Flowering Harvest

 Many of the autumn-sown veggies are starting to flower so its a chase to harvest all those veggies ASAP. We harvested all of our Florence Fennel bulbs and carrots last week. Our pea season are ending this month. From self-sowed autumn tomato plants we get to harvest some ripe cherry tomatoes.

 The warm weather this week has hastened tatsoi to flower and got to harvest them. We harvested a few left overs chiogga beetroots.

Our only surviving chamomile plant is still producing flowers which we welcome very much.

 We also harvested boltardy beetroot last week. The last edible purple vienna kohlrabi was harvested. This kohlrabi has very long-ish thick stem but still edible.

 Golden nugget cape gooseberry and alpine strawberry fruits are still in season here in our small garden. We had volunteer garlic small bulbs sprouted in container last autumn and I pull them out all for immediate use in the kitchen.

Join in Daphne's Dandelions Harvest Monday.

Back to School and Harvesting

 I have returned to school from maternity leave almost 2 weeks now and Abby is 2 months old. Hence, disappearing for a short while again from the blogsphere. I have not come in early to school yet probably around noon as it is hard to leave Abby. But then I stay at least until 7PM. I think that is an excuse I am never a morning person (another excuse low blood pressure). The Medela freestyle breastpump has been a savior as I can do 3 things at a time breastfeed, expressing and browsing the net. 

I missed Daphne's Dandelions Harvest Monday last week so these are the harvest summaries for the first half month of October.

 The month of October will be continuously harvesting Western Red Carrot, Boltardy Beetroot and Golden Nugget Cape Gooseberry.

 We still have some fresh lemon grass stalks to harvest after the plants stayed dormant during cold season. Peas are reducing as the weather gets warm. Harvest the last black round Spanish radish last week. Need to start harvesting Florence Fennel regularly before they flower. We kept on finding some potatoes whenever we do some weeding in the garden.

We harvested our first small red cabbage last week. No more Bloomsdale spinach in the garden as I harvested them all as some of the plants starts to form flower stalk. The last 2 touchstone gold beetroot were harvested and I left one to flower to collect seeds.

 The harvest in the photo above were growing at the back of our backyard fence on reserve land. They got trampled by the council cleaning team. My husband was shocked when one morning he wanted to harvest some veggies at the back all the veggies were almost gone and even big plants were mowed. We managed to harvest leeks that had hair cuts because the stem were planted deep into the ground and only the top were mowed.Same with the florence fennel were severed from its roots and the leaves cut , lucky that the bulb stayed intact. For 3 years, I grew veggies back there but this is the first time happened. The spring onion flowers were left drying on the plant but it got chopped so brought them in to dry.

The previous post I mentioned that I am giving-away Australian Brown Onion and Spring Onion seeds.

Winners, please send me your address so I can post it to you (kebunkmg@gmail.com).

Aussie Brown Onion and Spring Onion Seeds Winners:

> Gardenglut author of Glut: a year in my patch

> KitsapFG (Laura) author of The Modern Victory Garden

>Joyfulhomemaker author of Fhat Farmer Chick

>Ummuaidan author of Our Simple Garden

>Malar author of My Little Garden

Rigatoni with Zucchini, Lemon and Mint

We have started to harvest some of our topweight carrots that were sowed end winter (August) on the sunniest patch in the garden. It is grown on hard clay soil. So we got a funny looking roots but the roots are strong enough to grow through hard soil. Before we have some several days of hot weather it will be best  to harvest all those carrots before it become bake carrot in the soil. The exposed carrot root are becoming blackish instead of normal greenish. We harvested our last florence fennel as it is not growing that much due to the warm weather we have during the day. The location that I planted them was too sunny and dry for them I reckoned. Contemplating at the moment to try growing them in container during this summer.

Yellow currant tomatoes are still very prolific. It takes a long time to harvest them. There are also many self-sowed yellow currant tomatoes near this plants. Our volunteer yellow pear cherry tomato plants also has some ripen fruits. But it did not make it to the harvest basket as it is consider as rare item in the garden at the moment. So it is always pick and pop in the mouth.

Harvested some Lebanese zucchines and Lebanese eggplants last week.

Just for fun, the total cost for us to make this dish is less than AUD5.00. It says that it is for 4 servings. But it was quite a lot that it was for lunch and dinner for us. This is the first time we tried zucchini with pasta.

