Arugula sprout for the Fall garden.

Sprouts

Only about 36 hours since planting and the radishes are already sprouting!

Fall Garden

After being part of a community garden through church this year, I am going to attempt a back yard garden for the fall.  Last week I went and bought some lumber to make two raised beds six feet in lenght, four feet wide and one foot deep.  I picked out the best spot I can find on in back of the house which is facing south.  Unfortunately there are a couple large trees that will provide some shade.  Maybe one or more of the trees can go in the future, but for now we'll just see what works.  I was not able to build the beds right away so I planted the seeds in a starter kit and hopefully will get the beds build this weekend.  First frost is around the third or fourth week in October, which give me around 45-52 days.  I planted  radish, beet, zuccini, chard, broccoli, snap peas, spinach, kale, and bush beans.  The only questionable ones are the zucchini, peas and beans.  There may not be enough time to get a harvest from these and even if the plants are okay, the pollinators by be all gone by then.  Oh well, it will be info for next Fall at the very least.

Radish (sparkler) are supposed to be 25 days to harvest.  Target date 10/1/11.  I could probably get another crop if I sew more seeds in a couple weeks. (Conventional seed)

Beets are Detroit Dark Red, 58 days to harvest.  Target date 11/3/11. (Organic seed)

Zucchini (black beauty) are 50 days to first harvest.  Target date 10/19/11(Organic seed)

Chard (green) is 55 days to harvest.  Target date 10/24/11 (conventional seed)

Arugula is 30 days to harvest.  Target date 10/6/11 (conventional seed)

Broccoli (green goliath)  is 60 days to haravest.  Target date 10/29/11 (conventional seed)

Snap peas (Burpee) are 70 days to harvest.  Target date 11/15/11 (conventional seed)

Spinach (Teton Hybrid) is 45 days to harvest.  Target date 10/14/11 (conventional seed)

Kale (dwarf blue curled, Vate's strain) is 60 days to harvest.  Target date 10/29/11. (conventional seed)

Bush Beans (burpee tenderpick)  is 50 - 60 days to harvest.  Target date is 10/19/11 to 10/29/11 (conventional seed)

Can't wait till the seeds start sprouting!

Dinner

Dinner tonight was leftover chicken shepards pie with steamed kale and green beans.

The shepards pie was made by mixing frozen mixed vegetables, diced onion, diced eggplant, diced and boiled chicken breast, cream of celery soup, salt and pepper. When I went to make this I was surprised to find that you can get organic, condensed soup at Whole Foods. I had never seen any condensed soup other than Campbells. It's a good idea when making this to get the low sodium soup if you can, otherwise it can come out a bit salty.

The kale and green beans were steamed then topped with a bit of ume plum vinegar. Ume plum vinegar technically isn't vinegar, but it tastes yummy. The kale and green beans were both harvested from the community garden.