Garden Journal 3/11/10: Growing Onions from Purchased Plants - Ordering and Planning

1015Y Texas SuperSweet Onions Harvested Last June

Realization of the Day:
Despite numerous failures and disappointments in the garden over the years, when it comes to buying seeds and plants I'm still a consummate optimist. I also have no self control. This can be a dangerous combination—and pricey, too.

Last spring was the first time I grew onions from purchased plants rather than onion sets, and despite the fact that many of them bloomed way too early (which means I ended up with some fairly small onions) I enjoyed some delicious success—and still ended up with bigger onions than I've ever grown from sets. (The flowering was most likely due to some wet and wacky spring weather, and I'm hoping to cover this problem in a future post). I wrote a little about last year's onion growing here and here.

For experiment's sake, in late February of 2009 I ordered a total of 10 bunches (approximately 60 plants per bunch) of 9 different varieties of onions (along with hundreds of leek plants—which was a whole other growing adventure I've been meaning to write about) from Dixondale Farms in Texas, the oldest and largest onion farm in the U.S.

I'm running a little later with my ordering and planting this year, but according to Dixondale's shipping schedule, March 9th was their suggested ship date for my area. I also ordered fewer plants and fewer varieties, sticking to the ones that did the best for me last year.


Some of My 2009 Harvest: Red Candy Apple, 1015Y Texas Super Sweet, and others

Here's what I ordered yesterday:
2 bunches 1015Y Texas Super Sweet
2 bunches Red Candy Apple
1 bunch Candy
1 bunch Super Star

The 1015Y Texas Super Sweets (so named because October 15th is the Texas planting date) are a Short-Day open pollinated variety. Red Candy Apple, Candy, and Super Star are Intermediate-Day hybrids. I don't usually allow hybrids in my kitchen garden, preferring to grow open pollinated heirlooms instead, but I make an exception when it comes to onions and leeks, rationalizing that homegrown hybrids are definitely better than none.

According to Dixondale's 'Which Varieties are Right for You' map, Intermediate-Day are the best type of onions to grow here in southern Missouri. I didn't learn until last year that the size of an onion bulb is dependent upon daylength and temperature, not the size of the plants.

I really liked the flavor of the Red Candy Apples—so sweet, and the size was good. I couldn't get enough of them in this Garbanzo Bean Salad with Red Onion, Scallions, Cilantro, Parsley, and Feta Cheese.

I'm embarrassed to admit that none of the yellow Candys ever made it into the ground (I ordered too many onion plants last year!), but since it's Dixondale's most popular variety (they sold over 85 million in 2009), I have high hopes. They say this variety will work almost everywhere in the country and is great for beginner gardeners.


6/5/09: Just Harvested Super Star Onions Laid out to Cure before Storing

The Super Star onions started blooming early, so I ended up picking them on the small side, but the flavor of this white globe-shaped variety was very nice, and the plants were vigorous. And as you can see in the top photo, the 1015Y Texas Super Sweets—which are indeed sweet—did quite well.

If you're gardening by the moonsigns, the best time to plant onions—even though they grow below ground like potatoes and garlic—is on a fertile day in the first quarter, so if all goes according to plan (new bouncing baby lambs and other unexpected farm stuff notwithstanding), I'll be putting mine in the ground on the 18th, 19th, and/or 20th when the moon is in Taurus. You can read more about minding the moonsigns here and here.

In an effort to post more often on this poor neglected garden blog (and keep better track of what's going on in my garden!), my new goal is to write shorter posts (okay, I'm failing miserably so far) that focus on just one or two points. I plan to hopefully write more about growing onions, including soil prep, onion planting, an amazing way I discovered to organically control weeds, troubleshooting, and growing tips in the near future.

In the meantime, you'll find lots of helpful information about growing onions, including online and downloadable guides, on the newly redesigned Dixondale Farms website.

Are you growing onions this year? Any favorite varieties, stories, tips, or other oniony info you'd like to share?

