Darienne

I need some advice about what to plant in my window garden. I have already grown green onions, and I can grow cherry tomatoes. I have a pot of basil to divide and I'll get Ed to buy me a pot of parsley if this is available. I know that Senior Sea Kayaker (hither-forth to be called SSK...sorry for the impertinence on my part) grows peppers, two kinds of basil and cilantro, etc. I'll go for the Italian parsley...not the cilantro...and I don't know about the peppers. What others things are recommended, please? And when should this or that be started? Don't go to any trouble please, just a few ideas...

Importance? Very. In this case, it's Granola bars that you can pick up and eat. That's the problem.

My problem is that I just don't really know enough about cooking to answer that one...which is why I am asking in this 'absurdly stupid' topic. I am older than dirt, but I only started 'cooking' just over a decade ago and still don't know enough so that I could answer my own question in this case.

I do use an unsweetened peanut butter and I could try that solution...but... OK. If nothing else turns up, I'll just do that.

Salt usually intensifies the sugar content I have read. I want to substitute something for the amount of sugar which is needed as a liquid binder.

I've just made a granola recipe and find the result far too sweet for my taste. (Ed likes it...but then...Ed likes Butter Tarts and I can't stand them.) However, the sugar ingredient in this recipe is maple syrup...1/2 cup..and it is part of the non-dry components which hold the recipe together. Peanut or other nut butter is the other non-dry ingredient. If I cut down on the syrup, the recipe won't hold together. Suggestions please.

Here's the website for the Mediterranean Dish recipe for the tomato soup recipe. https://www.themediterraneandish.com/vegan-roasted-tomato-basil-soup/#wprm-recipe-container-31232

Yes, I'll PM it to you.

Two more significant firsts today...well, no doubt no big deal for others... but important firsts for me. Corn Chowder and Tomato Basil Soups. The Corn Chowder is good, but the Tomato soup is out of this world.

Showed Ed your winter set-up and he has agreed to help me move my second desk which is currently parallel to my computer desk to under the window, just like that of Senior Sea Kayaker. I already have the wide window sill and now I'll have a second and slightly higher level to work with. And I'll scrounge for containers in the garage and up at the Drive Shed and if necessary at the local Restore (where they just adore Ed and fawn all over Miss Mandy.)

Thanks, but I would say that heat as a problem is now over in the far frozen north.

Thanks. Will do. I love basil. Pesto. Yummm. Oh, I do have the potting soil already from my outside dirt bag garden which gave me such wonderful tomatoes. I need to do some rearranging in my den. It had a wonderful big window with a south east view. I've grown many bits and pieces in this window but currently it's a bit obscured by furniture. I have a Spider plant in it which I bought from the local library about 3 years ago and it's taking over my life. I've already given the library 2 huge sets of babies and the plant is currently producing another set. It just won't quit. Maybe I'll move it back some to discourage it a bit and have other things grow. I do grown green onions year round already and I've grown grape tomatoes from tiny slices. I would love to grow more stuff but I don't have the energy or physical flexibility any more. (Short crab.)

A question from the ignorant: Ed bought me a basil plant from a grocery store and yesterday I used ALL the leaves on the plant making tomato soup ...my first time and I was blown away with the deliciousness of the result...but now my plant is denuded and all I have left is the stalks and the small leaves which I know will grow and be usable in some time. What do I do next about the plant? Or do I simply wait for the next leaves?

Right. The last two tomatoes from the same vines I am growing have not reached the heights of deliciousness as the first few.

I am so impressed with your gardening skills and that of others on this topic also.

I'm just overwhelmed reading these posts about the wonderful gardens you all have. So envious. I've just this little dirt bag affair and some of it never took hold at all. My days of major productions are long over. We did have vegetable gardens going back and for a few years we actually grew hardshell gourds, pollinating them by hand. That was then...this is now. I could add that I grow green onions all year long with good success. However, I do have a question arising from my tomato success. The beefsteak tomatoes were a great success and the taste of them was just perfect...the kind of tomato you eat right there in the garden without even washing it off and you can't believe that it tasted that good. And then you make a sandwich with them and think you've died and gone to tomato heaven. So...we've now purchased farm grown and ripened on the vine from two different local farms and while the tomatoes were so much better than grocery stores red cardboard replicas, they did not live up the that incredible taste of my beefsteak tomatoes. Is this common? Do beefsteak tomatoes taste different from say...Black Krims (about which I know nothing)? Any feedback appreciated.

