Urban Leaves

Saving seeds... do we have a choice?

Natabar Sarangi - The Source from the source project on Vimeo.

World Kitchen Garden Day

World Kitchen Garden Day is an annual, decentralized celebration of food produced on a human-scale. It is recognized each year on the 4th Sunday of August.  It is an opportunity for people around the world to gather in their gardens with friends, family, and members of their local community to celebrate the multiple pleasures and benefits of home-grown, hand-made foods.

Here is the logo.... when you organise a get together you can download it and use it to attract attention.

Activities:
How people celebrate International Kitchen Garden Day and with whom is up to them. Some choose to do so in public ways with large gatherings of friends and neighbours, whereas others opt for a more intimate celebration with close family. Here are a few ideas for some activities you might consider organizing depending on the level of involvement you would like to have:

-a walking tour of gardens in your area
-a kitchen garden or local agriculture potluck
-a kitchen garden taste-test
-a harvest or planting party
-a benefit for a local food/gardening charity
-a kitchen garden "teach in"
-a single food theme party
-an activity at a local farm
-etc

See what they are organising in India at Urban Leaves ....

where this young lad was worried about his pet snail eating his spinach leaves, at a recent celebration in the garden!

 

 

 

 

 

In the USA its all about freedom.... freedom to grow food where you want to.... you won't believe this video.... it makes me feel sick to think that growing vegetables can be a finable offense!!

You can watch the video and read more here

THE TROUBLE WITH ITALIAN FOOD....

 

"The trouble with eating Italian food is that

five or six days later you’re hungry again."

~ George Miller

There are more and more blogs in Italy and some about Italian food. This quote and photo came from Aglio, Olio & Peperoncini and some ideas for polenta that make me go straight to the cupboard to start cooking lunch, before it is even 8am!

My favourite blog in Italy is Path to Self Sufficiency.... obviously not by an Italian but here is a lovely snippet from a recent post by Heiko ( a Dutchman, who was brought up in Germany and has lived in the UK for a long time and who now lives in Italy on the border between Liguria and Tuscany):

 

.......To put it quite simply, I really do not understand the concept of money. I mean it, I don't. I can just about follow why they invented it in the first place. Back in the days when humans just roamed the countryside, life maybe wasn't exactly easy, but it was simple. All you needed to sort out was who went foraging for berries and roots and who did the hunting. In the evening they all met up again and shared their spoils.

When they invented culture you could still manage quite easily. You hunted an extra wild boar or deer, picked a few more berries and invited the guy with the interesting metal contraption from the other valley to bring along some pina colada and the other chap who manages to extract those strange sounds out of an old goat skin to join your feast and hey, you had a party!
But once people started settling down people started to specialise. There was the cabbage farmer, the goat herder, the medicine man, the carpenter and the plumber. Once the cabbage farmer got himself yet another acre of land he needed a bit of help. But soon his workmen got bored being paid in cabbages, there's only so much you can do with them. So they needed to come up with some sort of currency, some sort of token with a value they all agreed on..... read on...

It gets better and better and is a great little story!

AN INDIAN INVITATION

Oh how wonderful it would be to be able to go to this. If there are any readers who are nearby, please go, and take some photos to show us. Sunita is a board member of Kitchen Gardeners International. Click on the poster to read.

Dear friends,

The Malnad Mela is back in Bangalore for the third year running!
Come and join us in this celebration of produce and local art from the Western Ghats. Explore the importance of seed biodiversity and supporting conservation oriented livelihoods that seek to preserve and enhance age-old practices. Take home traditional seed varieties and enjoy fresh vegetables from your very own home garden.

Date:     February 27-28,  2010  (Saturday & Sunday)
Time:    10 am to 6 pm
Venue:  4, Ashley Road, Off Brunton Rd (behind Hotel Ajantha on M.G. Rd),  
             Bangalore: 560025

 

Some of the produce and products from the forest home gardens this year include

• indigenous seeds
• wild forest foods
• traditional snacks and preserves
• spices
• honey
• dairy and poultry products
• kokam butter balm
• mud paintings
• vegetable hair dyes
• hand-sewn patchwork pieces
• yoga mats
• soap-nut scrub
• natural incense
• areca leaf plates
• seed jewellery
• herbal oils
• seed murals
• natural insect repellents ……and more.

