July Groundwork

July is typically one the hottest months of the year with average temperatures hovering around 105 .9 degrees in the beautiful Phoenix area. Here's a gardening check list.

• Check plants for water stress, increase the frequency of water, and make sure you water slowly and deeply to flush the salts below the root system.
• Harvest herbs during cooler morning hours and deadhead flowers to keep herbs from becoming stringy or woody. Dry some of your herbs for use later in the year.
• Protect tomatoes and peppers with shade cloth and place extra layers of mulch, compost or straw around the plants to conserve moisture and lower soil temperatures.
• Support plants and place straw under developing melons, tomatoes and strawberries.
• Pick any citrus that might remain on trees, and paint trunks of young trees to prevent sun burn and cracking.
• With our high temperatures and drying winds, make sure to keep your compost piles moist so microorganisms will continue to decompose the materials. If open, you might cover with plastic or a tarp until monsoons arrive.
• Vegetables that thrive in our desert heat are eggplant, basil, sweet potatoes, armenian cucumbers and okra. You can plant seeds of pinto beans, snap beans, corn, cantaloupe, muskmelon, pumpkins, winter squash and armenian cucumber. Keep a close eye on all new seedlings, they must be kept moist until established.

For added interest and beauty, you can still sew seeds for cosmos, four o' clocks and sunflowers.
Sunflowers are not only great for color and beauty, the seeds are highly nutritious and are rich in oils and minerals. You can easily grow enough sunflowers in your garden to produce snack seeds for your family. One variety used for producing hundreds of seeds is the Russian Giant or the Mammoth. Once the flower has died back and the seed head begins to droop, cut the stem leaving a few inches to tie it up. Hang it in a dry place, not in direct sunlight and tie a paper bag around the seed head to catch the seeds as they dry. Poke a few wholes in the bag to allow air circulation. When you have collected enough seeds, spread them on a baking sheet and sprinkle with salt and a little oil. Bake in a warm oven for 30 to 40 minutes. Let them cool and store in an airtight container. Relax under a tree in the late afternoon and watch the sun go down.

CALABACITAS

I recreated this recipe from my memory of eating Calabacitas years ago in a little Mexican restaurant in downtown Phoenix.

Olive oil

Onion - chopped

Zucchini - chopped

Crookneck squash - chopped

Corn

Shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Salt and pepper

Heat oil in a skillet (I used garlic-infused olive oil). Sautee onions for a 5 minutes, then add squash and salt and pepper, and cook until fairly tender. Add corn. Heat through. Sprinkle on cheese. Serve hot. This is a great way to use up all that zucchini that seems to appear overnight in the garden.

Kim

THAI CUCUMBER SALAD

Lots of yummy cucumbers ripening right now. Add a shallot, red hot pepper, and some rice wine vinegar and you have a Thai cucumber salad. Chill for an hour and you will have a lovely little treat.

6 to 7 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
2 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt

Mix the above and pour over:

1 cucumber, seeded and sliced
1 shallot, chopped
1 red spur chili (or any red pepper), chopped

Chill for at least one hour. I have also substituted a red onion for the shallot and have used crushed red pepper when I didn't have a red chili on hand. It all works.

Kim
www.arizonatraveler.blogspot.com

SWISS CHARD GRATIN

Swiss Chard? Sadly, another vegetable I'm not familiar with. So, seeing a gorgeous bunch at the farmer's market the other day I bought some.

I found a good Alice Water's recipe on The Wednesday Chef blogsite.

A few things: This recipe calls for 1 cup of breadcrumbs and I think that is too much. I actually liked it better without the crumb topping. Since I had some shallots I needed to use up I substituted the shallots for a 1/2 chopped onion.



Remember, greens tend to really cook down so I put everything in a small baking dish.

I really liked this dish--it was very flavorful. My sister did not care for it but she doesn't like any cooked lettuce-type vegetable.

You could also change few things with this dish--such as I did by adding the shallots. Sprinkling a bit of freshly grated parmesan on top would be great.

Swiss Chard Gratin

4 servings

1 1/2 bunches of chard

1 cup fresh breadcrumbs

2 teaspoons melted butter

2 tablespoons butter

1 onion, diced

Salt

2 teaspoons flour

1/2 cup milk

A few strokes of freshly grated nutmeg

1. Wash and stem the chard. Save half the stems and slice them thin. Bring 2 quarts of salted water to a boil and cooked the sliced stems for 2 minutes. Add the chard leaves and cook until tender, about 3 minutes. Drain and cool. Gently squeeze out the excess liquid from the stems and leaves and coarsely chop them.

2. Toss together the breadcrumbs and the melted butter. Toast on a baking sheet in a 350-degree oven, stirring now and then, until lightly brown, about 10 minutes.

