Harvested my first zucchini this morning!
We’ve been harvesting cocozelle zucchini this last week. Excellent texture. Will start looking for open car windows if the neighbors don’t need them.
I’ve shredded and frozen them in the past, which works okay for bread and fritters, after you dry them. Any others thoughts for a zucchini surplus?
Anyone know about when/how to plant cyclamen seed pods? I gave several to my neighbor but there are a few left. Would love to see more of these plants/flowers.
The tomatoes are pretty much a bust this year.
Bumping this up! I also have cyclamen pods ripening up. The variety is amazing… it has giant flowers.
We finally harvested some pickling cucumbers off my garden bed. The nitrogen rich food did something- the zucchinis are springing back to life. Finally! There are green tomatoes on some bushes… there is hope!
I’ve been partially successful using RoundUp specifically formulated for Poison Ivy. It grows in a very small natural wooded area behind our home. Each year I suit-up totally covered (one layer), and spray plants. I say partially successful because I have to do it each year. It works for that year, but pops up in other areas the next year, like Whack-A-Mole. So far, no personal break-outs, but I may just be lucky.
I feel like Peter Piper - picking a peck of peppers! Peppers are the plants that are producing now! I mean I’ll use them but getting peppers is not on equal footing with a big ripe tomato or a nice zucchini or eggplant that you can make a dish out of!
My tomatoes have teeny fruit! Collected 4 pickling cucumbers, and my nitrogen deficient garden bed has perked up after some plant food administration. Maybe even a zucchini in the nearest future for me! 
Bumping up!!! What’s cookin in the gardens?
I picked oodles and oodles of grape type tomatoes this morning and did a little garden clean out to make room for a trial fall crop of radish, lettuce and an early beet. Kale is going strong. Best year of success with onions. Peppers at home are producing lots, peppers at my community garden not so much so I pulled some out today.
Making tomato jam right now and enjoying a BKET!!! (bacon, kale, egg, tomato)
We are drowning in tomatoes of all varieties…Early Girls, San Marzano, Sun Gold and red cherry. We’ve had a few eggplants, a lot of jalapeno and cucumbers. Just picked our first red bell pepper but have a few more growing. We got a few zucchini a month or so ago but then the plants died. We have a few other pepper varieties but haven’t picked any of those yet. Also have some green plants but not ready to harvest yet.
I’ve made several batches of marinara sauce that I froze but am planning to give canning a try with our next batch of San Marzano.
With too many days that hit 100º and no discernible monsoon this summer, the tomatoes have taken a beating. I’m not getting enough to can/freeze this year. They haven’t been setting fruit because it’s just too hot. Pole beans are starting to dry up so bean production has slowed, but that’s OK because I have a couple of gallon bags full of beans on the fridge. Cukes are doing fabulous, though. I’ll be making garlic dill pickles tomorrow. Onions also did well. So did the chile peppers.
The 2 eggplants I moved to pots did wonderful until one of the pest deer ate them both–and ate my zucchini plants too. I thought deer didn’t like eating fuzzy or prickly leaves. Seems I was wrong.
The deer have particularly aggressive this summer and have torn down the fencing around the garden more than once and have chewed anything that is near the deer mesh. A doe ate the potted flowers on my patio table, grazed the penstemon and bramble roses planted around the patio and is stripping branches off all my young trees. About the only thing the deer haven’t eaten on/near the patio or garden is my big pot of basil. Maybe I need to make some pesto for the freezer before they change their minds.
I want to plant some fall veggies–lettuce and peas, but it’s just too hot to think about working in the garden.
I thought for sure a deer had got to one of my parsley plants - I woke up one morning to a stem only plant!!! But then the other day I was looking at another parsley plant - and found the culprit - a caterpillar! Big fat green one. Sorry bud. He got moved to another part of the yard.
One of the saddest days of the year, I pulled my vegetable garden today. Kind of comical that I was pulling it on an 80 degree day in October in Ohio! Temps are dropping though and highs for the next 10 days are 50’s at best so it was time.
I picked up anything with promise. Several random peppers. A couple shallots that were hidden. A big bouquet of zinnias that I always line that garden with.
And 17.4 pounds of green tomatoes! My plants were still LOADED! Some are heirlooms. Yes, I weighed them!!! I’ll be sharing some but it’s A LOT of tomatoes.
Any ideas of things to do with them that is NOT fried green tomatoes??? I currently have them in a closed box in hopes that some may turn red.
One year I was able to turn enough that I had garden tomatoes for Thanksgiving!
@abasket
Years ago, I made this as a surprise course for one holiday meal. I let the kids guess what flavor it was. Pretty good, too. I only served the ice cream portion, no garnish. I’d call it delicate.
https://zaikazabardast.com/2011/08/31/tomatoicecream/
Nowadays, there are lots of recipes for this. You’d have to see if any adaptations are needed for larger tomatoes (other recipes say to boil the quickly to get the peels off, then scoop out the seeds.) Guessing you don’t want to look at anything that resembles a tomato, so if you adapt from another recipe, consider straining well, get the chunks out.
This one is calling to me, too
http://frozenfix.blogspot.com/2010/08/green-tomato-marbled-goat-cheese-ice.html
edited
@abasket , years ago I had tons of green tomatoes and canned several quarts of green tomato “mincemeat” pie filling. No meat was involved - chopped apples, green toms, golden and black raisins, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, butter. It was very good but mince pies are kind of a love-them-or-hate-them thing…
^^^ unfortunately I’m in the “hate them” camp - but I can see how this idea could work!
The tomato ice cream is really interesting…!
My D’s boyfriend suggested pickling them or using them sort of like a tomatillo and making green salsa. My cousin in France says she uses them just like red tomatoes in a tomato, feta, onion type salad.
Green tomato chutney?
The chutney would def work - and use up a good handful - but I’m not into the flavor profile of tomato/cinnamon for a chutney. Good find though!