Daylily Blooms

My veggie garden is coughing because it is so dry these days. However, the lilies are showing off in the drought. Here are some of the late June blooms...

Burgundy with Yellow Throat

Double w/ Ruffle

Orange with Yellow Midrib and Yellow Throat

Red with Orange/Yellow throat

Ruffle Rose with Burgundy Eye and Yellow Throat

Double Orange Ruffle Spider

Row of blooms

This is a beauty and big

Cream with Yellow Throat

Burgundy with Yellow/Chartreuse Throat

Yellow Spider

Ruffle Peach with Orange Eye

Rose with White Midrib and Yellow Throat

Almost White Trumpet

Funky looking Ruffle Spider. Pink with Yellow Midrib and Throat

Very Large Pale Yellow Blooms

There are over 7000 recorded varieties of daylilies out there in the world. We have over 200 on our farm. I'm not sure we will ever identify them all but I don't know that I care about that anymore. They are beautiful and fun to enjoy during the brief season.

As Promised...

A photo of the Elephant Garlic I harvested yesterday. Time to roast some up.

Notice the little nodes on the bottom of the bulb. You can replant those little nodes and a single bulb without individual cloves will grow from them. It's kind of miraculous.

Pacify the General

Some people think beets taste like dirt. I do admit they have an earthy quality, but I love that taste. I can’t get enough. I am already sad that I didn’t plant more beets this season.  I think I have a new excuse to overplant them next season.

I see an acupuncturist in Mars Hill. She is great! Go see Julia at Oak and Willow Acupuncture http://www.oakandwillowacupuncture.com/

One of the things that keeps coming up for me is an angry Liver chi. I also have some sort of battle going on between the spleen and liver chi. I get the funniest visualizations with this. Julia refers to the liver as the General. So I picture a liver dressed up as Cap’n Crunch and the spleen as Mighty Mouse. They are duking it out and meanwhile my blood is depleted and I’m low energy, can’t sleep right, anxious, not pleasant…etc.

This is where the beets come back into the picture. Julia talked with me about blood nourishing foods like BEETS, collards, and kale. I was happy to have another reason to lust beets.  Beets detoxify the liver, but they also help nourish blood, strengthen the heart, and calm the spirit.

Here are a few ways we like to cook them on the farm…

Simply boiled. Yup. Boil till tender. Run under cold water to peel off skin. Done. Slice and eat as they are or add to salad.

Roasted. Cut off the tops (save for sautéed greens). Toss beets in olive oil. Put them in tin foil or covered oven safe dish and put them in an oven at 375. Start checking for fork tenderness after 25 minutes. The time varies based on the size of the beets so keep checking. If you like sweet potatoes too, then try roasting them together. We call it Sweets and Beets.

Now… sometimes I like to boil/roast the beets then toss them into a pan with the greens and some garlic. The beet green tops are meant to be eaten too and they taste really yummy sautéed together.

I will recommend my friend Delia’s fabulous idea of boiled/roasted and chilled beets tossed in olive oil with fresh mint! Oh my, that is good stuff. When she brought these over to our house, I knew she was a flavor genius.

A little tip from my chi to yours:

Nourish your blood and pacify the General…eat your beets.

Garlic Breath

This week I harvested the first of our garlic plants. The variety I pulled was the California Early garlic. It is supposed to be a smaller bulb but these were pretty large. I love the purple markings on them too!

If you haven't grown garlic then please put it on your to do list for this coming Fall. It is a simple, low maintenance crop that will give you a year of garlic breath in return. Simply break up the bulbs into single cloves and plant them about 6-8" apart. We ordered some bulbs but we were also given bulbs from a local farmer. Mulch them and forget about them till early summer.

Cut off the scapes when they come up to encourage the bulbs to grow. It forces the growth energy to the bulb instead of the flower. The scapes bloom into beautiful flowers which I use in my flower arrangements. You can also cook with the scapes.

We have another variety, Elephant Garlic, that I will harvest sometime next week. I have seen a preview of these monster bulbs and they are going to be stupid big. I will post some pics when I unearth them.

The Early Calis are in the basement curing. I will divide them up and share them with the other families here on the farm. The bulbs will be ready for the kitchen pantry in two weeks. Garlic has a huge laundry list of health benefits and it's totally worth the stink.