Sow: freeze coming

Posted on November 10, 2014 by Julie Petroski

The prediction of the first really cold night in North Texas gets everyone all worked up. It’s on the way for tomorrow night supposedly. No, it’s not going to snow. Or even make icy roads. Still, already people are battening down hatches and digging out their warm coats and sweaters—boots made their fashion appearance as soon as the temperatures dipped to 80°F. Brrrr.

While I don’t necessarily mind pulling out the headlamp and the frost cloths to cover everything up once I get home from work in the pitch black that’s 6:30 pm, I realized last year that sometimes such attempts are utterly futile.

You already heard about Seymore the feral tomato plant (actually plants — I found that he created several clones of his wild armed self). He’s gone because no amount of frost cloth would protect his crazy girth (and I’ve already got cute little super red tomatoes happening on my kitchen counter. I guess they like it inside the nice warm kitchen).

The peppers may be ok but they might not be (more about that later). The kale, chard, bok choi, arugula, lettuce, collards, spinach and mustard should all be fine. The herb box close to the kitchen door will be ok since the brick walls keep their planter warm. I’ll pull the little wheeled herb garden closer to some nice warm bricks.

But there was some major picking this past weekend so that all of those plants lives would not be in vain.

First casuality: Malabar spinach. Last year, I foolishly thought covering it would keep it going. It is on a trellis so that was not a good idea and made for a nasty melting, black-leaved mess to clean up. I got a huge metal bowl worth which will last us a couple of weeks in our breakfast green drinks.

Next was bye-bye basil. There’s a lot that grew from two little plants. So I gave away two gallon ziplocs and have another two washed and ready to be turned into pesto tonight. Just throw it in the food processor with garlic, olive oil, pine nuts and parmesan and then pack it away in the freezer for eating in the cold miserable months. Brings a smile to my face just thinking about those delicious dinners.

Peppers are a little iffy and I’m thinking about going out tonight and picking the biggest ones that remain on the plants. This morning before work I roasted several trays of poblanos and jalapeños for future meals. I’ll peel them tonight and into the freezer they go to brighten up soups, stews, Mexican dishes and more.

I fully intended to plant garlic yesterday, but as I mentioned yesterday, I really don’t know how to rest but I ran out of steam. Maybe tomorrow morning before work when I water everything that’s still alive. Farmer Megan gave me some nice bulbs just waiting to be planted and it will give some bio-diversity to Seymore’s former home (Raised Bed #4). Let’s see how cold it is in the morning.

And even though it’s not Throwback Thursday, here’s a major brown dog throwback for the gratuitous dog photo of the day:

8 week old Godiva

Sow: urban farm update

Posted on June 19, 2014 by Julie Petroski

Lots of amazing stuff is happening on the Urban Farm. We’ve had amazing weather and rain! June’s been cooler than normal at night, but we’re back into the 90°s during the day. Everything’s looking quite jungle-y and very green. The blackeyed peas are getting bigger. The okra is producing and we’ve had a couple of meals from it. The feral tomatoes are starting to turn red. The Malabar spinach is covering the trellises. The basil seems to grow as fast as I cut it. I’ve been picking peppers right and left. It’s a great time of year where I’m not buying produce at the store, except for fruit. And I’ve been giving it away like crazy.

Here are a few photos of what’s been going on:

We’ve had several weeks of beets now. The Detroit reds have won for best all around flavor so they’re the only ones I’ll grow in the fall.

I’ve harvested about 10 of the feral Sweet 100s. After all the tomatoes are harvested I’m going to leave the plants in the ground and see if I can get a second harvest in the fall.

The feral tomato plants covered with bird net so the birds don’t eat all of the tomatoes

Since I didn’t know I was growing tomatoes, I had to rig up a way to keep the bird net in place. Hooks on the fence, a couple of tomato cages and some bricks were my solution.

Okra is well underway

Flowers on the green bean vines

Bell peppers are going strong

A big black and white bug seems to like green bean leaves

This weekend our pal Fred is going to make some of his famous jalapeño poppers using these beauties. They are amazingly delicious bacon wrapped, cheese stuffed jalapeños that are grilled on the BBQ. I will harvest Friday.

Lots of jalapeños

The tomatillos look like patio lanterns. I can’t wait to make salsa verde. The plants are probably at least 4 ft tall. You can see poblano peppers in the background.

This shot of the blackeyed peas is about a week old. They have doubled in since then.

