Capturing The Essence of Tomatoes

Posted on September 19, 2022 by Ann Lovejoy
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Slow or fast, red or green, roasting captures those essential flavors

Saving Summer To Savor In Winter

After such a long summery stretch of dry heat, it’s startling how quickly autumn arrives. Though the days are still warm, the nights are already dipping into the 40s and since the air quality has improved enough to open the windows at night, it’s fun to snuggle under blankets again. This morning I sorted through my summer clothes and started bringing out the sweaters and even a woolly hat or two. In the garden, even as I pull out the last of the faltering elders, eager young starts are building quickly into productive plants. This year, we’ll be enjoying several kinds of cole cousins, including my favorite Purple Sprouting Broccoli and red Brussels sprouts, colorful kin that taste great and can really brighten up a salad or veggie plate. Of course there are lots of kales, from Dazzling Blue to Black Magic and Lacinato. The most heavily textured kales seem especially inhospitable to Cabbage White butterflies, especially the really frilly types, but the butterflies finally disappear in fall so we can enjoy the tenderest smooth types too.

As summer wanes, the late tomatoes are finally ripening and we’re eating the cherry types by the bowlful, knowing they’re the last of the sun ripened ones we’ll taste until next year. Though some plants are still going strong, those cold nights are already nipping the leaves of some of my tomato plants as well as the outdoor basil. Along with the big reds, I’m harvesting green tomatoes of all sizes as well as the semi-ripe ones from the saddest looking plants. All are heading to a glorious future as roasted remnants of that pure summer flavor. Once roasted, they go into 1-cup freezer containers to await their higher destiny. Some get initially frozen in a dedicated ice cube tray that has a heavy cover flap to keep out funky freezer flavors (the same tray I use for freezing pesto without garlic, as garlic doesn’t improve with freezing). Once solid, you can pop out the cubes and pack them into longer term containers, then add one or two to add depth and richness to winter soups, sauces, and stews and give off season salsas a livelier homemade quality.

Slow Down And Savor The Subtleties

I don’t can big batches of pasta sauces anymore, but any decent store bought sauce can be juiced up nicely with the addition of sauteed onions, peppers, etc. to boost the usually bland, rather heavy flavor. (For a big umami boost, add quartered Kalamata olives to the onions and peppers while sauteeing.) However, adding a few cubes or even a cup of thawed roasted peppers, whole or pureed, can transform a dull bottled sauce into a rich one that doesn’t tasting stale or stodgy. I don’t bother to remove seeds or skins when cooking tomatoes down for sauce or soup because they bring a lot of flavor to the party. If anyone objects to the textures, a quick buzz of a stick blender will take care of that. If tomatoes will be cooked, whether for canning or roasting, I just quarter tomatoes, removing the stem ends if the scar is tough, and pureed or not, the results are better than anything you can buy.

Roasting is definitely the simplest way to deal with a lot of tomatoes. When it’s still too summery to hang over a hot stove, roasting is the easiest way to deal with the bounty without getting heat stroke. You can mix reds and greens or roast them together, but while ripe ones can benefit from faster roasting at higher temperatures, green tomatoes taste far more delicious when roasted low and slow. The idea is to allow them to caramelize a bit without drying out or burning, so low temps are important. And here’s a hot tip: if you line the baking sheet with parchment paper, cleanup will be much easier(!).

Low-Slow Roasted Green Tomatoes

8 cups green tomatoes, halved or quartered
1 tablespoon avocado or olive oil
1/4 teaspoon basil salt or kosher salt
1-2 teaspoons rosemary sprigs (optional)

Preheat oven to 225 degrees F. Lightly rub each tomato, (skin side only) with oil, then place them cut-side-up in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet and sprinkle lightly with salt and rosemary if using. Bake at 225 degrees F until soft and edges are lightly caramelized (2-4 hours or more, depending on size and ripeness). Pack in freezer containers as-is or puree first. Makes about 5-6 cups.

Posted in preserving food, Recipes, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living, Tomatoes, Vegan Recipes | Tagged | Leave a comment

The Little Known Positive Side Of Smoke

Posted on September 12, 2022 by Ann Lovejoy
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Smoke & dust bring some surprising benefits

Smoke, Ash, Dust & Plant Health

This weekend, my band played maritime music at the venerable Wooden Boat Festival in Port Townsend, Washington. We were hoping that the breezy seaside location would mean less smoky air than we’ve been experiencing at home, and to some extent it did. Even so, I found myself coughing funky gunge for hours afterwards, not too surprising when you learn that Seattle had the worst air quality on the planet that day. We’ve held that dubious honor before, since regional winds all too often carry smoke and even ash from far too many wildfires. When the West burns, even coastal areas can get the fallout.

