B/CS Gardening

It's a new year and a new month. More to plant and a bit more construction are on the list for this month, but first, let's review what I accomplished last month.

I planted brussels sprouts, onions, and greens. I didn't plant carrots because I don't have a bed deep enough, but I'll ignore that for this month. I cleaned out the old plants that didn't survive the first frost (tomatoes, peppers, egg plant), and trimmed back the oregano. I dried the oregano trimmings and put the leaves in a jar for later use. I also cleaned up the garden by pulling out most of the weeds and tilling the unused squares before planting.

I thought Sunday’s update would be my last for the year, but I think I can sneak one last update in before the new year.

Before leaving town Monday, I ran by Producers and picked up some onion sets and seeds for some greens and brussels sprouts. The onions and sprouts should do fine with the cold. The other plants in the garden that are similar to greens did well through the recent freeze, so I’m trying the greens.

It’s the week of Christmas. Here in Texas, we don’t usually expect a white Christmas, and this year is no different. Our first freeze was a couple weeks ago. I took that as an opportunity to clean out of the garden anything that couldn’t survive a really cold night. What was left were the various greens: lettuce, radishes, kohlrabi.

The weather is finally getting cold. It’s been drizzly all afternoon and in the upper 40s. Current forecasts indicate a 40% chance of snow Friday. Looks like I’ll finally need to pull out the last remaining plants from summer.

This is also a good time to put together a list of things I need to get done this month. I won’t have much time to get outside around the new year, so I need to make sure everything’s done and ready for January. I can’t wait until the last minute this time.

Today is the Thanksgiving dinner at Friends UCC, where I sing in the choir. I was out of town for most of last week, so my partner signed us up to bring a side dish. Saturday morning, we stopped in at the farmers market and picked up four pounds of carrots and a bottle of olive oil.

Carrots aren’t that different from parsnips, so I like to try parsnip recipes with carrots. Today, I made maple glazed carrots using a recipe from Joy of Cooking (1997 edition, page 394).