Tiny tomatoes turning red

And for today’s gratuitous dog photo of the day, here are my bathing beauties enjoying their pool:

So: winding down

Posted on November 19, 2013 by Julie Petroski

pepper haul (from top): bell peppers, Anaheim peppers, jalapeño peppers

2013 is winding down and this lucky, yet turbulent year is promising to end on the same chaotic, always changing, yet exciting note that it started.

First, a quick Urban Farm update: After last week’s earliest freeze in 13 years, I lost pretty much all of my pepper plants. They were covered with peppers so we were able to save the peppers even though the frost killed the plants. There are two which are now cut down to tiny things and one that was more protected that’s still looking nice and bushy. We’ll see what happens in the next week or so since we have snow predicted. After I harvested all of the peppers, my plan was to can “cowboy candy” aka pickled jalapeños this evening to give out as holiday gifts, but the powers that be had other plans and I was not in the right frame of mind to can. Spending a chunk of the afternoon at the vet, giving the old credit card a little bit of a workout will do that to a gal.

I also lost the beautiful malabar spinach vines, but not the plants. They’re still hanging on and I’m hoping they hang on through the winter and do their thing all spring and summer again, even though Bruce really isn’t all that crazy about their thicker, more juicy than North American spinach leaves. The haricots vertes aka green beans were also murdered by the frost. The last ones were quite good and worth planting again in the spring. One hidden basil is hanging on, though it will most likely be a casualty in the coming weeks. Still I supplied many people with tons of basil this summer/fall and that was really gratifying. Plus, we have a bunch of pesto in the freezer.

On the plus side, we are having a lovely bok choi harvest, growing plenty of leafy salad greens for lunches, and enjoying the beauty of tons of bushy kale and brightly colored chard. The radishes were also quite good, though they are done. Hopefully the carrots they were planted next to can do their thing. The beets are pitiful compared to the spring ones, but I’m hoping that the ones that are there are at least delicious. Snow peas are slow growing for some reason. They are not loving North Texas fall. The herbs are all growing like champs.

The Gs are also in rare form these days. The cooler weather is bringing forth some rowdiness and naughtiness, although you wouldn’t guess it from the dogs spread out across the kitchen floor at the moment. But they’ve had a tough couple of days.

You see we’re trying to give Gidget more freedom and less crate time. Yesterday’s weekday attempt was a bit of a fail. Notice in the photo below that there are little yellow-orange half-chewed pumpkin-y things lying on the dog beds and floor. Those are the decorative gourds that I’ve had kicking around since Canadian Thanksgiving and was hoping to keep around until American Thanksgiving (a week from Thursday). That is not to be since George and Gidget think they are delicious. George greeted Bruce at the back door with one in his mouth last night. Godiva also took several dainty bites out of a bright orange mini pumpkin looking gourd. Needless to say, we have no more gourds lying around the house. And I’ve moved my big pumpkin and anything else that might look tempting to Gidget to higher ground. At least no one experienced any GI issues due to the gourd consumption.

the Gs gourd-ous handy work

And then there’s the vet. He has just joined the practice and the 4G network just might be his opportunity to put his kids through college. Last week it was Guinness with an ear infection. He is prone to them and no matter what we did ourselves to doctor him, it wasn’t enough this time, despite training from the vet, consultation from our vet tech friend, and OTC products. He’s now doing much better with special ear meds and a prescribed course of hard core cleaning. Cha-ching!

This week (today) it was Godiva. Cha-ching! I’ll spare you the gory details, but suffice it to say, she must not lick a certain body part for the next 3-4 days so she’s going to wear the Cone of Shame when she’s not being supervised by us. She is on some serious antibiotics and steroids to get the itchy situation under control. And she’ll be hanging out with me at work for the rest of the week, since leaving her at home in the cone, puts her at a disadvantage with the rest of the Gs. It also makes her very sulky. And that in turn, has made me feel rather sulky. Or maybe I am just suffering from lack of natural vitamin D.

Gratuitous dog photo of the day is of disgruntled Godiva:

poor Godiva

So: great house

Posted on November 15, 2013 by Julie Petroski

Pretty in pink (photo by Trish at Three Dog Bakery Plano)

As you can guess by the big smile on Gidget’s face, she’s pretty happy that Bruce bought her a puffy coat last weekend in preparation for the earliest frost in 13 years that came on Tuesday night. Buying dog jackets/dog clothes of any kind is new territory for us since our bulldog didn’t need any additional insulation and the other 3Gs have thick natural coats. Poor Gidget doesn’t have a lot of insulation and her white coat is very short. Now she’s protected from the elements and won’t shiver during her twice daily walks with the rest of the pack. And believe it or not, she really does seem to like the jacket.