Harmful as smoky air is for people, it can have some surprisingly positive effects on plants and even soil. While most research has looked at the damage smoke can do to plants, a few studies have noted additional beneficial results. After the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, it was noticed that while plants died in badly hit areas, where ash was distributed less deeply, apple and wheat crops were increased by about 25%, an effect that persisted for some years. Researchers also noted that thinner coats of ash and even ashy crusts actively help dry soils retain more water and add minerals and other nutrients to the soils. That said, it’s still true that when particulate counts are high, the little bitty bits can cling to foliage, clogging up the little window-like structures (stoma) on foliage that allow plants and air to freely exchange water and oxygen. Dust and debris can similarly reduce free gas and water exchange, so it’s still important to hose down plants during and after smoky periods.

New News Is Good News

Even so, it has long been assumed that the net result of extended smoke exposure was as bad for plants as for people and critters. A report in the January 2020 Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences confirmed that wildfire smoke may actually increase plant productivity. During the summer of 2018, researchers tracked the ecological effects of wildfire smoke in California’s Central Valley and correlated their findings with a number of other recent smoke studies. It turned out that smoke generally only blocks about 4% of sunlight (less than previously supposed), and that the way smoke diffuses sunlight lets light penetrate more deeply into dense tree canopies, increasing the photosynthesis efficiency of canopy foliage and increasing overall plant productivity.

What’s more, in some situations, the scattered light of smoky conditions measurably improved plant health and productivity in restored wetlands and natural bog environments. Who knew? There are very complicated biochemical reasons for all this, but it seems likely that, given the frequency of naturally caused fires and volcanic activities over the millennia, many plants have adapted to take whatever advantage may be possible from the resulting conditions. So what about our gardens? There, too, we may find more resiliency than expected, especially if we stay vigilant abut watering on hot, smoky days, as plants with dry roots are susceptible to more damage of all kinds than well watered ones.

An Unexpected Benefit Of Dust

This has been a good year for Cabbage White butterflies and thus a tough year for cabbage, kale and other greens. After a frustrating spring, I was delighted to notice that the Cabbage Whites had retreated from my Pea Patch garden bed, even though they were still very active in my tiny home garden. The difference was that the Pea Patch community garden abuts an active construction site where a wonderful playground is being built, relying heavily on natural materials. Many yards of soil, wood chips and gravel have been dumped and moved about all summer, causing clouds of dust to settle on nearby beds. As it turns out, mine is one of the lucky ones, as the heavily dusted kale in mine soon produced new, unblemished and un-nibbled foliage.

Where neighboring gardeners were regularly hosing off foliage, the caterpillar damage continued unabated. Since my Pea Patch garden is largely a pollinator patch and doesn’t need frequent watering, I’ve largely let it be for the bees (if not to everyone’s delight). Apparently, that dusty coat on my kale caused any Cabbage White eggs to be smothered and the adults must have grown discouraged, which is fine by me. Now, as I’m planting fresh kale and greens, broccoli and Brussels sprouts, I’m experimenting with deliberately dusting the young foliage on some of the plants. It will be interesting to see if dirtying the leaves helps keep them clean of caterpillar damage! Onward, right?

Posted in Garden Prep, Health & Wellbeing, pests and pesticides, Planting & Transplanting, Pollination Gardens, Soil, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Garden Retreat Or Garden Advance

Posted on September 6, 2022 by Ann Lovejoy
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Our newest neighbors enjoy gardening together

Gardens That Welcome and Include

After way too many hot dry days, the garden is finally starting to perk up, thanks more to heavy dews than actual rain. After each rinsing, grateful birds flock eagerly to drink and prink and the dusty plants breathe freely again. At last the garden feels like a haven again. September 1 is supposed to usher in autumn, though the equinox isn’t until the 22nd this year, but despite still-hot days, autumn is clearly coming. Cooler nights and crisper air hint at rain on the way, and it will certainly be welcome. I’ve been thinking about welcome lately as I visited several gardens that felt far from welcoming. Two were described as garden retreats and another as a haven, but all shared a combination of stark public-facing areas and high hedges that offered not even a glimpse of the goodies inside.

Though a sense of enclosure can make a garden feel comfortably sheltered, high, dense hedges (or walls or fences) can feel fortress-like, walling out passersby as well as any neighbors. I get that feeling overlooked by neighbors can be uncomfortable; I always prefer to live where curtains aren’t needed because nobody is in a position to see into the house. However, what would it hurt to provide some sense of abundance in the front yards, instead of pairing tightly mown lawn with sternly sheared blobs of barberry or spirea or dwarf laurel and calling it good? Not only does that look rather barren and bleak, such highly manicured landscapes don’t offer food or shelter to anyone or anything (except I suppose in that the landscapers get a wage to keep that iron hand of control so much in evidence). The actual gardens have retreated behind the tall hedges, and whatever they may be, these public-side plantings are not welcoming and definitely not gardens.

