Myoga ginger flower

After having new lealf shoots in April, I have been looking forward to harvest summer flower blossoms. Hard to spot as they grow under soil next to the stem, best to get them before they bloom, and before slug attack. But only possible to spot when you see one white flower tip stick out from the soil. 

Best to fast cook or pickle in miso to enjoy the crunch and a mild gingery flavour. 

Cucumber pickle

Growing cucumber again for the first time in a few years, mainly because it can be too productive and have too much harvest. Nice to have it back for a change, will try to harvest early when they are small to keep up with production. 
Easy pickle in miso and umeboshi plum sauce for a day. 

Red Orach

A new veg this year, direct sow into open bed, and grows well in this heat without bolting, yet. A bit like spinach in texture but more like amaranth that loves heat and  able to cut and come back for a while. 

Sweet potato sprouts

I got 3 sweet potatoes half buried in greenhouse to produce slips, to be transplanted around. Turns out to be a great way to have many young sweet potato plants in a short time. I now have a good 20+ plants and can start harvesting the tip top young leaves, and for the plant to branch out to have more shoots for picking. 

The first small dish of stir-fried sweet potato sprouts for summer, looks like many more to come, fingers crossed. 

Cold lunch

Another heatwave in Ireland, 28˚C, hot enough not to want to cook. Gather some pre-cooked veg and sauces to make this simple lunch, complete with protein, veg and carbohydrate, multi ingredients. 

beetroot
mango
blackcurrant vinaigrette 
potato
basil, ginger, turmeric lemon sauce
tofu
pumpkin seed miso
chorizo

New potatoes

Planted in late March and after around 100 days, it is time to start digging some out. We like them small and waxy. 

I boil potatoes for 10 to 15 minutes depending on size, pour water away and let them stay inside the steamy hot pan, like having sauna. The potatoes are sweet, waxy and don’t need any seasoning. 

Goes well with grilled striploin, and pineapple, coriander, roasted bell pepper vinaigrette salad. 

Garlic harvest and uses

Finally garlic is ready to be pulled up, 2 weeks later than previous years, even though I planted them in mid October, 2 weeks earlier than usual, can only blame the cool weather. However because of continuous wet weather, I don’t need to water at all, so this is very easy veg growing. 

I sorted them out into orderly big bulbs for planting on end of this year, good size bulbs for turning into black garlic, already opened up/irregular looking bulb for immediate use, the rest left to dry in a shady place. 

I prefer to transform them as I am very reactive to fructan in garlic, big gas problem. So the rest of the garlic will probably turn into confit garlic to keep in freezer and honey fermented garlic, which can be kept in the honey for a long time. 

 

I made a batch of low temperature fried dried garlic. Just roughly minced in machine, mix with some olive oil and bake at 120% until crispy, then sprinkle sesame and bake for another 10 minutes. Very tasty and crispy result, to be sprinkled on top of dishes or soup for the crunch…. enjoy if you don’t have garlic gas problem. 

 

A second batch is lactic ferment garlic, cover garlic with water, add 2% salt of the weight of garlic and water used, add black peppercorns and bay leaves to season. Leave at room temperature to bubble away for a month. 

Basil multi ingredients sauce

Planted 4 types of basil this year : Sabertooth, Purple, Siam Queen, Thai, they are growing well in the green house even if this is not a warm summer. I have to keep picking leaves to make sure they grow bushy. 

The harvest is enough to make a tasty sauce, this one has all 4 types of basils, ginger, turmeric, lemon zest, juice, black pepper, Shio Koji, honey and olive oil. With 20% Shio Koji, the sauce can keep for a while in the fridge. 

Very useful and nutritious to accompany many dishes, from natty to smoked mackerel to plan cooked veg. 

Sweet potato slips

This year I aim at having more dark green leaves to eat through out the seasons. Summer is particularly difficult, and sweet potato leaves is a rare one that grow well in the heat. 

To start it growing, I tried the method of half buried shop bought sweet potatoes in the green house, cover with lid if not yet warm enough, keep moist. Indeed after 2 weeks, slips are sprouting, so easy. When they are bigger I will planted them in the green house to grow on. I will have many plants for harvesting leaves, not aiming at having tubers or not. 

Summer veg harvest

After a heatwave, I have the first harvest of pea, sweet and taste of summer. 

Beetroot red and gold are more tasty with more heat, just cut up to eat is enough, like mild sweet  juicy fruits. 

Koji

To fulfill this year’s plan to eat more fermented food, other than having water kefir grain to make fermented drinks, I ordered dried Koji to used in fermenting veg and meat. 

I hydrated Koji with water, seasoned with 25 % its weight in salt, keep at room temperature for a few days to properly swell up then keep in the fridge. 

This salted koji  (shio Koji) is used to pickle raw veg and meat, to soften, ferment and impart a salty umami flavour. First trial on julienned beetroot, and beetroot leaves, both worked well after a few hours. Effect is similar to miso, but for the same money you get more koji to use. 

 

Artichoke

A bit late this year due to cooler weather, but the harvest of artichoke flower buds are in full swing. I like to serve it for lunch as the carb to fill the stomach. 
Steam for 20-30 minutes, eat slowly the nugget from the base of each bracts until the flower receptacle. Sometimes I make a pesto to go with it, but most of the time i just enjoy the natural nutty flavour.

Tomato chutney

Barbecue pork sausages and made some chutney to go with form homemade tomato sauce instantly. Simply mix tomato sauce with marmalade, soy sauce, chilli sauce and that’s it.

Second sprouts of Kailan

The only benefit of having cold weather is that the new sprouts from the leaves nodes of Kailan after the first cuts are growing well, reasonably good size, offering a continuous supply of leafy greens. 

Beetroot in 4 ways

Harvested a good size beetroot from the greenhouse, sowed in mid March. The leaves are big and petioles fat, decided to use them separately. 

Half of the beetroot baked with bell pepper and herbs 

The other half used to make beet kvass drink, by cutting into cubes and ferment in 2% brine It took 4 days for the fermentation to bubble away. Nice umami salty sour flavour.

The leaves are used in soup.

Petiole cut into cubes and salted at 2% for 2 days to soften and ferment, then used in soup.

Sprouting seeds

To supplement home grown veg in this late spring season and add variety, I bought some seeds for sprouting, cress, fenugreek and wheat germ. All germinated well and harvested in a week when the green leaves formed. Among the three, cress has the most distinct flavour, a bit spicy, nice to know there is a lot of nutrients inside these tiny sprouts. 

Kailan petioles

This is the fattest Kailan this year, with huge dark leaves. The stalk and leave parts are my favourites, while leaf petioles are hard and not that tasty. As this plant is quite big, I divided into 3 separate parts and served in 3 meals. Leaves and stem are stir-fried on their own with ginger, rice wine, tasty as such. 

The petiole part is cut into pieces, stirred with other veg and seasoned with anchovies, garlic and chilli sauce for a stronger flavour.  

Spring salad

First salad from home grown leaves, a mix of baby red and green kale, Tong Ho, lettuce and pea sprouts, fresh and beautiful looking. 

White turnip coriander soup

This year I changed to grow white turnip, from seeds I bought in Tainan. Like previous experiences, bolting very fast, I have been cutting off the shoot to hopefully make then grow the root. Harvest one root, decent size, texture is a bit coarse, too hot inside when sun is out. 
Still it is nice to make quick boiled soup with salted egg and miso, adding fresh coriander just before serving elevates the flavour greatly.