Other dogs are not so lucky. While our Dallas weather is unpredictable at best, sometimes it gets below freezing and that’s not good for outdoor dwelling dogs. So this week, Bruce built a dog house for Duck Team 6‘s Outreach Team to give to a nice dog named Goliath (and I helped). On Monday evening after work to be exact. For about 4 hours until we figured our neighbors would call the cops on our use of power tools in the later hours of the evening. Should have started on Sunday!

This dog house was different than other dog houses. You see, Goliath is a senior Great Dane who has lived outside his whole life. And like most GD’s, he’s very tall. So he really needed a mini shed. Unfortunately, a mini shed wouldn’t fit in Bruce’s truck assembled. So Bruce designed a modern dog house that was made of a preassembled floor, walls, and roof which could be joined together in Goliath’s yard.

The floor: plywood base with deck posts to raise the plywood off the ground and keep Goliath warmer

Bruce assembling the frame for the first wall. He attached plywood to one side of each frame.

Test filling the walls together. The back wall is higher to allow water to drain easier off the single sheet of plywood roof.

One wall done, on to the opposite wall.

Gidget making sure Goliath’s house will be sturdy enough.

Two walls done, on to the sides

Framing up the side walls

Final assembled house with Goliath inside—he likes it! It just needs a coat of paint.

More photos are available on Duck Team 6’s Facebook page Operation Goliath if you want to check them out. Bruce got Goliath setter in before the temperature dropped and he said Goliath seemed very pleased with his new digs.

However, on Tuesday night, one of the Gs was not so pleased with her home:

Naughty Gidget decided to remodel.

And while I did have a lovely harvest on Sunday afternoon:

Sunday’s harvest from left: bok choi, tons of basil, mixed salad greens, Russian kale, Swiss chard, nero kale, haricots verts, Malabar spinach, bell peppers, Anaheim peppers, jalapeño peppers

salad greens growing away

it was not a great week for the urban farm. With several very cold days and frost, some plants couldn’t handle it. I have yet to assess the damage thoroughly (I was traveling for business starting early Wednesday morning and got home late last night), but it looks like even with the frost cloth as protection, several of the pepper plants and the Malabar spinach have bit the dust. Oh well, more compost for the spring!

Today’s gratuitous dog photo features four familiar mugs:

4G Network on a coat buying mission (photo by Trish at Three Dog Bakery Plano): Guinness, Godiva, George, and Gidget

Sow: mulch better

Posted on October 2, 2013 by Julie Petroski

Sorry, folks. I know I’ve been MIA for much longer than normal. My feeble excuse is work’s been pretty intense and snuck away to the Great White North for a much needed girls’ weekend with two of my pals.

While I was gone, Kate from the yummy foodie blog Tea and Tamarind nominated sowsewso for the Shine On Award. (I’ll take care of the formalities of accepting later. Maybe on the weekend.) Thank you, Kate! I appreciate your kudos and I thank you for the nudge that got me to write today’s post.

But in the interest of catching you up on what’s been happening on the Mortroski Midcentury Urban Farm, I need to show you a ton of photos:

ugh. untidy garden.

Summer’s been rough in the aesthetics department. The pine straw mulch looked great for a while, but then it seemed to help the grass grow back in the places where we didn’t want it.

So we started ripping up the landscaping cloth around the raised beds and stock tanks. Notice who appears to be doing most of the work.

I read that many people use newspaper to more successfully smother grass and weeds, so we got several coworkers to save their papers for us

once we got all the old stuff up, we could put down the newspaper

then it had to be soaked so that it stuck to the ground better. again notice it’s Bruce doing all of the work.

mulch applied over the wet newspaper. it already looks better, right?

we ended up doing about 1/2 of the garden on the first day because we ran out of mulch. still it looked much better.

it’s a little hard to see everything, but once it was done, it looked awesome. thanks to Bruce for all the help.

It’s been about two weeks since we completed the mulching. I’d like to say that the grass/weed mixture is 100% smothered and the mulch looks perfect. I’m afraid that this weekend, I’m going to need to pull out some grass. But still if I’m vigilant, I’ll be able to keep things looking nice.