Previous onion posts:
6/2/09: Harvesting Spring Onions Grown from Purchased Plants
10/8/09: Growing Short Day Onion Varieties in Spring and Free Green Onions in Fall
6/7/08: What To Do with 125 Green Onions (Scallions)
6/7/08: Wanted: Your Recipes and Favorite Ways to Use Green Onions
6/12/05: Growing Onions In The Garden
3/16/06: It's Time to Plant Onions!
4/4/06: Operation Onion Complete!
4/26/06: Companion Planting Beets & Lettuce with Onions

Scallions and spring onions should be here soon!
Sour Cream & Onion Dip
Savory Cheese & Scallion Scones
Fiesta Cottage Cheese Veggie Dip
Mexican Jumping Bean Slaw
Summer in a Bowl
Colors of Summer Salad
Healthy Swiss Chard Tuna Salad with Kalamata Olives
Swiss Chard Cabbage Salad with Garbanzo Beans and Cottage Cheese
Garbanzo Bean Salad with Red Onion, Scallions, Cilantro, Parsley, and Feta Cheese
Sprinkled on top of Hot Swiss Chard Artichoke Dip
Three Onion & Three Cheese Pizza

© Copyright 2010 FarmgirlFare.com, the happy to have onion breath foodie farm blog where buying too much and planting too much are half the fun of gardening, right?

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Easy to Grow from Seed Favorites: Miniature White Cucumbers

I Love these Crunchy Little Things

Realization of the Day:
I can't let another year go by without telling you about my new favorite cucumbers—and for once I'm actually telling you about something in plenty of time to plant!

If I had to choose between growing lemon cucumbers (which I wrote about here) and these mini white cucumbers, it wouldn't be an easy decision.

What are the advantages to growing this open pollinated variety (which is really more very pale green than white)? First of all, just like with cherry tomatoes, smaller cucumbers mature more quickly than their larger counterparts—49 days versus an average of 55 to 70 days. They can be picked and eaten when they're even smaller than the ones in this photo (and I don't have especially big hands).

This can be helpful if you have a short growing season, are usually plagued by cucumber loving insects and/or disease (the less time they're growing means the less time there is to attack), if you want to squeeze in two crops during one growing season, or if, like me, you always seem to be planting everything late and are racing your first frost date.

Other advantages? I've found them to be very easy to grow when direct seeded in the garden once the soil has completely warmed up (cucumber plants are not cold tolerant). In fact, these cucumbers are so easy to grow, last summer I harvested quite a few from healthy volunteer plants that sprouted up in our kitchen grey water runoff ditch—from seeds that had gone down the drain and weren't even fully mature.

For the 'real' plantings in the garden, I put four or five seeds about an inch deep in little hills a few feet apart and simply let the plants sprawl. Since this is a long vined variety, you could save space by planting your hills next to a trellis or fence and the vines should climb right up it.

I used to start all my cucumber seeds in containers in early spring, keep them indoors, and then transplant the little seedlings into the garden once the weather warmed up. But delicate cucumber plants can be temperamental, and I've found that the direct seeded plants grew so much faster out in the garden that I didn't end up gaining anything except extra work by starting them indoors.

All ease of cultivating aside, what's really important when growing anything of course is flavor, and miniature white cucumbers have a very nice one. They're mild and sweet, with a pleasant thin skin that never needs peeling. I bought some larger green cucumbers from our Amish neighbors last summer to supplement my garden bounty, and I remember being surprised at how thick and slightly bitter the skins seemed compared to these minis.

And, last but not least, they're adorable.

I ordered my miniature white cucumber seeds from Pinetree Garden Seeds in Maine, and their catalog says this small white, black spined pickling cucumber is a very heavy yielder (which always wins points with me) and is never bitter.

I've also grown Boothby's Blonde cucumbers, a long vined Maine heirloom which Pinetree describes as 'a crisp, medium sized slicer, 6—8" long, with a very pleasant flavor and texture,' and while I liked them, I like these minis better. I often found myself simply slicing them up and munching on them plain as a snack, or on a plate with cheese and crackers.

One of my kitchen garden goals this year is to keep a jar or two of refrigerator pickles (you can pickle almost anything!) on hand during the summer, and I think these little cucumbers would make nice ones.

At $1.30 for a packet of 10 seeds, the were a little more expensive than the other varieties Pinetree sells, but still a great deal. And once you've grown them in your garden, you can simply save some seeds from your best specimens to plant the following year.

If you don't have a magical kitchen grey water runoff, be sure to let the cucumbers fully mature on the vine before you harvest the seeds you want to save, which for this variety means the cucs will get much bigger and much darker in color. I know I have some pictures of what they should look like, but unfortunately I have no idea where they are. If I come across them, I'll post them.

In the meantime, what are your favorite kinds of cucumbers to grow?