We will also have products from the Concerned for Working Children (CWC), Kundapur and Himjoli, Himalayas.
This last year has been ecologically eventful with wayward weather (blame it all on climate change we are told!), failing crops, rising food prices, insane development plans, and the threat of having Bt Brinjal seeds on the market (fortunately thwarted for the moment thanks to people’s pressure). The hope is that our modest effort will help with seeking saner alternatives and pro-active responses to the current dismal state of affairs.
Thank you all for your encouragement and support. Please do pass this mail on to others you know or e-groups. Print out the attached poster if you can, to put up in your neighbourhood store, office, school, college or other place.
We look forward to seeing you again over the last weekend of February!
Regards,
Sunita Rao
94802 99200
Founder Trustee - Vanastree
www.vanastree.org

MY NEW HOME

On the 18th of January, I arrived in Hobart, Tasmania to stay with my friend Erica and her family for a couple of weeks, looking after their house and dogs and one lovely daughter for one of the weeks while the rest were away on holidays. Well,they have now returned and I am into the 3rd week, hanging around like a bad smell perhaps.... but I have been so enjoying Hobart and surrounds that I have gone and bought a house here!

 

When you buy a house you need to have a few things in your mind that are so important to you that if just one of them is not right, then you must not go ahead. To me these were:

 

 

 

• The main rooms must be filled with light all year round
• At least 1 acre of land (4,000 m2), already cultivated to some extent, and private
• Quiet..... no road or other noise
• Fertile soil
• Mains water inside and plenty of water for the garden
• Large kitchen
• Energy efficient heating /cooling, including a slow combustion heater
• House in sound condition
• Broadband internet available
• Not too far from a city (less than 1 hour's drive)
• Walking track suitable for taking a dog off the lead
• A nice setting and outlook.... water or hills views
• Flattish land

After these, there are some things that are preferable:

• Mains sewer, not septic
• Insulation
• A house with character and history
• Established fruit trees
• No tall trees on the northern side of the house or garden
• A verandah like Deb's... now I cannot find the photo to show you why!
• Solar panels / solar hot water heating
• Down to earth community
• Doesn't have things I don't want, that make it expensive for all the wrong reasons, like extra bathrooms, fancy kitchen
• Large building suitable for future Bed and Breakfast maybe

And here are some dreams:

• A creek
• A spring
• An established organic veg garden
• Cheap
• Within walking distance to some shops and a cafe
• By the sea

Built in or before 1910. Weatherboard.	A little dam fed by a winter creek. 1 acre	Excellent condition
Big, light kitchen; big, gas stove.	Location, location, location! But cheap!	Quirky with creek
Sheltered veg garden and fruit trees	Walk to shops and community garden	Sunny verandah

This gorgeous little house in Cygnet, Tasmania, has all of the "must have" requirements and most of the rest as well. There are a couple of extras that I am so excited about..... no water meters and mains water from the Huon River area which comes from the rain forests of wild south west Tasmania.... read that word.... RAIN forests! It has a creek and associated easement running diagonally through it which makes it impossible to sub-divide in the future which means it is much cheaper than other, similar properties. The local GP has a permaculture property rather than a fancy city house. There are blueberry and other berry and fruit farms, and even some organic ones. It is 5 minutes walk to the sea and it has never ever been 40 C .....!! And every few years it snows.... oh is this paradise or what?

 

Like Pattie, I thought I would have a competition  "Who will be the first blog-reader to come and visit me?"

Here is a photo of the future B and B..... but, as you can see, its not ready to use yet so you can sleep inside the house..... or in the quirky, old ship's wheelhouse in the garden !

There are more photos here.

Is anyone else having trouble with photos on Live writer?

SINK AND WALL GARDENS

A lot of vegetable gardening authorities, whatever that means, suggest planting vegetables on raised beds but in South Australia and a lot of other Mediterranean zones, this, to me is madness. In places where summer water is oh so precious, we do not need to provide drainage, we need to be preserving every drop of water for the plants. If you look at raised garden beds, you often find the paths, which are lower than the beds, grow lush crops of weeds and grasses!

Jude Fanton has found these beautiful gardens in the arid zone of western Rajasthan, India, which show what can be achieved when we look at our own environments and not those of people on gardening shows in other climates, even in the same country as ourselves.

