Wayne

@Thanks for the Crepes Nice quote. Good points made by all however for me the garden is also a place of refuge and contemplation. At the risk of sounding silly let's call it the Zen of Gardening (similar to the Zen of Fishing).

After about 12 hours all the radishes are uniformly stained.

@Chris Ward I can still remember the first time I was served braised radishes. Delicious and transformed into something completely different.

@Wild_Yeast Here are the daikon and watermelon radish pickles. The recipe is the same as the daikon and carrot pickle recipe from Andrea Nguyen's 'Into the Vietnamese Kitchen'. This is about a 1:1 ratio since I'm thinning the radish plants but is illustrative of how the colour bleeds into pickling liquid.

Unfortunately the city I live in is firmly rooted in the 1960's with respect to policy concerning horticulture. It's got to be weed free grass. Species of trees on municipal property is very limited (likely a result of not creating a disease reservoir with potential for damaging the area's commercial orchards). There are fruit trees on private property and indeed I have an arrangement with two of my neighbours to pick their unwanted cherries and apples.

Just started 'Real Food Fake Food' by Larry Olmstead.

@Smithy They taste like a citrusy cucumber and are eaten whole like a grape. Younger children find them fascinating compared to a watermelon. @Okanagancook Thanks. For such a small footprint they provide all season and lots for the freezer. Grape harvest for sparkling wine started about two weeks ago here.

I've been a silent lurker on the original thread and have to say I envy your access to relatively pristine wilderness areas. I live in an area where although there are lots of opportunities to forage the area leaves a lot to be desired. The vast majority of the area is industrially farmed and the runoff (with all the attendant pesticides, fungicides, herbicides ...) for the peninsula's watershed generally passes through areas that would be ideal for foraging. It's easy to determine what is used as it is all published as Application Schedules and Protocols. I'm fortunate in that I have friends on whose land I can forage however it is limited in area and scope. I'm looking forward to your book's release and wishing you success.

@Shelby Beautiful melon. It's one of things I've never had any success growing primarily due to the endemic powdery mildew in my area. Many a year I put in and babied the vines to end up with one or two stunted fruit. I've been off-grid for awhile and returned to find the fall plantings I put in before leaving starting to show some life. This bed, which originally was planted last fall with garlic and harvested in July was replanted with bush bean (lower half) and the top half reconditioned then later planted with beets, daikon and watermelon radishes. Once the bush beans had given their all they were removed, the soil reconditioned and replanted with more beets, bok choy, tatsoi and a variety of lettuces. Other beds have more lettuces, radicchio, spring radishes, more beets and a Hail Mary final planting of bush beans. There are still lots of chard, kale and collards and these will last until they're killed by frost. Habanero peppers. With this hot summer all the hot peppers have been very productive. I found this growing a few months ago from the gap between the fence boards and let it grow. I last planted these two years ago so it was a bit of a surprise to see it. Mouse melons (Melothria scabra) beside cherry tomatoes for scale.

I've had this on hold at my public library and they've just received their two copies so I should have it in hand by early next week. Looking forward to it after reading reviews.

Really can't come up with anything. Looking at the photo with respect to the woodworking, and comparing it to the finishing on the rest of the object, I'd guess the depression was formed with an adze and the state of the wood suggests whatever it held had a significant affect to get into the grain. I can't see the original maker carefully bevelling all the edges and then hack away at the depression and leave it like that.

@DianaB From the photos I can narrow it down to 3-4 genera most of which are toxic. I would suggest contacting a local Mycological Society to get a firm identification.

Nice report however I had to laugh as what immediately came to mind was Mr. Wensleydale from Monty Python's Cheese Shop skit .

How about a heavy duty rolling pin with handholds also used for crushing (sort of a rolling mortar)?

I've cured and smoked some of the catch from a recent fishing trip. Starting material: These are the 'tails' (fillet posterior to the vent) from four freshwater Chinook/King/Spring salmon. Caught weight was 23, 21, 16 and 11 lbs. The tails on the lower right have a different colour due to that individual's diet. Fillets were dry-cured with a coarse salt, brown sugar, black pepper, touch of mustard powder and fresh tarragon. Fillets were then bagged and weighted and allowed to cure for four days. Turned every day. They were then rinsed, dried and allowed to form a pellicle overnight. The cure resulted in a 14% weight loss. Ready for the smoker. Smoked at 200 F. to an internal temperature of 140 F. with some pecan chips. Since I was using the smoker I also smoked these Jalapenos from the garden. Final product: Turned out very nicely. They're headed north with me (except for the piece I tasted in the lower right corner). Jalapenos got skinned, seeded and will be frozen for winter use.

