Okanagancook

haresfur: The raised bed looks like it is fabricated out of metal. Is it aluminum? that is brilliant. We made our initial raised beds out of regular two by eights that I painted twice but after 8 years they started to rot. Now we are using some kinda treated wood that is ok for growing veggies. Not sure what it is called as my DH did the purchasing. We have a large bed that needs replacing so this metal may be the way to go. How are they attached at the corners if you don't mind explaining. Asparagus is difficult to get going. We planted four seedlings last year and only one made it. We have a stand of wild asparagus that does well if one ignores it :-) cheers,

thanks, we had it fabricated and have done about 20 pig roasts and 3 lambs.

Today's haul. Dug up most of our potatoes. Those big tomatoes are Cherokee Purples. First time I have grown them. Saw a whole show on them with It's a Chef's Life. They are very juicy and for us they are not getting blossom end rot like some of the varieties I have been growing in the past, early girl comes to mind

Dinner the next night after the pig was 18 egg yolk pasta from Flour + Water along with a sauce made with freshly picked tomatoes and homemade Italian sausage and that zuc salad posted on another thread. My nephew, Eric, wanted to learn how to make the pasta and he did a fine job without too much intervention. The amount of pasta and sauce was enormous and we all thought there is no way on earth we are eating all that. Wrong, Eric managed to almost finish it off.

68 lb pig on the fire (charcoal and apple wooed) at 1 pm; the picking of the loin area started at 3 pm and the hams/shoulders were at 140F by 5:30 pm. Took it off the spit and put it on to my granite countertop and carved it up to go with the sides. No pulled pork, just slices. After 36 people ate all they could I had 8 lbs of meat left some of which was pinkish while other parts were over done. With the latter I will make some carnitas and the pink slices we'll have in sandwiches over the next two days. Now the bones, etc. have simmered for two day and it smells very piggie in here. Ready for straining today.

Dinner on Saturday was this girl and the sides including a big old pot of baked beans which is not on the table yet. Our tenth annual pig roast.

Foolishly I planted five zucchini plants thinking I would harvest them when they were nice and small so therefore I would NEED five plants. Wrong. I get six+ little gems a day at the moment. This was zucchini and arugula salad was delicious: 1 garlic clove 3 oil cured anchovies1 oz lemon juice1.5 oz Fonterutoli extra virgin olive oil*salt and freshly ground pepper to taste 8 oz green zucchini (whole)8 oz yellow zucchini (or yellow crookneck squash) (whole)2.5 oz arugula Serves 4 as a starter salad Crush the garlic in a mortar and pestle. Add the anchovies and crush them too. Add the lemon juice and combine with the garlic and anchovies and then add the olive oil, stirring it all together to emulsify the dressing.

Ok EVERYONE absolutely out of the park meals on the last couple of pages. My finger would be raw hitting the 'like' button. So, just once a great big blown away I wanna come your house for dinner like.

Yesterday I made Paul Prudhomme's lamb jambalaya. I put some of the spice mix on the lamb shoulder cubes that I had browned well then threw it in the pool at 131f for 8 hours. I then added it to the mix just before cooking the rice. This is a great way to make stew type dishes because the meat was nice and juicy but tender. I may even put the meat in after the rice has been in there for 10 minutes next time. Sorry no pics.

It is in Under Pressure.

The tip of the tongue seemed lean which is what I put on the crackers and probably why I wrote 'lean' in my post, but you are correct, as I sliced the rest there was quite a bit of fat on the underside of the tongue. Looked up the nutritional analysis: 1 oz has 6 grams of fat compared to an ounce of corned beef which has 5 grams of fat and then there is top sirloin trimmed of fat at 3 grams of fat per ounce. 3 grams of fat per ounce would be considered 'lean' I believe. At any rate, it was delicious. We don't see tongue in main stream supermarkets around here. Our local butcher has them along with lamb neck . This one I got from our Vale Farm that we like so much....grass fed organic beef.

Yes, it is hot here in the Okanagan but we have not had luck growing okra. Except, the first year we tried it the plants were four feet high and we got okras quite well but since then the plants get about a foot high and one or two okras are harvested per plant. We have tried in different beds but to no avail. So, we have given up and now that the Superstore is here, they have it quite regularly. All the ideas for cooking okra above sound good. Thank you for posting. I tend not to fry it because we are watching our waistlines! Curried okra is also nice. Usually the recipe calls for it to be fried with onions and spices.

Bacon brushed with maple syrup, zucchini pancakes, baked tomatoes from the garden and microwave scrambled eggs

Tom Keller's corned beef tongue! 28 days in the corn brine. 24 hours in the pool at 158F. Skinned. Sliced. On crackers! Yum, yum. Got 600 grams of lean meat off one tongue. A definite do-over.

Ditto, what a great story. I LOVE JP.

Sounds like my dear speedy eater hubby....seems it is now extending to wine drinking.

We have given up trying to grow okra here. Just not hot enough. I bake mine at 375 for about 20 to 30 minutes. Salt, pepper and oil. No slime but I like the look of Shelby's. Is that tempura batter I wonder?

Are those marinated mushrooms? That tableful of goodies is exactly what my late father just loved to eat. When he lived at the care centre I would go to the Italian shop in Edmonton and load up on his favourite meats and cheese along with some nice bread. Then the sliced tomatoes and cucs which he totally ignored. I was always amazed at how much he could eat.

scamhi, wow and WOW again. What a great idea for a party. How big is that pan if I may ask? Ann_T, your breads look nice and light. Do you use Atta flour or a combo of whole wheat and white? The latter is my favourite combo. Don't care for the texture that Atta flour gives them. Shelby, now where oh where could you have gotten those zuke's?

They seem to be from restaurant chefs: Jonathon Sawyer, The Greenhouse Tavern in Cleveland and Stephanie Izard, Girl & the Goat in Chicago. Three recipes in all.

I also get Fine Cooking and love the publication as well as their special editions. In Food and Wine this month there is a little recipe booklet for Chobani Yogurt! Interesting.

I am not laughing because they look like my onionsl. If I leave them too long the stem flops over and the bulb get brown and then the bugs come and start nibbling! I like your red ones. Are they the Italian torpedo onions?

Just picked one week's growth on the New Zealand spinach. In photo two you can see the stalk that the leaves grow on and when you cut the stalk it sprouts new ones like the one on the lower right.

Thanks LindaK. I have a mitt lode of scapes in the freezer so will try some of those ideas. I have some garden peas for dinner so will try steaming some scapes to mix in with them! I wonder what garlic scape butter baked on some bread would be like. Probably needs some regular garlic on there too. May have to try that with the lamb chops and peas tonight. The garlic is drying nicely. I have two fans on them and keep the garage doors open during the day for good air circulation. It is nice and toasty warm in there which is optimal for curing. huiray: yes, soft necks don't produce scapes and are mainly the variety found in supermarkets because they don't require hand planting like the hard necks. The website I reference up thread has some good information on the varieties of garlic. Both mine are porcelain hard necks which tend to grow better in my neck of the woods.

There is a whole thread on lamb ribs! [Host's note: to avoid an excessive load on our servers this topic has been split. The discussion continues here.]