More posts about some of my favorite things to grow:
Favorite Heirloom Tomatoes to Grow—Mine and Yours
Growing Onions in the Garden
Growing Short Day Onion Varieties from Purchased Plants
Harvesting Spring Onions Grown from Purchased Plants
Endive and Escarole in the Kitchen and Garden
Growing Lemon Cucumbers from Seed

How to Grow Beets from Seed (and here's my favorite beet recipe)
How To Grow Swiss Chard from Seed and Why You Should (and recipes)
How To Grow Your Own Gourmet Lettuce from Seed (It's easy!)
How To Grow Arugula from Seed in Less than a Month
Tips for Growing & Using Rosemary Year Round

© Copyright 2010 FarmgirlFare.com, the snow is finally gone (for the time being) foodie farm blog where now I'm suffering some serious cucumber withdrawals. I knew I should have put up a few jars of pickles last year.

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Garden Journal 1/31/10: Snow Days and the Dream Garden

And She Sleeps (the garden, not me)

Realization of the day:
It's a weekend for dreaming and scheming.

Friday's six-inch snowfall has us happily cozying up indoors—except for the three to four hours a day tending to the donkeys, sheep, chickens, dogs, and outside cats. But I don't mind doing chores even in the snow, especially when it's sunny and warm like today. (Does thinking 30 degrees is warm mean that I've officially crossed over?) It really is beautiful out there.

Now that I've lived on a farm for 15 years, I start to go a little stir crazy if I don't get outside every couple of hours. What's nice is that no matter what the weather, there's always some good reason to leave the kitchen or computer and head out into the fresh air, even if it's only for five minutes to empty the kitchen compost container, feed some scraps to the chickens, or just hug a sheep.

I'll admit that a little laziness does kick in when everything is covered with snow, and I'm perfectly content to stay out of the the garden for a day or two. I certainly don't stop thinking about it, though.

This is the time of year when the garden in my mind and the garden in my reality have so much in common. With no blister beetles or other annoying bugs, no weeds taking over, no ravenous rabbits and deer, no crop failures, no dog damage, no seeds that never sprouted, no seedlings that should have been put in the ground weeks (or months!) ago, no work that can really be done (though I'm sure I could come up with something if I tried), and all those big plans to harvest the most glorious bounty ever, it's definitely one of my favorite times of year in the garden—until I get hungry of course.

Is there anything going on in your garden right now—or is it all still happening in your head?

More snowy garden photos:
2/4/09: Why I Love Growing Vegetables in Raised Garden Beds: Reason #1
Garden Journal 3/1/09: Early Spring Planting Plans & an Unexpected Delay
Garden Photo Journal 1/11/10: My All-Weather Gardening Companion
And lots of links to Snowy Farm Photos here and here

A little help if you're dreaming and scheming about what to grow:
Favorite Heirloom Tomatoes to Grow—Mine and Yours
Growing Onions in the Garden
Growing Short Day Onion Varieties from Purchased Plants
Harvesting Spring Onions Grown from Purchased Plants
Endive and Escarole in the Kitchen and Garden
Growing Lemon Cucumbers from Seed (I love lemon cucumbers)

How to Grow Beets from Seed (and here's my favorite beet recipe)
How To Grow Swiss Chard from Seed and Why You Should (and recipes)
How To Grow Your Own Gourmet Lettuce from Seed (It's Easy!)
How To Grow Arugula from Seed in Less than a Month
Tips for Growing & Using Rosemary Year Round

© Copyright 2010 FarmgirlFare.com, the snowbound foodie farm blog where one thing I do miss in the garden this time of year—besides all that fabulous food—is seeing all the butterflies fluttering about.

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Garden Journal 7/27/10: Harvesting Really Late Planted Garlic

Growing Garlic: Not Bad, Not Bad

Realization of the Day:

I'm a lot more excited about growing garlic after digging up this year's crop.

I'm doing a little back dating here, so that the garden journal date above accurately reflects the day I actually harvested my garlic, as opposed to the day—two weeks later—I'm finally getting around to writing about it. It would only be cheating if it were the other way around, right?

Last year I promised myself I would never again plant my garlic in February, which is about four or five months later than it should go into the ground here in southern Missouri. And this year I kept that promise—I planted my garlic in March instead.

My 2009 garlic is on the left, the purchased Amish garlic is on the right.

Yep, on March 6th I planted two types of hardneck garlic: some of mine that I'd harvested last year, and some from our Amish neighbors that I bought at the only store in town, which is 10 miles away. Talk about your one stop shopping. It's an odd little place, usually filled with various odd characters hanging around (we're all a little odd in some way around here) where you can buy everything from bags of potato chips to bar and chain oil, fence posts to frankfurters, gas and gates to—some days—garlic.

The only other business in town is the itty bitty post office, and it closes for lunch from twelve to one, which just happens to be the time I am almost always driving by. Thankfully I can call up to the store before I head out and ask the owner to go over and get our mail (which the postal service won't deliver to the farm) from the post office, so I can pick it up at my leisure from him, rather than racing out the door in the hopes of getting up there before noon. You also can't access your post office box unless the post office is actually open, but that's a whole other story, and I'm getting sidetracked.