That’s important since it’s patio season again in North Texas. Time for sitting on the patio enjoying adult beverages with friends as we watch the 4Gs and their doggie pals romp around the yard. I can’t wait. It’s really lovely.

As for the urban farm, my kale seeds haven’t sprouted and after a few weeks of waiting and watching the chard sprout and thrive, I’m giving up and picking up some transplants this weekend. Bok choi is growing well. Beets are a little disappointing so I’m going to plant more seeds. Beans are doing their thing and flowering so I’m hoping for a bumper crop. Various salad greens are growing well.

Tomatoes are a disappointment once again and may get pulled out. They are a complete mystery to me. I tried everything, fertilized as directed, watered, and the weather wasn’t that hot. But some of the plants are flowering again so maybe there’s hope.

Snow peas seem to be taking their own sweet time, but maybe they don’t like being so close to the okra. The okra may get pulled although it could still keep producing until the frost kills it. I’ve been giving it away and I have a huge bag of it in the freezer. I’d love to make some pickled okra but that is a little more of a time commitment than I can do. I’d like to get some collard greens growing. Peppers are going crazy. Basil too. Radishes are turning into cute little seedlings. Malabar spinach is thriving and so pretty. And the peaches I froze back in the spring are reminding me that it’s time to make jam.

You’ve probably gathered that I haven’t been spending much time with urban farm. Hopefully I get a bit of time out there this weekend.

And now it’s bedtime. So I bid you goodnight and leave you with a gratuitous (and nap-tastic) 4G photo:

“hey people, where are you gonna sleep?”

sow: dirty gardener

Posted on September 4, 2013 by Julie Petroski

Guilty as charged! It was a fantastic Labor Day long weekend for getting stuff done—with plenty of time for relaxing. Although I slept in for the first time in eons, I spent most of Monday afternoon outside digging in the dirt. Perfect timing too since it rained on and off all morning long—a lovely way to start the day lounging about and drinking coffee, although Guinness was not impressed with what the wet weather did to his morning walk.

Monday’s harvest was pretty awesome (notice the seed packet next to the pile of produce):

The chard is the last of what I planted last fall. As you may have gathered from the seed pack, I planted more. The peppers are all still going strong as is the okra (it’s all as tall as me now so it’s getting harder to pick) and they’ll keep going until the first frost hits them. I decided to freeze the nearly 1.5 pounds of okra I gathered up since it will be nice to pull some out in the middle of winter and use it in soups or stews.

But picking wasn’t the most important part about Monday. Serious digging happened. And I’m not talking about the hole that Gidget and George have been making next to the driveway when no one’s looking.

Why? Well, because fall’s here. Ok, truthfully, fall’s not really here until September 21 or so and it’s still close to 100°F almost every day, but it’s time to get fall seeds in the ground. So I started by soaking some snow pea and beet seeds on Saturday evening. The snow peas are already sprouting and they were planted on Sunday afternoon!

Monday, I dug, added compost and soil, pulled weeds. moved stuff around. And I did a lot of squatting which is why my body was a bit sore yesterday—and my brain was too tired after work to blog.

But not too tired to get one more thing done. Bruce and I worked on clearing out the flooded stock tank (#3) last night. I used about 1/2 of the dirt to augment the other beds and tanks on Monday, then he finished clearing the rest of the soil out into two wheelbarrows. We added three bags of crushed stone, then tested the draining (works fine now). So we loaded the 1/2 of the dirt that was left back in and I’ll get more dirt on the weekend so I can plant carrots and radishes.

Can you tell that I’m excited to get new stuff in the ground? Here’s what what I planted on Sunday (all seeds are from Botanical Interests):

Oregon sugar pod II snow peas
French filet bush beans (had to plant more since I think the birds may have eaten some of the seeds I planted a few weeks ago)
Gourmet blend beets (check out the seed pack above)
Detroit red beets
Five color silverbeet Swiss chard
Nero Tuscana kale
Red velvet leaf lettuce
Qs special medley mesclun
Cilantro
Italian parsley
Bok choi

Here’s what’s sticking around from the spring planting:

Malabar spinach (going crazy still)
Oregano (moved into a planter)
Thyme (moved into a planter)
Mint
Jalapeño peppers
Anaheim peppers
Clemson spineless okra
Orange bell peppers
Green bell peppers
Marigolds (moved to the bed with the fall tomatoes, they help attract bees)
Black diamond watermelon (a gift from a friend that is finally just starting to produce watermelons)
some of the basil (see below for details)

My arugula patio planter experiment is going very well. We’ve been harvesting handfuls for sandwiches and burgers—it’s really yummy. Definitely going to do it again next summer and maybe try a couple of additional planters to increase the volume.