Little Gardens Everywhere

With so much concern for pollinators in the news these days, I’d love to see a national movement to turn all such unused lawn-scapes into pollinator patches. There could still be those towering privacy hedges, guarding more personal gardens from unwelcome eyes, but at least the useless turf, unvisited except by weekly mowers, could be doing some good in this weary world. Coming away from my little tour, I found myself even more appreciative than ever of my own neighborhood in a rather charming (and garden-rich) mobile home park. In terms of privacy, I hadn’t expected much when we moved in, yet I’ve been very pleasantly surprised to find that our small home feels fully as private as the physically isolated places I’ve lived. I’m impressed at the forethought that has each unit placed so that few if any neighboring windows are directly aligned. Some unwanted views are blocked by a fence, carport or shed, but most are screened by evergreen plants, which makes a stroll in the mobile home park feel like, well, a stroll in a PARK park.

Because the lots are mostly very small, the gardens tend to spill out into the street, generously sharing blossoms and assorted garden decorations with passersby. Even before I lived here, the park reminded me of those lovely paintings of English cottage gardens, which always seemed to be both billowing with bloom and packed with produce. Many of these little gardens are similarly dual-duty spaces, with raspberries trellised up to save space above a ruffle of bright annuals, and a sprawl of strawberries sharing a bed with tall, fragrant lilies. Where elderly (and hello, totally inappropriate) trees devour planting beds with questing, hungry roots, several people have created raised box beds filled with kale and calendulas, squash and salvias, roses and rutabagas. One enterprising neighbor lines a cement carport floor with potatoes in big grow-bags and for the delectation of the neighborhood plants the street edge with spectacular bushes of Brugmansia, with enormous, swirling flowers amid airy puffs of Nicotiana mutabilis that scent the air from evening into the night. Across the narrow street, a splendid Datura opens deep purple blossoms with dramatic white linings, and both plants are keeping local bees busy zooming back and forth to savor the bounty.

Welcoming and Inclusive

When you walk around this little neighborhood in high summer, the sound of happy bees is almost as loud as the birdsong. These friendly, welcoming little gardens are always lively, providing a haven indeed for a multitude of tiny critters. Most of the homes also offer a little seating area, some tucked behind a sheltering tree, others snugged down a necessarily short path with garden beds on both sides, and a few set out in full view of the street. Narrow and overhung with bushes, the shared street is really more like a long, winding driveway, with gardens spill into it to soften any hard lines. Since most passersby are neighbors, there’s less focus on shutting people out and more on inviting them in for a cup of tea and a comfortable chat. After decades of living at the end of long driveways with no neighbors in sight, it’s refreshing to be part of a genuine neighborhood, where kids play in the street and people walking their little dogs stop to chat (and get totally tangled in leashes as the dogs have a little sniff-fest).

Our newest neighbors arrived a few weeks ago, a lovely young family with two pre-teen boys. Originally from Venezuela, they first sought political asylum in Florida, then moved here at the invitation of a neighbor who was an old friend. Now they’re all sharing an older but renovated mobile home, the owner having moved into a smaller home-share part of the unit and the family living in the main area. The whole family spends time outside, kids playing with lots of laughter and joking, adults chatting cheerfully with passersby. What’s more, the whole family is enjoying bringing some tired, weedy garden beds back into vibrant life. Soon this neglected patch will be another abundant little garden, welcoming and friendly. Onward, right?

Posted in Birds In The Garden, Garden Design, Gardening With Children, Health & Wellbeing, Pollination Gardens, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Rain Barrels Save Water, But Is It Clean Water?

Posted on August 29, 2022 by Ann Lovejoy
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Lifestraw filters are good basic emergency supplies

What’s On The Average Roof?

With the rainy season on the horizon (hopefully), I recently wrote an article about using water saved in rain barrels safely and have been answering many questions ever since. Several people wanted to know if they could use wooden barrels, rather than the ubiquitous plastic ones sold today. Well, sure, if you can find one that holds water and has never held anything toxic or nasty. Sadly, wooden barrels aren’t common anymore, and if you do find one, unless it was intended to be used for aging wine or whiskey, it may not even be water-tight. For one thing, wooden barrels need to stay full of water or they dry out and leak like crazy, and even after they get refilled, it can take a while for the leaks to close up. What’s more, sometimes a drying barrel will warp, and the metal hoops that hold wooden barrels together may fall off or corrode and crack, ending the useful life of the barrel. Finding new ones isn’t easy, unless you live near a brewery; the art of coopering is growing rare and nearly all barrel makers now work for breweries that favor traditional aging techniques. And no, there’s no way to put two half barrels back together; most of the half-barrels sold as planters are made to be filled with soil, not water, and are not really half of a complete barrel at all.