Rigatoni with Zucchini, Lemon and Mint ( The Australian Women's Weekly-The $ Smart Cook)

Ingredients:
500gram rigatoni pasta (coles brand AUD1.00)
60ml olive oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed (home-grown)
3 medium zucchini (~360gram), grated coarsely (home-grown Lebanese zucchini)
180 gram ricotta cheese (I used less from leftovers for leek and fetta triangles)
1 cup coarsely chopped fresh mint (home-grown used less 1/2 cup cos not many leaves at the moment)
70gram roasted slivered almonds, if desired ( in a rush I forgot about them)
2 tablespoons lemon juice (from neighbour)

(1) Cook pasta in large saucepan of boiling water until just tender; drain.
(2) Meanwhile, heat oil in large frying pan; cook garlic and zucchini, stirring, 2 minutes. Add cheese; cook, stirring, until just heated through.
(3) Combine zucchini mixture and pasta in serving bowl with remaining ingredients.

We harvested all our Nero Black kale and Red Russian kale leaves last week as I wanted to clear some patch for warm loving vegetables. My husband seems to be allergic eating Red Russian kale but not Nero Black kale. Do you know whether this allergy to particular kale is common? My hand itch too when I harvest Red Russian Kale especially at the part that has been cut probably from the oozing liquidy thing.

I am only successful at growing small cabbage head. 

Some potatoes, leeks and kohlrabi harvested yesterday.

Visit Daphne's Dandelions to see different kind of harvest from different season such as winter or summer and the all year round tropical climate.

Salmon Kedgeree with Fennel and A Malaysia Twist Salad

This week, we harvested nice size of leeks. Those leek seedlings were born in Gnomesville given to us by Veggie Gnome last fall. We harvested as well a Florence fennel, purple kohlrabi, some yellow cherry tomatoes from 2 plants and some baby potatoes. Did you noticed our November cooking are speedy and simple. The cook is getting lazy in the kitchen as she is getting busy with writing up her thesis. Have to do lots of reading before you can think and write something for a thesis. I found another interesting fast to prepare dish and less cleaning up to do in the kitchen with this recipe. If you have left-over cooked plain rice this is a good recipe for it as well. This dish is to said originate from Britain.

Salmon Kedgeree with Fennel (adapted from The Australian's Women Weekly-World Table)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups white long grain rice (We used basmathi or leftover cooked rice about 5 cups)

400 gram canned red salmon

75 gram butter

1/3 cup coarsely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

1 cup sliced florence fennel

2 teaspoons lemon juice

3 hard-boiled eggs, chopped coarsely

(1) Cook rice

(2) Drain salmon, discard skin and bones. Flake flesh.

(3) Melt butter in large frying pan; add rice, fennel, parsley and juice. Cook stirring until heated through. Add salmon and eggs; cook stirring gently until heated through. Serve with lemon wedges.
Note: I mixed in some Pak choi together.

Yup fennel and lemon goes well together.

Simple!

Another new experiment prepared in our kitchen.

If you don't have green mangoes or other vegetables that usually mix together for a Malaysia typical sambal salad, you can use slice red onion, florence fennel, kohlrabi mix together with pounded shrimp paste and chilli. Season well with lime/lemon juice, salt and sugar. You can also add in some crushed roasted peanuts. It taste so good that I took the picture only when it is left this much. It really taste like Malaysia typical sambal salad. A good appetiser.

Canned red salmon will be stock in the pantry now for busy days.

Finocchio Frittata

We have been very lucky with growing finocchio this year, I have no complaint at all about growing this plant. It grows well without any pampering or much attention. But I will say that it is not a vegetable that can make you fall in love with it at first sight regarding taste. It is definitely one of the vegetables that is an acquired taste. To be honest, I don't hate or like this vegetables at the first month I started to harvest them. But now I started to really like and enjoy them. It is all after trying different recipes and experimenting what combination goes well with finocchio. I found out that finocchio really goes along well with mixing them with lemon juice.

 This is one of the recipes that I tried with florence fennel. This is also the first time I used ricotta cheese in my cooking...I like the taste of this cheese blended in the mixture of this frittata.

Finocchio Fritters (Recipe from The Australian Women's Weekly-Fast Vegies)

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh fennel

1 medium fennel bulb (500gram), chopped finely

3 green onions (spring onions), chopped finely

1 small carrot (70gram), grated finely

2 eggs, beaten lightly

75g ricotta cheese

1/4 cup (35g) plain flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

vegetable oil, for shallow frying (used olive oil)

~Combine fennel leaves and bulb, onion, carrot, egg, cheese, flour and baking powder in medium bowl, mix well.

~Heat oil in large frying pan; shallow-fry heaped tablespoons of mixture until golden brown both sides and cooked through. Flatten slightly during cooking, drain on absorbent paper.