I picked up some sprout seeds over the weekend and will be trying out growing those on the window sill just as soon as I get some quart mason jars (I thought I had some, but I only have 1/2 quart jars). I really love them on sandwiches and am a little worried about all of the illnesses that store-bought sprouts seem to have. (The instructions explain how to properly disinfect the seeds so there is little chance of getting sick.)

The fall tomatoes are cranking away. There’s fruit on the Indigo Rose and Celebrity plants, flowers on the rest and I’m already dreaming of tomato sandwiches and caprese salads. The warm days and cooler nights appear to be working their wonders. I pulled a tomato (sweet 100 so Bruce won’t care) and a bell pepper (green) plant that were formerly in the flooded stock tank and really didn’t appreciate being moved. They weren’t doing well, so it seemed a better idea to use the space to plant something else.

I’ve had an exceptional season for basil. I’ve made pesto several times, frozen some, given tons away. Last Thursday I gave away 10 1-gallon bags of the stuff to some coworkers:

I love basil and it’s so gratifying to grow—that’s why it makes me so happy to share it. While I have had great plans to make another couple of batches of pesto to freeze (I have everything I need, just need to do it), I haven’t gotten around to it yet. But I did make a lovely basil-watermelon-feta salad from a recipe one of the basil beneficiaries suggested (thanks, Lauren):

Martha Stewart’s Basil-Watermelon-Feta Salad

It was pretty and delicious and I plan to make it many times—I even made a small batch of it for our work lunches today.

The basil is also doing double duty as housing. If you look carefully at the photo below, you will see the toad that has lived in Raised Bed #4 all summer. He arrived when the tomato jungle was making tons of shade and has stuck around. Last night, I saw that he’s made a little hut from the mulch around the basil. Hopefully it keeps him hidden from Gidget (she keeps looking for him, perhaps because she has a taste for toads).

Toad in a hole

But as cute as it is, a toad isn’t a dog. And it won’t satisfy your desire to see gratuitous G photos from the long weekend. Here are a couple of my favorites of George and Gidget, who are quickly becoming best friends:

George has a ball in his mouth that Gidget really wants

Hope you’re having a great week!

Sow: basil bouquets

Posted on August 7, 2013 by Julie Petroski

More basil bouquets: this time with a cute sticker and a handwritten note

Today I continued spreading a little garden joy: I brought a couple more unexpected basil bouquets to work.

If you have extra basil, I recommend it highly. First, most people like surprises of free stuff. Second, you get to talk about your garden and maybe you’ll inspire someone to try growing something—or trade tips and hints. Third, basil grows back if you give it a good trim. I swear the stuff I cut down on Sunday is already growing back despite the crazy heat that we have this time of year.

Plus, we still have tons of basil which is absolutely fine with me. I still plan to make some pesto and dehydrate even more.

Fransi over at Three Hundred Sixty-Five and I did a little brainstorming the other day and we’re both convinced that herb bouquets would make terrific little gifts when someone invites you over for dinner. If you invite me over for dinner, this time of year your bouquet would be made of rosemary, basil, sage, thyme, oregano, and chives. I killed my lavender some how, but it would have looked pretty in the bouquet.

I’d probably tie it up with garden twine then wrap the whole thing in brown paper so I could write something on the outside and close it with a Mortroski Midcentury sticker. And they’d change with the seasons of course. Fall would bring cilantro and dill. And I now realize that I could use some Italian parsley. That would look pretty in a herb bouquet.

Imagine receiving an Italian herb bouquet: Italian parsley, oregano, thyme, basil. It would smell amazing. And you could chop it all up and make some sauce. Don’t worry, I’d bring some wine too. Or maybe dessert. Or some fancy chocolate. Or some okra (it seems to be very well received down here).

From a practicality standpoint, these bouquets could be great for people with small households or single people. A little of this, a little of that and you’d have a lovely centerpiece that you could use in your recipes all week. Maybe you could even pick and choose what you’d like. I could see the yuppie-hippie grocery store making them, although they’d be exquisitely lovely, but tiny and $20 a pop. Wouldn’t surprise me at all when small packets of even non-organic fresh herbs are $2.50 each.