3. Melt 1 1/2 tablespoons of butter over medium heat in a heavy-bottomed pan and add the diced onion. Cook over medium heat until translucent, about 5 minutes. Stir in the chard and season with salt. Cook for 3 minutes. Sprinkle with the flour and stir well. Then add the milk and nutmeg and cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add more milk if the mixture gets too thick. The chard should be moist but not floating in liquid. Taste and add salt if needed.

4. Butter a small baking dish. Spread the chard mixture evenly in the dish and dot with the remaining butter, cut into bits. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs evenly over the top. Bake in a 350-degree oven until the gratin is golden and bubbling, 20 to 30 minutes.

Enjoy!

Kim

http://arizonatraveler.blogspot.com

A safe way to deal with birds!

I really don't like birds. They make a mess in the garden, but they especially like to steal newly planted seeds and new seedlings as they are coming out of the ground. There are several products that you can buy to keep birds out, but this is the least expensive one and it works perfectly.

PIN-WHEELS!!!

The aluminum ones work the best because they reflect more, but the birds just don't bother the garden when I have these place in various locations in the garden.

If you can't find any in the store, just "google" the word and plenty of places pop up where you can order some. They work great and they are pretty on windy days.

Composting: "Black Gold" for Free!

During the tight times we are having now, I was interested to read that home vegetable gardens were growing in numbers. Plant nurseries were doing a booming business selling seeds and bedding plants for the home gardener. One important element of a successful home garden is making sure you have a healthy soil and that involves composting.
Compost is an important soil amendment that you need to grow successful vegetables. You can either buy a compost mix at the home/garden centers or, better yet, you can make your own for FREE!
Basically, here is what you need, a pitch fork, plant waste, sun, air, and water.
That is it. Now you can get fancy and build or buy a composter, we call this “gourmet” composting, or you can have a “casual” composting pile. A casual pile may take longer but it will still work. Composting bins help heat up the pile faster than just a casual pile, so that will speed up how soon your compost is ready. You need the temperature to be about 140 degrees for a speedy compost (2-3 months). What is necessary is that you have the right recipe for the compost mix to work. Let me explain.

You need a layer of “green”, like grass clippings or other yard/kitchen waste. When I say kitchen waste I am talking about anything plant based. NO MEAT IS ALLOWED in a compost pile. The only exception is egg shells. These decompose great! All of these products are high in nitrogen. Next, you need a layer of “brown”, like dirt or dried leaves and twigs, which are high in carbon. If you have built a composting cage, or have bought a composter, just make a few layers of these and then get it wet.
The moisture level is very important. If your compost is too wet, it will decay and smell awful! If it is too dry, it will not decompose. You need the same amount of moisture as if you have a sponge that is wrung out.

Once you have your layers and watered it, then you need to mix it really well. Then every few days, you will need to turn it with the pitch fork to keep it “aired”. The only thing to remember is that if is starts to STINK, you have it too wet and need to dry it out some. It should have a fresh smell like good soil smells.
In Arizona, because of the heat, you can have finished compost within 6-8 weeks. You can also add worms to speed it up but here is Arizona, I have never had to do that. Also, if you call Mesa City, they will deliver old black garbage bins to Mesa residents, for a small price that you can use as composting bins. You just need to drill holes in the sides for some air flow to happen inside. Check with other cities to see if they also have this service. Composting is really one of the easiest things in gardening to do and you can save a lot of money by making your own compost.

Have fun getting your hands dirty!

How to Grow Better Tomatoes

After weeks of planting countless tomatoes for myself, friends and clients I feel confident in saying that I have placed the last tomato in the ground for the season. Although I have not been able to implement all of the valuable advice that I gathered from Love Apple Farm, I thought some of you might be able to take advantage of Cynthia Sandburg’s remarkable, garden knowledge. Cynthia manages the kitchen gardens for Manresa Restaurant near San Jose, California. This woman is serious about her tomatoes! She starts with a two foot hole, adds a raw fish head, a couple of crushed egg shells for calcium, bone meal for a phosphorus source, and an aspirin to increase disease resistance. She then adds worm castings, an organic fertilizer and a root booster! Take a look at Love Apple Farm’s website to find more interesting details.

RASPBERRY SALAD DRESSING

This is the most delicious salad dressing and you will love it over all of your fresh garden greens. I tend to like sweet over savory so this really hits the mark.

Raspberry Salad Dressing

1/2 c sugar

1 c salad oil

1/3 c red wine vinegar

1/2 tsp dry mustard

1 tsp salt

8 raspberries or 4-6 strawberries mashed (the more berries you add the thicker the dressing)

Enjoy!

Kim