For centuries, wooden barrels were the shipping containers of choice, holding dry goods like nails and gunpowder as well as salt fish and beef, tobacco and tea. Some even held liquids, from molasses to wine and spirits. Empty barrels were often placed under eaves or at the ends of wooden gutters to capture water off the roofs of barns and outbuildings and homes. The captured rain water was a handy source of clean(ish) water that was usually nearer to the house than the well (something much appreciated by children, who were the usual water fetchers). Rain barrel water was often used to irrigate flower beds and smaller vegetable patches near the home, and in the rainy season, might be used for laundry and even for the family’s Saturday night baths.

Up On The Roof

Rain barrel water wasn’t usually used for drinking and no wonder. Even when roofs were mostly made of wooden shingles or slabs of slate, they were still pretty dirty places. In hotter climates, roofs might be less apt to accumulate the thick mosses and lichens so abundant in cooler areas, which make perfect hosts for all sorts of unpleasant pathogens. Even so, roofs everywhere are visited by birds, rats, raccoons and/or other regional critters, all of which leave their droppings behind when they wander away. Such droppings can include a generous assortment of pathogens and diseases, many of which survive quite well despite the heat and drought on a hot rooftop, being able to go dormant in various ways. Many will positively thrive once they hit the rain barrel, lingering invisibly in the relatively warm, still water.

I know I’m getting a little geeky (again), but seriously, there’s a lot of unsavory stuff in most rain barrels. Besides those natural yet dangerous substances, today’s rainwater can leach chemicals from modern roofing materials, from manufactured shingles to treated wooden shakes. Our rooftop runoff can now include asphalt, tar and glue, petroleum by-products, glass particles, lead, and more. Metals roofs can shed zinc, copper, and aluminum as well. Some of those chemicals can react with water, especially acidic rain, and bind the harmful substances so they remain hidden but still effective in our water barrels. In addition, rainfall increasingly contains tiny plastic particles that accumulate in our bodies, with both known and unknown effects (and none of them likely to be good).

Finding A Filter

Several readers wonder if rain barrels can be a source of drinking water in an emergency. Well, no and yes: If you are assuming that you can just dip and sip, then no. Really no. If you can filter that water, it might become safe, but getting there requires more than a simple screen type filtration system. First, any filter must strain out bird and animal droppings, pollen, dust and dirt, slime molds and other unsavory things, all of which will affect the quality and cleanliness of the rainwater. Beyond that, it’s best to have a filtration system that is also able to capture lead, copper and other toxins as well as bacteria, especially if your rain barrel is not covered, as standing water nearly always develops various kinds of gunge, visible or not.

Some people feel that it’s enough to filter out particulate matter before using rain barrel water for irrigating plants, since many plants and soils are able to effectively purify water, but if it’s going to be used on edibles, or serve as emergency drinking water, better filtration is wise. A filter system for stored water should include a pre-filtration stage of at least 30 micron rating, an automatic filter backwash cleaning function, and a way to remove the backwash water (usually not a lot) from the filters. Polypropylene & ceramic cartridge type filters can remove sediment and bacteria, but not viruses, while activated carbon filters are very good at removing and/or reducing odors and unpleasant tastes, as well as some chemicals including iron and hydrogen sulphide, but not bacteria or viruses. Most micro/ultra filtration membrane systems can remove sediment, bacteria and viruses. Hopefully it’s also obvious that rainwater capture tanks and plumbing materials must be rated as suitable for contact with drinking water.

Barrel Cleaning & Personal Emergency Filters

August is a good time to empty water storage containers, a task that should be done annually. Use unfiltered water freely on ornamental garden beds and lawns or for washing the car, patio or deck furniture. When setting up a new water barrel, rinse it out with bleach water, making sure any plastic bits are flushed out. To keep stored water potable for up to a year, add 4-1/2 teaspoons of bleach per 55 gallons of water. Store the barrels in a shaded place where they won’t heat up in summer weather. If the hose attachment is near the very bottom of the barrel, set the barrel on blocks to make it easier to get the hose on and off (this turns out be be quite important!). To clean rain barrels, empty them completely, then scrub until clean and rinse them out with a mild bleach solution.

If you envision needing a lot of water during a prolonged emergency (think tsunami, etc), consider more complex filtration systems such as the Lifestraw Community water purifier, which removes most particulate matter. There are also smaller units, including personal units designed to be used by a single person. These supposedly never expire and the membrane filter can process up to 1,000 gallons, which is at least a few year’s supply. Onward, right?

 

Posted in Birds In The Garden, Drainage, Garden Design, Health & Wellbeing, Moss, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments