This Week at Ramsey Farms

Garden Fever: Seed Planning, Christmas Tree Recycling, and Randomness

It's barely January. Garden fever is burning me up! :) Looking and reviewing and re-reviewing and measuring the garden plan. Discussing and researching the building of cold frames to cover newly planted seeds in order to kick start the growing season several weeks ahead of time. Making my seed buying list and our January garden to-do list! Wooop! Seventy-three days until spring & counting!

The overwhelming urge to plant and grow something led me to a cold, rainy day project that recycled a clear plastic berry container into a seed germinating greenhouse for basil seeds! This will stay on top of the fridge (it's warm up there) for a few days until I see sprouts of green! Keep your fingers crossed - this is my first attempt at growing herbs from seed I harvested.

I researched then started a batch of broccoli sprouts this week. They soaked in warm water overnight and I rinse and drain them twice a day. It should take 4-6 days so we'll see what happens.

Spring / garden fever also have me looking at harvest dates for my favorite North Carolina - South Carolina grown fruits. For the past few years, we pick strawberries in April,  blackberries & raspberries in June, and Apples in late September. We eat a ton of fresh, raw fruit and bake a plethora of breads, cakes, pies, cobblers, & crisps.

But my favorite thing is the canning. Tart and tangy blackberry jam in January is divine! Sweet, juicy strawberry jelly is so delicious I have to hide the jars to maintain my inventory. Spicy, sweet apple butter and fresh tasting apple sauces give me the delicious taste of warm autumn mountain days all year round. Over this cold winter we've learned about making our own apple cider vinegar from the peels and cores of all those apples (and to think I've been wasting them all these years!! So mad.) and did you know you can make pectin - that jello like substance that makes jelly, well jelly-ish...you can make it from what? An apple! Yes, I'm going to be making jelly without commercial pectin. I am going to make crowder pea hull jelly this spring. I may skip the blackberry/raspberry pick this year but I decided that we must go get fresh peaches this year too! Oh! Spring...so much to look forward to and plan. Woooo!

On another note...since this week is all about de-Christmasing, I am considering recycling this year's tree into another bottle tree! Either to replace the one I created in the garden last year or as a new one in the front or for a friend? Got to think on a stand...the one I have outside now has my old iron rebar (?) tree stand on it and it's buried to hide it and support the bottle tree. Any suggestions?

Cold, cold, cold weather hit us again this week! :( A low of 20 Friday morning and 17 Saturday so the colorful sheet tents went up again at night to tuck in the plant babies for those cold nights! I got super protective and covered every crop we have including the ultra-hardy garlic and kale and the wintering herb garden. They are calling for a low of 4 degrees Tuesday morning. Yes four. So Monday I plan to harvest the biggest broccoli heads and at least one of the kohlrabi plants and keep covering the rest!

Speaking of Christmas (well...back a paragraph), did I tell y'all I got a sewing machine for Christmas?!? My dear, sweet, thoughtful Mom found a 1968 Swinger "Fashion Mate" that a friend of her's had had in storage for the last thirty or forty odd years.  I've been wanting a sewing machine for a long time, so I am very excited for this vintage piece.  It appears to be in good shape, I picked up some Singer Lubricant to oil the movable parts and sewing machine oil for the motor at Mary Jo's Saturday morning along with needles and a rotary cutter. I hope to get her up & runnin' this weekend as I have many projects that I want to start! My first project is going to be an apron! :) Yes. It's 2014 and I want to sew my own pretty apron to wear in my kitchen while I bake breads, make jams & jellies, can pickles & homemade salsa, and serve dinner to my family and friends. Sigh...

Broccoli

Broccoli watch is on here at Ramsey Farms! :) I'm keeping a close eye on these plants as they are nearing harvest time. Whew...it's about time!  These little beauties were planted about September 13 (unless I wrote it down incorrectly, which could be possible as we did not take close garden notes until now.) My original harvest expectations were for late November or early December, but the plants all appear to be healthy and continue to grow. The largest heads are at approximately 5.5 inches. I would like them to be a minimum of six inches to harvest.  Broccoli is a very cold-tolerant plant with ability to withstand a hard frost of 15-28 degrees.  In fact, the frost is reported to give this veggie a sweeter flavor! However, I think I'd be pushing my gardening luck if I let them stay out in the four degree temperature that's being forecasted for Monday night.

Breads

I'm pretty stoked that my home baked breads have been rising again beautifully. I guess this new jar of yeast was just what it needed. I am also happy to report that I have not been using the bread machine for the last two or three weeks. I was scared at first that I would not have the time I believed the bread machine saved me or that it would be too difficult to mix and knead by hand. It's so easy to get used to a convenience or machine or gadget which presumably makes our lives easier and think we just can never go back to living without the crutch. In fact, it's been much easier and probably faster and no hassle of dragging that big machine out and putting it away. Check out my recipe for homemade hamburger buns from Thursday.

During the week, I started a batch of sourdough bread starter. I've done this in years past, but never baked much back then. I believe this will get a ton of use since I bake bread at least three times a week now. I will definitely update you all on this next week! :)  Also this week, I whipped up a large batch of rustic weekly-bread. The dough can last in the fridge up to 14 days and you just pull off a cup full of dough each night (or morning) you want to bake the bread! Yum to that. I made 8 crusty dinner rolls with this bread tonight and it was super delish! Will post the recipe for this coming up because I think it's a keeper to add to my regular weekly baking.

Love Your Comments

So have you ever grown herbs from seed, grown broccoli in your garden, or made sourdough bread starter? I'd love to hear about your experiences! How was your Christmas? Use the comments box below to respond!