Too much mint

Mint is great, I put a few seedlings in a 5" pot 3 years ago, stuck the pot in the ground, and then proceeded to ignore it ever since, save for the trip to grab a sprig here and there.

As many of the seed packets will attest to mint from see is not "true" I.E. it wont have the same flavor as the parent. So what I did this fall was to carefully select a leaf from each sprig, if I liked it, the plant was safe, if it was less than spectacular, I pulled the stalk and its rootball up. Hopefully next year I will have a more consistent flavored patch of mint. I also trimmed it back heavily, and spent the afternoon wondering what the heck I am going to do with all this mint.

Well some of it is going to get dried for tea of course but thats a lot of tea, and I usually prefer to blend it rather than go straight mint.

So, I made mint jalapeno jelly. Considering I hadn't made any kind of jam all year I really didn't feel rusty. I did however omit the food coloring, so the jelly looks a bit yellow, but I scraped some out of the bowl when I was done and it is certainly powerful...Its an odd experience. I've only ever had mass produced mint jelly so this was definitely stronger than what I was used to. At first all you taste is the sugar, but after its been in your mouth for a second the mint hits you...and then the heat.

It would be pretty awesome on crackers with some cream cheese. Its usually recommended to be served with lamb but...not gonna happen, so if anyone has any vegetarian ideas for it (other than crackers or toast) fire away.

Everyone has been telling me...

What I already knew...victory gardens are coming back. And despite my best attempt to be cynical, I can't help but jump for joy. Especially when I read this...

...A White House carpenter who is a beekeeper will tend two hives for honey.

...Ladybugs and praying mantises will help control harmful bugs.


“First of all,” Mrs. Obama said, “there’s nothing really cooler than coming to the White House and harvesting some of the vegetables and being in the kitchen with Cris and Sam and Bill, and cutting and cooking and actually experiencing the joys of your work.”

“I wanted to be able to bring what I learned to a broader base of people. And what better way to do it than to plant a vegetable garden in the South Lawn of the White House.”

I couldn't agree more. In fact my new mission for the season is to get 5 friends to start a garden. Also from the looks of the layout that was posted, they are putting in some of my go-to flowers in border areas. Lets hear it for beneficials! Check out the article here. Now to convince the Obamas to join FreedomGardens and start blogging!

and by the way...the first of the lettuce seedlings just popped up to say hi

Where credit is due

If any of my readers are in the upstate NY area you are probably familiar with the megagrocery store Wegmans. I have several friends who have worked there for a number of years, and I know that unlike other grocery chains, they treat their employees well. I normally am quite cynical when it comes to giving the thumbs up to big businesses like this but well...they really get it, or at least it seems like they do. The organic produce section is almost a full third of the total and seems to get bigger each week at my location (dewitt). Some veggies you can only get organic. When you walk through the front door the local crops are right in front of you (and you cant get anywhere else in the store without walking past the local veggie racks). They have a huge chart on the wall with what vegetables are in season, and they post pictures of the farms they buy from right above the vegetables.

If I were better at planning and had more time I wouldn't need grocery stores, but lets face it, I'm not. So when I have to pick up a green pepper and some celery to complete an otherwise homegrown potato salad...I'm happy to report that its still local.


even the cherry tomato (the first of the season) Yesterday two more ripened (which my friend loved...but still no brandywines.)

Look what happens when your mammoth sunflowers are grown to close to your lemon queens, next year you get this.



Glamor shot, another 7 ounces of the most gorgeous cuke I have ever seen. I will be a shame to eat this one...no it wont, I've got three more on the way.


And on saturday I was a participant in a crop swap, and I didn't know it before hand. Some friends of my wife who live in CT met us at a halfway point (Albany) for a picnic. They (who has noticed similar problems with tomatoes being slow to ripen) had what he thought was a mix of zucchini and summer squash seedlings given to him. Turns out they were all yellow summer squash! He is swimming in them, so he cut about 10 lbs from his garden and gave them to me.

Desperate to start chipping at the mountain of yellow on the counter I pulled together this experiment, which I'm happy to say was great!



I worked in aMom&Pop pizza operation all through high school and college, so I consider myself fairly adept at the art. This one was a combination of one side just shrooms (for my wife who was not willing to be part of the experiment) and the other side with the rest of the green pepper, a little bit of our backyard onions, some rosemary and chunks of yellow squash.

It was fantastic, I've got some leftover dough and I'm cursing the brandywines right now because there is nothing better than pizza with slices of fresh tomato on top. Oh well.

If anyone has any favorite vegetarian recipes that use summer squash, please hit me up! I still have a mountain of it and so far only a few people at work have volunteered to take some. Abundance is killer isnt it.

Speaking of killer, the aforementioned killer in the previous post is a potato berry. Full to the brim of solanum, the thing that puts the deadly in deadly nightshade. In other words, eat the spud, not the bud.