I don't know if you remember my terracotta pots idea, but it comes from looking at my own situation and works wonderfully well in doing several things to help plants get through our extreme summer heat.

First, unsealed, unglazed terracotta is simply fired clay and is porous so the water moves very slowly out through the pot into the soil, keeping plants such as lettuce and bush beans turgid and fresh even in the full sun on days over 40C.

Secondly and probably equally as important, the water in the clay pot, covered with a tile, keeps the surrounding soil temperature from rising too high. It is high soil temperatures which damages the roots of plants and causes them to burn off, in extreme heat, and stop the roots sucking up water even if it is available.

For more on this experiment see these updates:

 http://hillsandplainsseedsavers.blogspot.com/2008/02/do-you-know-what-didnt-droop-today.html

Kate and the Beanstalk

Using tank water without a pump

Olives and Artichokes

Recently I experimented with another similar idea, where I put an open, plastic bowl full of water in the middle of a large, shallow tyre-pot and surrounded it with tiny, caterpillar-eaten bok choy seedlings. I could not believe the speed of their growth compared to seedlings I planted elsewhere and they were ready to eat in 21 days! I am not sure why it worked, maybe the water heated during the day and kept the soil temperature warmer over night..... maybe it was the humidity provided by the water..... maybe both.

Have you been around the world lately?

This morning I took a tour of some of the blogs we have listed in the side bar, under "Around the World in 80 Blogs".  I am so glad I live in blog-land, and can learn and laugh and wonder at all sorts of things people are doing in their back yards, allotments, window sills, balconies and in their research and handcrafts. Here are just a few, from Ireland, Japan, USA, Zambia, Singapore and Barbados.....

 

There is Peggy, of the Hydro farm allotment in Blarney, Ireland who is harvesting parsnips, Brussel sprouts, potatoes and one leek! She also has this lovely idea for some pots of flowers, that she calls tumbling pots.

Read more about Peggy :

Organic Growing Pains

Adekun seemed to be pining for parsnip seed to grow in Japan and has produced some edible parsnips at last!

Adekun's Japan Blog

 

Christa has Brussel sprouts growing under the snow at

Calendula and Concrete

 

 

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I love reading about Zambia and the work that Thulassy and 2 colleagues are doing there...... It really makes you think... a lot.

This is where it starts:

A farmer wakes at daybreak to ready his oxcart for the market.

He pulls his cattle from the crow and leads them into the yoke. He fastens a rope over the sacks of grain that represent a season’s worth of investment – money for seeds and fertilizer, a favourable rainfall, back breaking work to weed and harvest, and a lot of luck.

It’s cold and quiet. In the distance, the sky begins to glow with the rising sun. With a short whistle, he sets off on the first of many rocky miles, anxious for what awaits him at the market.

This is what we’re about:

The three of us work for Engineers Without Borders Canada in Zambia and Malawi, where we’re partnered with local organizations and companies that are working to include small holder farmers in agricultural markets.

This blog is a place for us to ask the question:

What does it take to make this work?

Read more at:  The First Mile

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Wilson is a wonderful gardener and writer in Singapore who I was lucky enough to spend a day with in September 2008. He has established a community garden and this food garden is an inspiration to many who live in apartments in Singapore. Here is a little from his latest posts:

 

Appreciate the beauty of Astonias

.....Besides being valued as handsome trees that profusely produce scented flowers, Alstonia has various other uses. The sap, which contain alkaloids, exuded from the bark of Alstonia has medicinal properties. The rather light timber fromAlstonia is used to make a range of products, from posts, coffins, corks, household utensils, floats to boards. In particular, timber from A. scholaris is used in the past to make writing slates for schools, which gave rise to the species name scholaris.

 

The Balsam in the Water

Waterlogged areas can be a headache for many gardeners as they can be expensive to improve for growing plants that demand a well-draining location....

....Like Impatiens balsamina, the flowers of Hydrocera trifolia yield a dye and the flowers of the latter are used to prepare a red dye for fingernails which serves as a substitute for henna (Lawsonia inermis). This use is behindHydrocera trifolia’s alternative common name, water henna.

This plant is easy to grow that are suited for growing inside or near the edge of ponds. Although aquatic in growth habit, one can also grow it in a pot of soil that is kept moist at all times. It thrives in semi-shaded areas to locations with full sunshine and can be propagated easily via stem-cuttings or via layering.