Growing Finocchio in container

Well-grown finocchio can have very big roots. However, it does grow well in medium size pots. The shallowest pot so far that we have success growing finocchio is about 25cm. This year we did succession sowing of finocchio from end March until June. None of the seedlings bolted. All of it produces bulb even the ones grown in shades.

Germination of the seeds was also almost 100% during the sowing period we did for growing in cool season. I sowed some seeds in containers, which left one undisturbed to grow in pot and the rest transplanted on the veggie patch.

I had to use a lot of strength to pull this one out from the pot.

More than half of the pots was filled in with roots rather than soil.

Spring-sown finocchio, can be thin out as baby fennels. One of the last-batches of finocchio that will be harvested in the near future.

The biggest finocchio that we grown in container so far weight about 950gram.

This is one of the new vegetables that we tried growing this year and will happily grow them again.

I gave some of finocchio produce to my parents last September and my mother made some finocchio juice.

I forgot to ask how the juice she made taste like.

Gift for Parents

Our garden/kebun has been very generous this month, although I have very much neglected our garden. Lenay and my brother has gone back to my parents home last weekend. They have brought back some vegetables for our parents. We are happy that we met some of our aim when we sowed seeds in fall for them to grow ready to be pick on the week my brother going back home. Visit Daphne's Dandelion Harvest Monday and see different part of garden in this world that gifted their gardeners who has given so much TLC in return. This week harvest photos are some part of harvest that we had for our parents. I have not taken much photo lately in the garden.

We had beginners luck with Florence fennel this year. Maybe this year is a good year for Florence fennel since I felt Florence fennel are selling cheaply this year in the local market and good size too. We had to harvest most of our lettuces since we had several days of warm weather, they have the sign to bolt.

Parsnip for my parents. First attempt at growing them this year last end summer.

Don't forget to sow some parsnip and carrot seeds this month quickly.

The germination rate was really good here in Adelaide plain.

Beetroots that were grown in container. It was my parent first taste of beetroot and I got a text with a request to post some seeds of beetroot after that.

Purple-podded peas season are almost over in our garden since those plants are dying. Those beetroot that received a haircut from my brother which I had to remind him several time not to trim near the root so much or it bleed.

Sprouting broccoli plants still providing generously.

This sweet potato is for us that were left growing in container over-winter. I was kind of worried that the tubers will rot in winter but I do not dare dig them out cause it was sharing space with Chinese Broccoli which I plan to harvest seeds from it. What a surprise when we dig out this 1.5kg sweet potato out. 

Crab and Florence Fennel Soup

Its officially spring here today!

The days are getting warmer and warmer.

Its time to wave goodbye to soups.

But its still cold at night.

From our last fishing trip we still have many crabs in the freezer and Florence fennels in the garden are  ready for picking. So what to do with them? I was flicking through pages of "The Food & Cooking of Finland" recipe book by Anja Hill and came across a crayfish soup recipe. It gave me an idea to adapt this recipe to crab and florence fennel soup.

Florence Fennel with English Daisy as companion in our garden.

It is our first time growing Florence Fennel in our garden this year.

Happy that we have beginners luck on this vegetable grown from seeds.

Crab and Florence Fennel Soup

Ingredients:
50g unsalted butter
50g (1cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
700ml (3cups) fish or chicken stock
5ml (1tsp) paprika
1 egg yolk
120ml cup double (heavy) cream
250gram cooked crab/crayfish meat
15ml (1tbsp) lemon juice
salt and ground black pepper (seasoning)
15ml (1tbsp) chopped fresh dill (to garnish)

*Optional~ Florence Fennel (sliced)

1) Melt the butter in a pan, stir in the flour to make a roux and cook over a low heat for 30 seconds, without colouring. Remove from the heat and gradually stir in the fish or chicken stock to form a smooth sauce.

2) Return the pan to the heat and, stirring all the time, cook until the sauce boils and thickens. Add the paprika and season to taste with salt and pepper.

3) In a small bowl, mix the egg yolk and cream together, then stir into the soup and heat gently, taking care not to let the mixture boil or the soup will curdle.

4) Add the florence fennel, crab meat and lemon juice to the soup and heat gently. Pour the soup into individual serving bowls and serve hot, garnished with chopped dill.

During our fishing trip, there were bit of crab pieces on the jetty which Ilhan made many shape of it.

This is one of his imaginative product.

What do you think it is?

Ilhan's mama made a wrong guess!

Its a diplodocus.
Linking with Wendy's GTTC.