@Wild_Yeast Nice. I'll be putting up batches of that starting in about 3 weeks when my daikon is ready for harvest. I also like to throw in a few watermelon radishes which bleed out a nice mild red tinge to the pickle.

@Thanks for the Crepes Around here it grows in anything: loamy soil, sandy soil, clay soil...it even grows in the cracks in concrete and asphalt .

@ElainaA Thanks for your kind offer however my neighbors would be more than happy to have me harvest their purslane On a more serious note give it a try. Add the leaves as a component of a salad. They have a mild succulent texture and a citrusy flavour. I had the same thinking outside the 'acceptable food' box. And yes the endemic blight in this area was non-existent this season however I still suffered from powdery mildew despite the drought conditions. @Bhukhhad I have tried them sautéed with other greens such as beet and chard and they work very well. @TicTac I use the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs Publication No. 505 'Ontario Weeds' as my go to. There are also many U Tube Foraging sites that go into detailed identification (although it would take a lot of wishful thinking to substitute another plant for Purslane). It is quite distinct. Nutritionally it contains high levels of omega 3 fatty acids. Lots of info online.

I was out picking early this morning and got tomatoes, bush beans, early beet greens, early watermelon radishes, herbs and hot peppers. This has been an interesting gardening season so far. Earlier we had high temperatures and drought conditions and now we have high temperatures and some rain. The conditions have affected different things in different ways (such as 3 months! to get usable garlic chives) however the clear winner has been hot peppers. I've got twenty plants comprised of Hot Portugal, Habanero, Cherry Bomb, Jalapeno, Aji Limo and Fish and they are prolific and HOT. This is the first time I've ever gotten ripe red Jalapenos. I've done ferments, made hot sauce, made Habanero jelly, eaten many fresh and still have piles in the refrigerator and many ripening in the garden. I know I'll end up freezing many whole to use over the winter. I was given a 3 inch seedling of Aji Limo in the spring and the plant is 4 feet high and 5 feet wide with somewhere between 200-300 developing peppers on the plant. There are garlic chives and Thai basil at the bottom of the bed. Aji Limo is a Capsicum chinense varietal as is the Habanero. Also due to the conditions this season I've been harvesting a lot of this by-product (what others call a weed). Sorry for the poor focus. Common Purslane (Portulaca oleracea) and I am unable to convince anyone that this is perfectly edible, tastes great and is a nutritional powerhouse. Anyone else eat and enjoy this?

@kayb It does indeed.

@Wild_Yeast Interesting process. A very different method than what I'm accustomed to but if it works I'm game to give it a shot when I can procure green mangos. A few questions. Do you notice during your initial brine treatment that fermentation is occurring? How active is the fermentation during the secondary sugar solution fermentation? My apologies for being overly analytical but I'm just trying to formulate the what and the why.

Ongoing lacto-fermentations: Starting from back row left: Cucumber spears with garlic, tarragon and mustard seed on day 2. Next is day 5 of mixed hot peppers with garlic. Next is green beans with garlic and tarragon (usually do these with dill but I seem to be on a tarragon tangent lately). Front row left is a completed 1:1:1 by weight Portugal Hot, Cherry Bomb and Habanero hot sauce with garlic finished with some pureed peaches. Next is day 2 of a 90% mash of habanero peppers and garlic for another hot sauce.

@Wild_Yeast Would you mind posting what you do? My only experience with mango pickle is the south Indian preparation.

You might be interested in reading this article by one of our local writers. http://torontolife.com/food/cooks-leaving-toronto-kitchens-corey-mintz/

@ElainaA Nice tomatoes. I've only grown the Jaune Flamee out of your varieties and would not do so again. I found them bland and went from unripe to overripe in a day. I'm putting the Chocolate Sprinkles variety on my list. I'm a big fan of black tomatoes such as Black Cherry and Black Krim for their depth of flavour and the Sprinkles should do nicely. We also keep a big bowl of tomatoes in the food prep area for snacking and, at least for me, inclusion in every meal.