Happy Vegan Eats & More…

I really wanted a greenhouse but I didn’t want to invest a ton of money. So, I went to Ebay and found this great Portable Greenhouse for under $160 (including shipping).

The garden is looking great! All our hard work paid off. This picture was taken July 21st:

The heirloom Brandywine tomatoes I got are doing very well (super tall!) though they don’t have many tomatoes yet. I plan on collecting and storing seeds for planting next year from these heirloom tomatoes. This will be my first attempt at seed collecting/storing/planting so we’ll see how it goes.

I picked these tomato plants up locally and they already have so many green tomatoes for frying:

My indoor tomatoes, which are hanging in the arbor right now are starting to ripen:

I hope they do this well inside this winter.

We have 1 broccoli plant and 1 cabbage plant that I picked up locally jsut to see how they’d do. We also have some onions, carrots and a few pepper plants.

I think I may have the tallest oregano ever! I’m not sure if this picture does it justice or not. The sad thing is that I never even use oregano! So, send me your recipes using oregano. Those with  tomatoes and oregano would be even better. christi@differentdaisy.com

For those of you who aren’t familiar with gooseberries, you’re missing out! I had forgotten about this yummy little berry until I was looking for plants online and remembered eating these at my great aunts when I was very young. They’re really like no other berry you’ve ever tried. Tart but unusual. So, I had to order a couple plants for my garden. And, too my delight I already have 3 berries on one plant. Hopefully the birds won’t eat them before I can.

Gooseberries have high nutritional value. They contain vitamins A and C and potassium, and are a good source of fibre.

Now, it doesn’ t look like I’ll get a big crop of berries this year, but next year look out! I’ll be making this chutney:

Gooseberry Chutney

3 lb gooseberries
1/2 lb onions
1 lb sugar
1/2 pint water
1/2 oz salt
1 tbsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 pint vinegar

Top and tail the berries, and chop roughly. Chop the onions finely and cook with the berries in the water until they are well softened. Add the other ingredients, and simmer until the chutney becomes thick, stirring occasionally. Bottle while hot and cover immediately.

This chutney, yielding about 4.5 lbs becomes more mellow in flavor the longer it is kept.

 SOURCE: http://www.gingerich.com/recipes/gooseberry.html

 Got some long awaited plants in last week: Hotel Giant Blueberries, Indoor Tomato Plants and Scarlet Bee Balm. They came from Gardener’s Choice and though it took a while to get my order I am very pleased with the plants. They are taking off nicely. They do offer a free wildflower seed packet with every order and if you go to samples you can get more free seeds. Shipping was a little slow but I expect that when ordering live plants because they really do have to wait until the plants are mature enough to ship.  

I ordered the indoor tomato plants hoping to get tomatos all year but I’m not sure if it will work. Right now I have them outside in hanging baskets so they will grow bigger but with any luck this winter they will produce in my sunroom. I got another product called a fruit salad tree. It came dormant. I planted it but I’m not sure when it will get leafy. It’s supposed to produce 5 different kinds of fruits. How exciting is that? I’m sure it will be years before I see any fruit but it’ll be well worth the wait to see what happens.

Indoor Tomato Plants (got 3)

Blueberries

Scarlet Bee Balm- Butterflies and bees love this stuff and it’s so pretty!

My red rose bush. You can see the recycled rubber mulch in the background. This stuff looks so good. It’s a little more expensive than regular mulch but is earth friendly and should last for about 12 years.

When catnip goes wrong!

I had to post this picture. I grew my own catnip this year from seed and the cats are loving it. They were just rolling around having a blast and then it got ugly! 

The raised veggie garden is finally ready and we’ve planted a few things: tomatoes, yellow bell pepper and a jalapeno. The official last day of frost here in Ohio is May 10th, so I’m gonna hold off on planting the delicate sprouts until then. I’ve been sunning the sprouts for a few hours a day to get them used to the sun. They all did pretty well but I lost a few.

This sunflower sprout is so big. ! can’t wait to see the beautiful flower it produces and eat those seeds!

I live in Southern Ohio, a nice place to live because we get all four seasons. Spring, summer and fall are great, but winter gives me the blues! About mid-December I start longing for spring. Right around the end of February, floral shops and grocery stores start getting in their hyacinths which is one of my favorite plants. They smell so good and one plant can fill a whole room with fragrance. The purple ones smell the best in my opinion. Anyway, as soon as I get a whiff of these flowers I know spring is right around the corner. Every year I buy a purple hyacinth so I can enjoy its scent until the warm weather comes.

This year winter seems to be dragging on and on for me. We had bad ice a couple weeks ago and flooding this week. Right now, it’s about 32 degrees. I’ve bought 2 hyacinths to get me through and both have bloomed out and are now waiting for the last frost to be planted.

I watch a lot of HGTV and just entered to win the 2008 Green Home. Wish me luck!  Aside from how awesome it would be to live in a ‘green’ home, warmer South Carolina is looking like paradise to me right now. It’s nice that HGTV is showing people so many ‘green’ options for remodeling and decorating because lots of people who would otherwise be unaware of these options tune in daily to this channel. I guess they really are taking ‘green’ mainstream. Any other HGTV fans out there?

Okay, way off topic. I was questioning whether spring is ever going to get here. A bit of a rant but relevant because I want to start planting those little veggie plants and showing off all my food creations. The sprouts are doing well, although I didn’t get as many melon spouts as I had hoped and no cucumbers at all.  Anyone have experience with these? Maybe they take a little longer or need special care.

I was so thrilled with the early success of the sprouts that I decided to get another biodome and start some flower seeds too. I got black eyed Susans, lavender (I already have a couple lavender plants but thought I could give some away), daisies, lupine and butterfly weed. Can’t wait to see what happens with them!

For the first time ever I decided to grow my own vegetable plants from seed. I normally just buy tomatoes, peppers, corn, etc.. plants from a local greenhouse. My boyfriend and I carefully planted a variety of seed in a little biodome last week. I will keep you updated on the growth of our plants. So far, we have just a few sprouts poking up, but they are very cute! 

 We planted a variety of melons, corn, cucumbers, a salad blend mix, spinach, onion, carrots and a few others.

Below are a few pictures of the sprouts after just a week. This is so much fun! I think everyone should try it, especially those with children.

>>Vegetable & Herb Plants, Seeds, More!<<