So, if you saw a herb bouquet at a farmers’ market, would you pick one up?

Sow: distributing wealth

Posted on August 6, 2013 by Julie Petroski

Big bunch of fresh basil becomes a tiny jar of dried basil.

But I still had more basil so I loaded it back up again.

The great basil dehydration experiment has been a great success. And very enlightening. Never again will I wonder why such a small bottle of a spice or herb costs so much. You saw how much basil I picked on Sunday. It had to be taken off the stems, washed, spun dry, then dehydrated for about 2.5 hours. Basically 1/2 of that became what’s in the tiny bottle in the photo above. That bottle isn’t full so I’m continuing to dehydrate to fill that bottle and hopefully at least one other the same size.

I also brought one of my work pals a huge bouquet of basil:

basil bouquet: like fancy flowers but edible

It caused quite a stir—before I knew it, I was dispensing gardening advice since another coworker has been having bad luck with her basil. And by the end of the day, the bouquet recipient’s boss was looking for some basil too. Luckily I have plenty more where that came from so I can bring them each a bag (though not probably as bountiful as the basil bouquet) tomorrow.

The malabar spinach is also growing like crazy so I brought a bag (repurposed from the yuppie hippie grocery store) for another coworker who is working hard to eat right and exercise. Picking the bagful didn’t really make much of a dent in the vines:

big bag full of spinach

Malabar spinach vines are surpassing the trellis

Malabar spinach and the fall tomatoes

There’s lots happening in the garden so I also brought a small bag of okra to the basil bouquet recipient. She’s a fan of okra (I checked since it’s such a polarizing vegetable) and was thrilled to get some. I hope she made something delicious with it:

paper bag of okra with some red jalapeños thrown in for fun

paper bag of okra with some red jalapeños thrown in just for fun

I’m really loving the okra, but it will be at it’s end fairly soon. So this morning I planted the fall bush beans:

Fall bush beans: chopstick is for making a hole for the two beans that need to get planted in each hole.

I also saw a familiar friend. I haven’t named him yet because I wasn’t sure he’d stick around (or not end up in George’s mouth). Got any suggestions for a name?

Look carefully for my toad pal. He hangs out near one of the raised beds.

And I’m continuing to hit the reset button: Bruce and I went to the gym again tonight for more cardio and abs/planks. Gotta say that I’m feeling it. Well, at least I know that my muscles are remembering what to do.

Have a great night!

So: Canadian content

Posted on August 4, 2013 by Julie Petroski

It’s weekend like these that I miss Toronto the most. Never mind the surface of the sun temperatures here in north Texas. It’s not just that. It’s another three day weekend in Canada, people! I miss all of the long weekends. If nothing else, it gives everyone who works for a living a chance to have an extra day to take a deep breath and enjoy an additional day off. Shops are closed. Businesses are closed. Everyone has to do something else.

No offense, but the US of A could really take a lesson from their neighbors to the north and add a few more holidays to the calendar…

But perhaps I need a break a bit more than usual since it was a crazy travel work week, spent mostly in North Carolina. That’s why you heard not a peep from me since last week at this time. Lots going on during the day and then of course, time to make up the work that didn’t get done well into the night. Rest assured it was all work and not much play, although I did attend a minor league baseball game on Monday night with some of my colleagues and their families. Good fun and so nice to meet their spouses and kids, plus how could you not smile with a grasshopper as a mascot?

The Greensboro Grasshopper

As for the rest of the week, I’m really lucky to that I have great clients and colleagues from the other agencies to spend time with. Despite that, I was really glad when Friday at 5:30 pm rolled around.

Which brings me to the Canadian August Civic Holiday. Bruce and I did our part to enjoy an abbreviated one: we bbq’d, we listened to plenty of Canadian musical content this weekend, and we built something that even though it’s a southern US house party/tailgate tradition that we could bring back to the Great White North with us.

a cornhole set

Yesterday, we put together our cornhole set. Yes, it’s a bean bag toss game favored by beer-drinking tailgaters and Texas bbq attendees. It’s a great way to spend an evening. Don’t worry, like everything in the Mortroski Mid-century, it’s not enough without a special paint job. A professional art director (thanks, Ward!) created graphics that will be printed on vinyl and applied as soon as I get around to sanding it and painting it ultra shiny white. Ward created the awesome red door logo for the MMC and we just love it. I promise to post photos of our cornhole game escapades in action.