Read more at Gardening with Wilson

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Barbados.... and the dry season begins.... oh what diverse and wonderful things we can discover from blogs....

 

Now, this is an excellent use for a swimming pool that may no longer be wanted....

 

....For those of you who don't know tamarinds it is the most sour of fruits. It is a pod fruit and can be used green and dried. As a child in Trinidad we would eat it with salt and pepper or rolled in sugar into a ball. I used to boil a syrup with it and add spices. It was delicious. In Barbados they would put it in cane syrup in a crock and leave it for several months to a year. That is sooo delicious , my mouth is watering now that has a unique taste and is no longer found.

 

Visit Barbados and read about the island gal .... I loves to cook for company and adore a fusion of various cuisines. I speak some french with some degree of fluency having studied Pattern making in Paris many many moons ago. I work as a water garden consultant and my husband and I grow water lilies.

Read more at My Rustic Bajan Garden

DANISH SEEDSAVERS ANNUAL MEETING

I love reading the blog "In the Toad's Garden" by Skrubtudsen in Denmark. And I noticed he has recently added this blog to his reading list, so I thought I would pop over to Denmark and see what's been going on there lately.

He has been to the Danish Seedsavers annual meeting and visited some interesting and beautiful gardens, such as this culturally diverse one, as he describes....

From Toftegård we drove to the allotments in Ishøj. It was exciting to see how much can be grown, when 100 sq.m. is exploited intensive. Ishøj is know for its large immigrant community. The allotments is a cultural melting pot, where people with very diverse cultural heritage meet each others gardening culture. Some are faithful to their origin, others are more curious, letting themselves getting inspired to grow new crops and grow in new ways. The joy of gardening prevail, almost every gardener there seems to share it. Almost, because here like every where some people with good intentions are not able to keep the garden from growing in to weed and wild trees. But in this allotment they are willingly helping if allowed. An old man kept his garden very well, but has fallen ill this summer. Those who can keep his garden for the time being. He probably helped others in need at times.

We are so lucky here, in Adelaide in particular, that we do not need to grow our tomatoes and capsicums etc in glasshouses like this one but I would so love to go and see how things are done in such a cold place as Denmark one day.

GROWING NOT JUST FOOD BUT LIFE...

 

We all have plenty of these in our cities, suburbs and towns.

They are usually full of rubbish and weeds.

Councils spray them with chemicals to kill the weeds.

No-one takes charge of them... except the rats and snakes and foxes.

But in Seattle they call them opportunities.....

And turn them into tiny community gardens like this one, above. People take charge....and colour their lives.

 

The larger community gardens set aside a percentage of the space to grow food to give away and they maintain them with weekly working bees.... like this one... every Tuesday from 5.30 to dusk. Nice.

 

In Seattle they do other creative things too with public or community land....please click on the photos to get a better look....

Follow the water pipe down from the gutter on the roof.....	into 2 quirky tanks for the garden behind and then the overflow splashes down via a tin rubbish bin and 2 metal bowls.....	....to a hollowed rock and then into a stony drainage area which waters the lawn ..... I love it!

 

So vegetable gardens and water facilities can be creative, interesting things ...which make them fun and inspiring and good places to be. They don't have to be just rectangular boxes with edges...

The community garden has escaped, below.... and is out in the street!

So, to all those who are helping create community gardens all over the world.... think outside the square.... invite art and nature in... grow not just food but life.

 

If they can do it in Seattle where the housing is like this.... we can do it anywhere.

SEEDS BELONG YU, MI

It was a fun evening meeting Jude and Michel Fanton, who started the Seedsavers Foundation in 1986, and watching the film they have made for the future survival of food and seeds in Polynesia, Melanesia and Papua New Guinea.

It was a delight to learn that they see seed saving a little differently these days, after experiencing such a diversity of cultures. In these villages scattered around hundreds of small islands, people don't fuss with names for different vegetable varieties and rarely try to keep seeds pure. If they happen across a different variety of something from another island, they are happy to try it out, let it cross  and evolve in a small area and see what happens. After all is said and done, these people are growing food because there is no choice for them. All they need is a range of foods to grow and if they produce well, are resilient and tasty then who cares what its name is or where it came from?

