The Oldies

It seems appropriate that I'm bottling, freezing and generally preserving end of season harvest whilst listening to the oldies, which is now the 60's & 70's. Yup, that's right. I can remember when the oldies were 40's & 50's. Ah well.

After that spectacular summer of cool temps we hit upper 90's in late August. We caught a break on Labor Day in the mid-80s and hopefully maintaining this through the week, but we haven't had much for rain in several weeks. I haven't watered the garden and things are definitely on the decline, such as cucumbers and summer squashes, but they definitely put out a great harvest this year! What I didn't eat/pickle the chickens have enjoyed. I hacked down a bunch of shrubby lamb's quarter this morning before the mosquitoes got unbearable. Still going are: eggplant, lemon squash, peppers, beans, basil, Mexican sour gherkin, winter squashes and the flowers.

I had started some seeds for a fall garden and the slugs or rolly pollies got them. Now it is too dry to start seed in the garden.

So now, the Beatles are playing and I'm putting up or putting by, whichever you fancy.

Apricot Wine

This has been brewing since mid-June when I got a big old box for $5 at Soulard Market. I

bottled it today. True Brews says to bottle it like you would beer. I'm not sure why, but it is nice to have in small serving sizes. Nice color.

The bottled results. Notice the clearest 2 in the middle were the ones I bottled first. The last pours were on the ends and you can see it is darker with more suspended sediment. 

Freezer Pesto

I noticed my first planted basil plant was getting woody, starting to flower and wilt so I cut it all down for freezer jar pesto. I'm hoping to do some more freezer jarred stuff. We'll see how this jar holds.

Freezer bound romas

I will freeze these solid and then bag for later use.

Morning's Harvest

A variety of maters, yum yum peppers and 2 varieties of eggplant.

Harvest before the heat & drought (2 wks ago)

Wildlife News: 

I've seen a record number of toads and southern leopard frogs in the yard this summer. I'm assuming it was the consistent rain we had. I saw one garter snake in the garden too. 

Leopard Frog 

Pipevine Swallowtail

Feeling today:

Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.