The Mountain Thymes

Barb titled this pic of Cliff waiting for his new Generac to cycle for the first time..........                                          man not waiting for a woman! I know you'll be surprised to read that he stood out in the hot humid air all day watching the installation of his new toy.  The land at north end of our house where all the electrical hook-up happened is a steep slant.  This is where Cliff stood talking to the installers.  The next day he complained that his hips were killing him and his neck was stiff.  You think!?! The garden is dry.  I've used all the rain barrel water to wet the cucumbers and tomatoes.  Actually, the plants are weary and have slowed their production, except for the gourds, which grow like weeds. They just meander all over the acreage where ever they want, climbing on other plants, up the cucumber trellis and into the woods.  I love these plants.  They're free spirits with no confines wandering happily through life.........unt

Two trips to the garden this morning.................. The Amish Paste tomatoes are starting to come in.  They're best for spaghetti sauce or home-made tomato paste.  This year I harvest as the tomatoes begin their color so nothing can eat them before I get them picked.  A few people I know here have told me the crows are eating their tomatoes.  We have 25 lb crows but they haven't touched my crop yet.  After I brought up the first bowl of cucumbers and tomatoes, I returned to the garden with my camera to get pictures of the beautiful winter squash blossoms and found the cherry tomatoes ripening under the large gourd and squash leaves.  I didn't have a container to carry them back in so I put them in my front capri pockets and found another cucumber, which went in a back pocket.  I've done this before, forgotten that I had tomatoes in my pocket, and ended up with juice leaking down my leg.  So this time I mindfully  walked back to the house, took careful steps up the

My kitchen had a funny odor, not like funny hahaha, but strange, kind of like food gone bad.  The kitchen compost bucket is emptied daily down at the side of the garden.  It's rinsed, sometimes with vinegar, and left in the sun to dry.  I checked all the containers in the refrigerator and wiped the shelves with baking soda and water.  The odor didn't reek of dead rodent, just kind of brought to mind old fish.  I had made salmon patties a few evenings ago for our supper, told Cliff I'd freeze the left overs for another meal, but thought maybe the smell still lingered somehow.  When my sweet tooth acts up, I snack on dried figs and Medjool dates. They're a sweet healthy gluten-free food, and part of the Mediterranean diet.  The fig package resembles a large hockey puck.  I store them in a quart-size zip-lock bag in the corner kitchen cabinet.  This morning I reached in the cabinet and pulled out a quart-size bag to satisfy my craving for sweets. The bag contained what l

Still trying to use up watermelon.  Warm and muggy here today, in the 80's.  Storms lurking. Watermelon Cooler Slushy and Watermelon Rind Pickles recipes can be found under Recipes tab.

Just posted the Spinach Watermelon-Mint Salad.   Delicious!  Cliff approved.

 Summertime and the livin' is easy........... Cantaloupe, watermelon, and cucumbers are plentiful.  Yesterday I made Overnight Pickles and Cantaloupe Berry Smoothie, both are posted under my Recipe tab.  Both are easy and delicious.                                                    Overnight Pickles                                      Cantaloupe Berry Smoothie with homegrown chocolate mint I had two more cantaloupe so scooped out the seeds and chunked them.  Then placed the chunks on a wax paper lined cookie sheet and did a quick freeze.  In about an hour the chunks were frozen enough to drop into a freezer quality storage bag without clumping together.  Suck the air out of the bag with a straw and freeze until you're ready for a smoothie.  I'm going to do this with watermelon, also.  Next recipe to try this week is Spinach Watermelon-Mint Salad.  I started preparing some watermelon rinds for Watermelon Rind Pickles when I discovered I didn't have enough appl

After weeks of daily rain and thunderstorms, we're now in a dry spell with temperatures into the 90's. I harvested the music garlic before they could rot in the saturated clay.  They'll dry for 2-3 weeks and then I can use them. My black krim tomatoes are beginning to color. Amish paste for spaghetti sauce. Dragons egg cucumbers vining up their bamboo teepee and gourd vines taking over the lower garden. After the 7+ inches of rain, I had to tie up the staked tomatoes to the garden windmill. This afternoon's cache.  That large cuke was hidden under the gourd vines.  I've picked a dozen cucumbers in two days.  Will try an overnight pickling recipe from a friend. And the first of our tomatoes share the spotlight. Watermelon and cantaloupes are so plentiful at the fresh markets that I'm making smoothies and looking for ice-cream recipes to use them up.  You can freeze melon chunks to use in smoothies. My summer squash plants rotted.. Deer ate the