This is the way we have tended to do things in our seedsavers group, mostly because we are not purists and often we forget the names for things and have tended to say "here is some seed from the cos lettuce I got from Joy"...... and this soon becomes "Joy's cos lettuce" and everyone knows what we are talking about in our group. I have containers of seeds labelled in this way, such as  Kath's broccoli, Deb's carrots, Barb's snake beans, Cath's yellow capsicums and so on. If they cross a bit it introduces more genetic diversity and this may or may not be good.

My version of Kath's broccoli crossed with my own cavolo nero (kale) and the result is that some grows as kale and some as sprouting broccoli, but I have lost the good broccoli heads so I will have to hope someone else has that seed still and try to stop that happening next time. Or do as I do with Joy's cos lettuce and that is just get fresh seed from Joy, as she always saves plenty.

So, within a group of people it is possible to have unique names circulating, things crossing and evolving for better and worse and at the same time, some pure varieties becoming more and more adapted to our own conditions, like with Deb's carrots. I have never been much good with carrots until Deb gave me some seeds from a variety she has been growing for 20 years. Since that is now the only one I grow, and I always have success with it, I am set for carrots. But I would like to mix my seeds in with hers now and again to maintain the genetic diversity to keep them robust.

 

People of these Pacific islands are often naive about western ways and think it must be better to follow these persuasive salesmen who seem to be offering them a better life. This research of Jude and Michel's, culminating in this film, shows the pitfalls of losing their traditional methods and the dangers involved in changing to chemical agribusiness. It gently encourages them by showing the joy and community involvement in their current lives compared to the solitary and dangerous existence of broad acre crops, based on chemicals and hybrids and GM seeds. Thanks , Jude and Michel, for giving so much of your time and your stories to all those who came on Friday night.

 

See more photos of the evening here. 

 

 

 

 

The film makes me want to spread the word not of any god but of the spirit of the seed knowing that as long as we have biodiversity, we have everything we need for a healthy and spiritual life. It really is that simple.

http://www.seedsavers.net/

DAPHNE, PEGGY and THE TOAD....

What a nice way to spend a little time, wandering about in a garden you hadn't taken enough notice of before. You can peek over the fence and see all kinds of things you know and don't know, when you go by yourself with plenty of time. I saw a few black aphids on the borage but then noticed the eggs of the predator lacewing and I knew Daphne's ecosystem was working to keep things in balance.

Her beans are very robust and may outgrow the corn that they are climbing on..... I look forward to seeing what happens there. And since I have visited her garden there has been quite a bit of rain to keep things looking fresh and growing well.

I had a lovely time at Daphne's, while she was out somewhere and I hope you will drop by too. She says we are always welcome, anytime. Here is her address. And here is the post that I took the photo from, all about her garden in June. Thanks Daphne.

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 In the Toads Garden  is about growing food and seed saving in Denmark

There is always so much interesting stuff in the toad's garden and I always learn something every time I go there. I just can't keep up with it all and find it fascinating that people can grow such a diverse range of vegetables even in very cold climates, such as Denmark.

......Red Russian is a different kale. The classic kale is deep green with curly leaves, whereas this variety has feathered leaves. Color is somewhat different, with a notable silvery shine. Taste is sweet, and raw leaves are crisp to the bite.

A villager probably recognise the colors from the swedes/rutabagas. Red Russian belong to the same species, whereas most other kales belong to same species as cabbage. When saving seeds it’s important to isolate from swedes/rutabagas and from other kales of this species, like the russian, siberian and baltic kales, as well as the north german scheerkohls. Read more about this here.

Thanks Skrubtudsen....

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It being the self-proclaimed "International day of vegetable garden blogs" I thought I'd take a little trip to Ireland, to Blarney, and see how Peggy is going with her allotment.

She has made a wonderful discovery....I collected 2 bags of compost from our municipal composter which I only found out about recently even though it is very near me!All green waste can be taken there and the finished compost is free to take away. Read more of this post here...

 

(There used to be a place like that in my council area until some idiotic neighbour complained and now it is a carpark! I hope they like it. Sorry Paggy, some things make my blood boil....)

Peggy's latest post talks about their allotment's open day On June 20th....I'd love to come Peggy, maybe next year!

Our Open Day is on Sat 20th June and this year we are going all out to have a super day with all of the new plot holders. Everyone can bring friends and family to view their own and others plots and we will be on hand to answer any questions. We spent the morning painting in glorious sunshine. Zwena has lots of old farm implements stored in the barn and outhouses so they are all being cleaned and painted and being put out on display as it has been a working farm for many years and the machinery tells the history of the place.