In the meantime, here’s how to learn the game before you come by with a 2-4 and challenge us to a game: http://www.americancornhole.org/cornhole-rules.shtml. Canadian friends: want one for your cottage? If you do, invite us up for a week (or maybe more) and we’d be happy to build one for you too! It really is a lot of fun and a great way to hang out for an evening.

Basil-zilla

If you need basil, you may also want to come by. I’ve already given away a bag of okra to the G’s best pal Tracy because without me here in Dallas, it didn’t get picked or eaten (NOTE: apparently even more got given away and the stuff just grows like a weed too. Sorry, Bruce, I was not calling you out for poor caretaking of the Urban Farm.)

Holy cow, everything hasn’t been killed by the surface of the sun temperatures is just growing out of control. The malabar spinach is growing everywhere and we have to keep our eye on it to make sure that it doesn’t try to choke out a fall tomato plant. Gorgeous and leafy and insane!

If you live in Dallas and want some basil or spinach, let me know—you can come by and pick some at the Mortroski Mid-century U-Pick Farm. That basil in the photo is destined for the dehydrator and the food processor. Thinking of an Italian herb blend for holiday gifts and some pesto as a surprise and delight for friends this week. There’s still tons more. Please, help us out.

It was a catch up weekend across the board. We tore the spring tomato plants out so that I could plant the fall green beans tomorrow at 7 am. They’ll be ready in September, but I’ll be covered with sweat even at 7 am. It’s just too hot to work the garden much later than that. This morning we were out in the garden at 10 am and it was really hot and I feel like I got an insta-tan.

Despite it being so hot, it’s actually the time to start planning for fall. We also did bits and pieces around the house that we haven’t been able to get done and got the garage back in order. We’re busy hitting that DIY to do list right and left.

green yard

And an important milestone: our front landscaping has now been in for a year. Everything has established quite well and because of the unseasonable rain, it’s all very green. Usually this time of year, everything would be much more golden—we are so pleased with how it’s going so far:

front yard: see what I mean?

It was a great weekend for the Gs. Thanks to our friends at Three Dog Bakery Texas, we finally have some toys that Godiva and George cannot destroy. Though the gator and clown fish in the photo with Godiva do not look very lively on their backs, let me assure you that they have no holes and no fluffs scattered throughout the Mortroski Mid-century:

Godiva is exhausted from trying to destroy toys

Truly a record for the Gs. The gator has lasted three weeks with no wounds and the squeaker still working. A record!

Hoping you all are having a wonderful weekend and making the most of your summer. As for me, it’s back to the RUSH program on the Palladia channel. If you’re reading this from Canada, I’m more than a little jealous that you get tomorrow off.

Sow: pesto presto

Posted on July 24, 2013 by Julie Petroski

I made the first pesto of the spring/summer basil Monday night. I planned to share this with you last night but it was a long Monday at work so today will do.

In this case, it was about three cups of basil, around 1/2 cup of grated Parmesan, about 1/3 cup of pine nuts, 4 cloves of garlic, almost 1/2 cup of olive oil, salt and pepper. I chucked the garlic and pine nuts into the food processor, added the basil and kept going until everything was blended. Then the oil went in while the machine was next the cheese. S&P to taste.

Lots of abouts because I didn’t use all the oil, I put in a little extra cheese, and maybe a little extra basil. I drizzled some of the leftover oil on top to preserve the vibrant green.

Do it some night. It takes no time and you can make the proportions all your own. More garlic. Less oil. More cheese. Different nuts. No nuts. 10 minutes including prep and cleaning and spinning the basil dry. The hardest part is cleaning the food processor (I was lazy and chucked it in the dishwasher because there was space).

Pretty, isn’t it?

Bruce said it was delicious too–he had it for dinner last night over farfalle pasta (you know, the bowties) with a bit of chicken. I sampled it when I got home from work after the leftovers were cold and it was still delicious. Score!

And there’s some left.

Today’s gratuitous garden photo:

They’re almost done, but it’s almost time to plant the fall beets.

Today’s gratuitous dog photo:

squirrel!

And one last thing, a shout out to the Grammar Belle who celebrates a year of trying to save the English-speaking world from grammatical errors today. Well done! Follow her if you aren’t and I guarantee you will be amused and re-educated.

Sow, Sew, So

Adventures in urban farming, messing around with thread, and commenting on everything else

Tag Archives: basil

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Sow: pesto presto

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