July 2006
You are currently browsing the articles from 5 rods written in the month of July 2006.
Another of the collective with a current courgette glut, I’ve been trying out some new recipes. This is from The Complete South African Book of Food and Cookery, with some amendments. It is a winner in our house.
3 large courgettes, thickly sliced
2 tbs olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
500g minced lamb
1 tsp flour
1/2 tsp dried oregano
200ml vegetable stock (or whatever you have available)
freshly ground black pepper
brown sugar
red wine vinegar
3 large tomatoes, peeled and thickly sliced
2 tbs grated Parmesan cheese
2 tbs soft breadcrumbs
Sauce:
2 tbs butter
2tbs flour
300ml milk
salt & freshly ground black pepper
100g feta cheese, crumbled
2 egg yolks, beaten
Put courgette slices into a colander and sprinkle liberally with salt. Leave 30 minutes to drain, then rinse and dry slices on recycled paper towels. Heat oil in a frying pan and saute courgettes until golden on both sides. Remove courgettes with a slotted spoon and set aside.
Add onion and garlic to the pan and cook gently until soft. Turn up heat, add mince and cook until it changes colour, stirring and breaking up lumps with a fork. Sprinkle with flour and oregano and stir in, then add stock and season to taste with salt and pepper. Cook gently for a few minutes, stirring once or twice. Taste and add a touch of brown sugar and vinegar as needed.
Make the sauce: melt butter in a saucepan, add flour and cook, stirring, on gentle heat for 1 minute. Remove from heat, cool a little, add warm milk, stirring until smoothly blended. Return to heat and stir until boiling. Season with salt and pepper, then stir in feta cheese, remove from heat and whisk in egg yolks. Stir 2 tbs of sauce into meat mixture.
Turn meat mixture into a greased, wide but fairly deep ovenproof dish. Arrange tomatoes in a layer on top, then courgette slices on tomatoes. Pour cheese sauce over courgette and sprinkle with Parmesan and breadcrumbs. Bake in a preheated moderately hot oven (190′C/Gas 5) for 30 minutes or until top is golden brown. Serves 6.
Written by The Little Green House on July 23rd, 2006 with no comments.
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Another five cauliflower plants had to come out this morning, following the two I removed last week. I still have about 15 plants left, so I’m hoping hard that they’ll escape the horrible disease. It seems that our allotment plot is riddled with club root, and I will have to review my planting choices next year to include more F1 hybrids with club root resistance, or give brassicas a break completely.
On a more positive note, the F1 Kilaxy cabbages that I planted (in the same bed as those pesky cauliflowers) have grown extremely well and are nearing eating point.
Written by The Little Green House on July 18th, 2006 with no comments.
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The harvest is in full swing now. The courgettes especially, they seem to double in size every night.
Written by exmonkey on July 13th, 2006 with 12 comments.
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Most allotmenteers probably have one vegetable appearing regularly in their cropping hall of shame. You know, a particular crop that year after year stubbornly refuses to give results in spite of the hand-wringing, pleading and tender care that is heaped upon it.
My own particular bete-noir (or would that be a legume-noir?) is the courgette. Courgettes are famed for being so productive that even the most ardent ratatouille lovers have been known to stand outside their houses grabbing passers-by and begging them to take the spares off their hands. But not mine. While others are overwhelmed with a glut and are exploring ever more outlandish recipes (chocolate courgette cheesecake, anyone?), I have resolutely fruitless plants. I think in four or five years of courgette planting I must have harvested a total of four or five courgettes - and even my maths tells me that’s a pretty poor number of courgettes per year.
But no more. This could be the year that I break the cycle - look what I’ve got:
That’s at least three (three! Count em!) on the way. I couldn’t be more proud.
Written by Pumpkinsouper on July 7th, 2006 with 6 comments.
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My first attempt at plaiting garlic. The second one is better, you’ll have to turst me on that.
The instructions on how to do it were given to me by a fellow allotmenteer.
Instructions here
Written by exmonkey on July 5th, 2006 with 2 comments.
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This from a Flickr friend….
Since ethylene helps with ripening you might want to put these next to some bananas, maybe in a paper bag.
I have pasted some info on ripening green maters below:
red tomato pigments, lycopene and carotene, are not produced above 29 degrees C nor lycopene below 10 degrees C
Extended exposure to cool temperatures interferes with ripening and flavor development
Store mature green tomatoes at 10 to 21 degrees C. Once fruit is fully ripe, it can be stored at 7 to 10 degrees C with a relative humidity of 90 – 95%.
Ripening enzymes are destroyed by cold temperatures whether in the garden or in a refrigerator
Ripen tomatoes in well-ventilated, open cardboard boxes at room temperature checking them every few days to eliminate those that may have spoiled. Mature green tomatoes will ripen in 14 days at 21 degrees C and 28 days at 10 degrees C.
Written by exmonkey on July 5th, 2006 with no comments.
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The first of the tomatoes. I wanted to see if they will ripen off the vine, so these got an early chop.
The new potatoes are somewhat abundant at the moment, which may become a problem as we cannot eat them fast enough. I think I’m right in thinking that you can’t store first earlies - so any nice potato (vegetarian) recipes will be gladly accepted.
Written by exmonkey on July 4th, 2006 with 2 comments.
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We are starting to get to the point where there is something to eat from the allotment every day. Today we picked a lettuce, some sugarsnap peas, a carrot and some salad onions for our salad tonight, some strawberries for our pudding, and a carrier bag full of redcurrants to make into redcurrant sorbet for tomorrow night’s pudding.I’d better get planning my food preserving and storing because it won’t be long before the allotment is chucking out more that we can consume on a daily basis. Peak Veg!
Written by The Little Green House on July 3rd, 2006 with 2 comments.
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