Her blog is called Organic Growing Pains. Thanks Peggy....

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HOME STAY IN INDIA

There is an Indian lady I know through KGI, called Sunita, who helps run Vanestree which is a small collective dedicated to promoting forest garden biodiversity and food security through the conservation of traditional seeds, in India. I was looking at the website and saw this page below  and thought wouldn't it be wonderful if we could help link people to home stays in places like this where visitors could learn so much, not just about another culture, but also about saving the seeds of what is their civilisation.

If you are thinking of a trip to India, please consider becoming a small part of saving Indian heirloom food crops from the ravages of agribusiness. I am sure your stay would be eye-opening and inspirational.

....The family has been farming here, near the village of Mathighatta, for generations. Their homestead features a plentiful garden and orchards, where visitors can learn hands-on about organic agroforestry or simply sit back and enjoy. The surrounding jungle contains natural and cultural treasures accessible through treks of various lengths; but innumerable varieties of birds, plants and wildlife are literally just at the back door.....

http://www.vanastree.org/homestays 

WILD RICE IN CANADA

I wanted to write a thing about special foods of the areas I visited but I had forgotten until this moment.....now I hope I can remember what I discovered!

I was reminded of this idea while just now reading the October/ November edition of Sumptuous (a magazine all about South Australian food and wine) where there is a thing about black rice which reminded me of wild rice.....

I was staying in Agassiz, an hour or so east of Vancouver, with Kathy-from-my-garden-group's parents. Agassiz is in the Fraser Valley, a food growing area for Vancouver and beyond. Rosemary and Garth took me to a house that simply had a sign outside saying .....Coffee Roasting and Pottery..... sounded interesting! Inside was a woman sitting at a potting wheel, who barely spoke at first, while we followed the signs about the coffee roasting going on behind the glass screen. She heard my accent and, as we were leaving, asked me what I was doing there, in a little town like Agassiz. We got talking and she was so wonderfully interesting I would like to have stayed longer, and written a whole thing about her.....but we were heading for the airport as it was my last day. I have her email address somewhere in my as yet not-completely-unpacked suitcase.....I must write to her.

Anyway, the gist of the whole wild rice thing is that she has a friend who is from an Indian tribe further north in Canada, where wild rice grows.....wild....it is native to Canada.....I didn't know that! Anyway, only the Indians from that area are allowed to go out and collect the wild rice, and she had some for sale in her coffee, pottery and now wild rice house/shop! Rosemary bought some of the wild rice, which is not rice at all actually, and I must ask her how she got on cooking it, but as I couldn't bring it into Australia I had to leave it for next time! It is so lovely to come across such stories quite by chance, rather than by taking some touristy trap....I mean .... trip! She also talked about her chooks and her vegetables garden and how there is an annual bike ride that takes in her place and other local growers and crafts-people during summer. She has a daughter in Japan.... and so the links went on and on.....until we just had to go. As I have written before..... the earth connects so many of us.

SEATTLE one of my favourite BLOG STOPS

I have been visiting Seattle online for a long time.
There are quite a few Seattle blogs I visit. So I just thought I would send greetings to all of you.

Melinda, One Green Generation, and her family and fellow bloggers of course.
Melinda has a list of North West bloggers on her site.

Tea and Cookies shows off Seattle as she spends time walking and writing and dining around Seattle.

Crunchy chicken and her Seattle buddies had a North West Bloggers meet up on September 7th this year. Melinda wrote about it on September the 8th.
It looks like it was a lazy afternoon for them getting together and meeting each other for the first time.

Crunchy has a very popular blog and many of her readers support her "Goods 4 Girls", check out her blog.

So I look forward to seeing some more of Seattle as Kate visits.

Amazingly a lot of bloggers do not show local gardens or local community gardens.
Come on gardening bloggers leave your back yards and show off your local community.

I also have read a lot about the wonderful markets and cafes in Seattle.
Seattle looks a great place to visit. I guess us South Australians just love the look of all that water and snow.

(You had best stay somewhere wet and cool Kate as it's starting to get hot and dry here.)

I wrote this in January when I was wondering what to do with all the chillies in my garden.

