Well I ventured into the outdoor oven yesterday(aka the backyard) and harvested our 1st veggies from the garden.
I had brought the nephew over to swim so he helped me cut the stalks I couldn't reach....
A pile of Collards!
Pretty meager for our 1st harvest but it's a start.....
I've never picked anything this early in the growing season but the extra warm weather all of June has hurried things along in the garden this year. This is my first year growing Collards.
The smallest of the leaves was well over 18 inches long.
I had bought a bag of Collards to augment this batch since I knew I wouldn't have enough to cook a whole pot this time. They were mighty good and if the bugs don't eat too much before I need to pick them again, I'll have another large pot worth to cook.
My mom loved her some collards. My father hated the smell so she was forced to wait until he went out of town on business overnight to cook them. She cooked them old school with fatback, potatoes and cornmeal dumplings, like her mother had fixed them. I never developed a taste for cornmeal dumplings so I cook them with bacon inside of fatback and leave out the potatoes too.
I saw Paula Deen make fried wontons stuffed with cream cheese and collards a couple of weeks ago. Now the frying part makes me drool but collards and cream cheese?!?!
Doesn't quite sound right to me.....lol
So what has your garden produced this week?
Sluggy
This week I have picked cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, gypsy peppers,and jalapeno peppers.
ReplyDeleteMy granny cooked collard (as well as polk and dandelion)greens. I don't cook them, noone could cook them like she did.
Heirloom grape tomatoes, little pear looking yellow tomatoes, and about 4 other varieties of . . . you guessed it! Tomatoes.
ReplyDeleteAnd no, we never have enough to can. We eat at least half of them before we get them in the house! We are all bad that way.
Frying in bacon grease is my first plan of attack for any hardy greens like collards, chard, spinach. I love the smell of them cooking..wonder why your dad didn't?
ReplyDeleteI can see using collards and cream cheese together...kind of like spinach and cream cheese in a dip or enchiladas.
Mmmm...Now I want some fresh green. My parents grow mixed greens..collard, turnip and mustard...and Mom just cooks them all together. With nothing in them. I can eat them until I am sick.
ReplyDeleteI love hearing what everyone is growing and harvesting!
ReplyDeleteAnd feel free to come here and get sick Frances...I've got collards coming out my eyeballs!lol