A second Canadian and Ontarian welcome to the forum (although I was born a Québécoise). You'll find this a friendly place. Your marinated chicken looks scrumptious.

Absolutely adore fish and chips, particularly cod. ❤️ That's basically the only food we now eat outside our home.

Sorry I looked it up...

I love, love, love bacon. Sunday lunch is bacon and eggs and toast. Eggs fried in the way my French-Canadian Mother-in-law fried them. But the best part for me is the bacon...not crispy please!...put into the buttered toast with slices of tomato. If I ever get to Scotland, I'm going for a Bacon Butty for sure. As head cheese, another French Canadian speciality...gah...I'd starve first I think. I once covered myself with shame when a friend serving a group lunch for ladies brought out the pièce de résistance, a jellied pork terrine, and I, obviously shocked and without any thought in my head, blurted out something untoward...can't even remember what I said, except that it was inexcusable and no doubt I turned beet red. Oh, did I mention that jellied meats are not my favorites?

Will look into this one. Am currently looking at Edible Wild Plants by Lee Allen Peterson, son of the Peterson Field Guides originator. Our library does not carry that title, but just found: Feasting wild : in search of the last untamed food by Gina Rae La Cerva, Will reserve it. Looks interesting if not entirely useful for my purposes.

Just going back to page 1 and re-reading this topic. How lucky you both are. Within a 12 block area of where we live is absolutely nothing but farms and houses and trees and poison ivy and deer and coyotes and wild turkeys and even the occasional cougar. ...on the other hand, how lucky we are

We have quite a number of field guides in our lives already. Twenty-eight years on a farm in the middle of nowhere will do that to you. I know that some items would be safe to eat and indeed we do eat a number already...puff balls, River Grapes, Morels (well they are gifted to an aficionado), and the myriad of apple trees of all kinds ...but as long as I know there's a possible toxic version of some plant, then I don't feel safe enough to try the one we have. I have collected Butternut nuts in the past but alas they went mouldy before we could eat them. (We have about 5 Butternut trees on our land. Don't tell the Ministry.) I am going to look up the cherry plant today. We've just gotten back to the house and I brought the plant's leaves with me. Wonderful Peterson guides... Thanks for the offer. I do accept because you no doubt know of some resources we have over looked. The most painful loss is my late Father-in-law's tree book from the Ottawa Experimental Farm. Ed's sister has a sentimental attachment to the book and so we had to give it up. (I should never have told her that we had it.)

Curious, I decided to measure my kitchen counters. The sink counter is 36". standard counter height I believe. The opposite counter...we have a galley type kitchen... I had Ed cut down and it's only 34". And then I have a marble topped table, good for things like making confections and kneading on and it's 31" high. But then...I'm only 5'2" (now)...and these heights are good for me. I had aunts who were under 5' high...that was not unusual going back 50 years. If I were the now seeming standard female height of 5'9" or 10", the counters might seem to low. On the other hand, I can barely use our chest freezers and my new washing machine and I know my sister-in-law, who is shorter than I am, has a great deal of trouble with these items and so now has a front loader washing machine because she just can't handle the regular top loading ones. So your height would make all the difference in the world.

I know about them but have never encountered them. I must Google this and find out what the tree/bush looks like. We do have unidentified berries on the farm...wild varieties of cherry I guess...but I am too hesitant to try any of them in case they are poisonous. Where's a field naturalist when you need one???? For instance, we had all these plants each year which I think might be Fiddleheads but I can't tell for sure. Or what about the various wild plants/weeds/herbs we could use or eat? We really need a field naturalist for a friend.....hmmm.....