Chillies, Spring Onions, Zucchinis and Beans

I have a lot of chillies growing in my garden.This year I decided to grow some milder varieties.
I have ancho, pimento, caysan, anaheim, hot wax, Thai chillies and purple tiger.
I have been thinking of using them in Mexican dishes but I found this image when I was looking for chilli images.
It is a Thai lunch special from Fremont in Seattle. A Pad Thai recipe with things like zucchini, beans and spring onions all of which we have in our gardens at the moment.
I think it looks pretty good so as I can not get to Seattle this week I shall try a vegetarian version with the Thai chillies I have growing.
Click on Brad Hole's Review in the Seattle Weekly.

This recipe looks as good to me today as it did in January. I might make Pad Thai for dinner, we have a great crop of snow peas we have been eating as we garden but some of them be perfect in this recipe. We even have some Seattle dark beer brewing in the kitchen but this wont be ready for awhile.

I reckon if you want to encourage people to grow their own food, eat organic or get children interested in gardening, Snow Peas are the best crop to grow. Imagine a front yard full of sweet snow peas and friends and neighbours wandering around sharing a snow pea feast!
If you think I am exaggerating, garden gnome mentioned they have more snow peas than they can eat!
Well it's our allocated watering day so I had best get back out in the garden.
Happy eating and gardening in Seattle Kate and everyone else.
Maggie

GROWING PEANUTS

I was just reading about growing peanuts in Singapore, on  Gardening with Wilson .

He says you can just grow them by buying raw peanuts..... it is amazing what we can learn from each other. 

I will be seeing Wilson in Singapore early next week.

He writes......Do you know that the peanut is perhaps the only common legume that has its fruit development process all taking place underground? After the small, dainty, bright yellow flower fade, a peg is formed at the end of a long stalk which elongates and bury itself underground!  

eat, pray, love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Yesterday I had a memo from Unley library to say a book I had requested was now available for me to collect.
I had forgotten I had ordered it.
I remember someone recommending it through their blog, but who and when?
My first blog to search would be Pattie's FoodShed Planet and sure enough those 3 words eat, pray, love appear in her post list.
And it was just over a year ago that Pattie spent 3 days in a hammock and ate and prayed and loved her way through this book.

You could look up FoodShed Planet to read Pattie's comments.
Pattie says this:

"Although not a professed foodie or localvore, Liz does celebrate the unique beauty of local food throughout this book. The first question she asks in every town in Italy she visits is "Where can I get the best meal?" And it's always a celebration of local traditions and tastes, as well as a powerful way to connect with people. In India, she eats daily vegetarian meals at the Ashram at which she's staying, and Indonesia is full of healing food."

The first section of the book, eat, takes place in Italy.
Pattie says the book mentions local food, page 45 mentions roasted endive and on page 61 I notice the author is offered homemade limoncello.

Sound a bit like someone we know? who says she is always hungry.

HAPPY TRAVELLING KATE

So as Kate is about to spend quite a few hours flying around the globe I thought she might like to look out for this book.

If I am too busy reading to come back on line, have a fantastic trip Kate.

We will look forward to hearing all your tales and gardening experiences with our distant gardening bloggers.

And yes we shall grow some seedlings for your summer garden.

Have fun Kate, we shall miss you.

OZ ASIA MOON LANTERN FESTIVAL

Moon Lantern Festival

Send this page to a friend Your Details Name Email Address Your Friend's Details Name Email Address When Sunday 14 September 2008 Venue Elder Park Price 4pm FREE Duration 4 Hours FREE FAMILY EVENT OFFICIAL OPENING OF OZASIA FESTIVAL A CELEBRATION OF TOGETHERNESS DATING BACK OVER 3,000 YEARS On the 15th day of the eighth lunar month of the Chinese calendar when the moon is at its fullest and brightest, family and friends gather to admire the moon and think of absent loved ones. Enjoy community dance and music performances and workshops. As the moon rises, school children from across South Australia will parade their beautiful hand-made traditional and contemporary lanterns in the park. The evening will conclude with a diverse range of live performances by OzAsia Festival artists. Choose from a delicious selection of Asian cuisine on offer. Moon cakes and lanterns will also be available for purchase. TV personality Jemma Rivera will MC the Moon Lantern Festival. “The drawcard was a huge parade of kids bearing thousands of lantern creations along the Torrens edge as dusk settled.” –Adelaide Advertiser