It's what to do with all that Basil time!

My work buddy, prayer partner and fellow plant addict, Beverly sent me this terrific recipe for mini caprese salad. I've made basil, tomato and garlic salad for ages but this takes it to a new level!

Here's her recipe:
Ingredients
1 lemon, juiced
1 small clove garlic, grated or minced
1 cup basil leaves, about 20 leaves, plus a few for garnish
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 pint heirloom cherry tomatoes, multi-colored if available, halved
1 cup bocconcini (bite-sized fresh mozzarella balls), drained, halved
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Directions
Combine lemon juice, garlic, basil in food processor or blender, process and stream in extra-virgin olive oil to form a smooth dressing. Combine tomatoes, cheese and dressing in a bowl and season with salt and pepper, to taste. Garnish with a few torn basil leaves.

To see a zillion different ways to serve this yummy concoction clink the Pinterest link below
 http://pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=mini%20caprese%20salad&rs=ac&len=18

Thanks, Beverly!

Cheap and Simple Seed Starter Cups

Most of my readers know how frugal- translate that cheap! Since I grow and transplant hundreds of tomatoes and other small plants, my container expense was climbing. I have small groups of folks over to my house every other week and we have snacks - I use the tall plastic cups to keep from washing dishes. They are just the right size to pot up my tomatoes for sale in! I used an ice pick to put holes in the bottom and a black permanent marker to write the variety on top!

Best Gardening Advice My Dad Ever Gave Me

Last week I promised to tell you the best gardening advice dad ever gave me. It's very simple but most of us have a very hard time with this one and it can make or break your garden. Without farther ado here it is in his own hand writing:

Trust me in Zone 6B this should be the Gardening Gospel! I have seen it snow 5 inches on May 5th!

Notes from Papa's Garden Journal - Growing Tomatoes

My dad grew the most awesome veggies. He kept a gardening journal and I inherited it when he died several years ago. I ran across the journal the other day and I had forgotten how many good tips were in there. In the next few weeks, I want to share some of them with you.  

This week we will talk about Tomatoes. Papa, as the grandchildren called him, tried all sorts of Tomatoes and here are some of his notes about his favorite varieties:

 

His all time favorite was Early Girl. Dad planted it every year and as it's name implies, he always got the first tomatoes on this plant. this was also the one he took suckers from for late fall crop.

 

Celebrity- Here's what he said about it, "set 6 plants next to Early Girl on 4-27. Both were from plants started from seed indoors on 3-10. Plenty of fruit on both varieties on 7-6. 7-18 giving away tomatoes to anyone who needs them!"

 

Parks Whopper: (I wonder if this one is still available) He planted it in 2000 and got "bunches" of tomatoes according to his journal.

One way he kept us in fresh tomatoes from early summer to late fall (sometimes as late as Christmas) was by rooting some of the sucker branches from the ones planted in the spring, planting them in the garden in mid-summer and these would produce fruit until frost. The tomatoes that still had green fruit on them when the first hard frost was predicted would be pulled up by the roots and the whole vine hung upside down in the barn. We would pick ripe tomatoes off them until Christmas!

Another way to save those green tomatoes is to wrap each one in newspaper, store them in a box in a dark closet and check them weekly for ripe ones. I’ve done this myself and had fresh tomatoes way into winter.

Next week I'll share his notes on growing carrots. We always had carrots way into January from the seeds he planted the pervious year.

 

 

Diseases in the Vegetable Garden

Just as the garden is always evolving, so too are the gardeners. This was my first year with an actual vegetable garden and I learned a lot. My beets never grew, carrots need more space and the zucchini needs a trellis. But the biggest lesson was to buy disease resistant plants. I thought about this is the beginning of the season, but in my rush and excitement to get my garden growing, I planted things that just looked good to me. 

Now, in late August, my cucumbers, tomatoes, string beans and snow peas are infected with a fungus. 

Last week I sprayed everything with an organic anti-fungal spray and though the plants look slightly better, I am not confident they will make it. 

Well, lesson learned. I will be sure to do a  good clean up in the next few months and remove the diseased plants completely. And next year I will do my research early and plant disease resistant varieties.