Saturday, May 24, 2014

This and That

Not a lot has been going on in the garden the last few days. I've gotten some weeding in. I dug out some gooseberry plants. If I let them (which I did last year), any branch that touches the ground will root. I offered them to Connie and she picked them up today. Then when I was in the garden I noticed I have a sage plant that self seeded and lots of oregano. And I still have anise hyssop and lemon balm seedlings coming up. I should have offered them to her as I'm just going to yank them out. And of course I can always split chives, garlic chives, and mint. She has a new yard that needs filling and they are certainly things to fill it with.

Today I planted out my basil. I had five plants and put them in two spots. Last year I lost all of mine to basil downy mildew for the first time. I'm hoping they live this year.

I also put a row of pole bean seeds out. They are between the chard and the onions.

This year I planted three kinds - Kentucky Wonder, Golden Gate Pole, and Yard Long. I'm not making my typical bamboo trellis for them. I'm hoping the 6' T-posts will be tall enough. But I don't know if they will stand up to the really nasty winds we have. I think I'll have to put in some angled poles later to give them more support.

None of that was real work as the ground had already been fertilized and prepared. I just had to plop them in. Tomorrow and Monday I'll have to prepare the cucumber/zucchini bed and the sweet potato bed then plant them up. Those might actually take some time and involve a little sweat.

I've also been playing around with gluten free bread. I've found baking gluten free to be much harder than using gluten. If you are off be a little the muffin/bread will be either dry as a bone when cooked, or it won't really cook right at all and be gluey. Ick. Gluten is such a magical substance. The bread above though came out fabulous. It is a very eggy yeast bread. At least with gluten free breads making bread is fast. They only need one short rise before cooking.

4 comments:

  1. I just sowed some Golden Gate beans also, it will be interesting to compare how they grow in our different climates.

    Do you have a gluten sensitivity? I've read that some people with gluten sensitivity can tolerate the gluten in heirloom grains like spelt and kamut. Have you tried those?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I don't know yet. I'm on an elimination diet and slowly putting things back in. Since my dad has celiacs I figured gluten would be one of the last things to go back. I'm hoping that I can eat gluten but I'm learning how to cook without it as I can't eat it yet.

      Delete
  2. I'm transplanting a bunch of stuff today as well - I do find it much easier when you prepare the beds ahead of time and then do the actual planting on another day but I have been so behind on things that that wasn't an option this time round. And I'm a sucker for bread & that bread does look delicious!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I don't have much experience with bread-making, so I'd be very wary of doing that gluten-free loaf. I guess you need a lot of "feel for it" to get it just right.

    ReplyDelete