty well here so I don’t see why the spinach won’t. I’ll let you know when I get it going.

And maybe some more water chestnuts would be good since the more I have, the more we seem to eat.

This will be my next project.