So a little brown paper bag of garlic appeared on a dusty shelf next to the candy bars one day in late February, and the garlic looked pretty good considering it had probably been harvested the summer before. Big fat cloves, no sprouts showing, a sign that said 75 cents a head or three for a dollar.

"It's from the Amish," the store owner informed me as I started pulling out heads. I'm really beginning to love these people—and I still want to build myself have Joe build me one of those sweet little cold frames. I bought three dollars' worth.

"You know you could plant this garlic," the store owner said as I paid for my garlic, two 50-pound sacks of alfalfa pellets for the sheep, a hundred pounds of oats, and a hundred pounds of dog food.

"That's what I was thinking of doing with it."

"But you know what you need to do?"

"What's that?"

"Plant it real soon."

"Yeah, I know."

After tasting the garlic, I bought several more heads the next week for planting. I figured I had nothing to lose, though I didn't have real high hopes. I've grown some really nice garlic in the past, but most of it was many years ago, and it went into the ground in fall. Lately, for various reasons, my harvests have been downright depressing—including the year I spent $77.00 on the stuff.

Amish Garlic Plants on 4-11-10

I planted the bulbs about 2 inches deep with the pointy sides up in one of my 4'x8' raised beds, and then mulched the entire bed with a heavy layer of sheep manure bedding hay from the barn (you can see a photo of the half-mulched bed and read more about fertilizing with sheep manure here). What's great is that the mulch gives your plants a small dose of organic fertilizer each time it rains or you water, until eventually all the manure works its way into the ground, and you're left with a hay barrier impervious to weeds, and then that eventually breaks down and helps amend the soil, too.

Garlic Bed on 4-11-10

Garlic Bed on 4-20-10

Garlic Bed on 5-1-10

I was suprised at how quickly the garlic sprouted and took off—I mean, look at all that growing it did in just 9 days in April—but it soon became obvious that my pathetic little bulbs were no match for the Amish supercloves. See the spindly little plants in the back section of the bed? That would be my garlic.

My garlic eventually disappeared into the weeds, but the Amish garlic took off and put on flower stalks, called scapes, telling me that it was hardneck garlic rather than the softneck variety, which is what you find most often in supermarkets. (I also just read in the latest issue of Organic Gardening magazine that supermarket garlic is often imported from China and sprayed with toxic chemicals to keep it from sprouting.) These flower stalks need to be trimmed off so the plant will send all of its energy down into the bulb.

Garlic scapes are edible, and over the past few years they've become quite the darling of the food world. You can do all sorts of things with them—stir fry them, toss them in salads, put them on pizza, even grill them—and while many people claim they have a fabulous mild garlic flavor, mine are always really strong, to the point where all I taste is burning hot, and I'm somebody who loves the taste of garlic.

I tried making garlic scape pesto a couple of years ago (even took photos!), and oh my gosh did it leave quite a taste in your mouth—for days. I need to do more scientific research, but I think that the flavor has to do with the type of garlic plants the scapes come from. Also, some of the garlic scape pesto recipes I came across literally called for like just two scapes in an enormous quantiry of olive oil and cheese. I should probably try cooking garlic scapes, and see if that mellows out that harshness.

Another sort of byproduct of homegrown garlic is spring green garlic, which is simply a young garlic plant you eat most of, and it really is mild and tastes wonderful. In fact, I usually try to double plant my garlic so that I can pull out every other plant to eat as green garlic in the spring. You can read more about my love affair with green garlic here.

Anyway, I snipped off all the scapes (no idea what date) and fed them to the chickens, who mostly turned up their beaks at them. It is amazing what the chickens will eat, and they really help cut down the guilt factor when it comes to tossing stuff out, whether it's from the garden or the deep freeze. Pizza is one of their favorite foods.

The best time to harvest garlic, as well as plant it, is not clear cut, and I actually have a separate post planned about planting and harvesting garlic that I hope to have up soon. Hint: there is no one answer to either question, and right now isn't the time to do either. I dug up a test head of my garlic the first of July, when about half of the leaves on the plant had turned yellow, and it looked like the bulbs weren't quite formed and could use a little more time in the ground.

The tricky thing about growing garlic is that towards the end of its growing cycle, it shouldn't get wet, since this tends to rot the papery outer layer which helps it keep from rotting in storage. That's probably why garlic grows so well in northern California (where I grew up but never grew garlic), since it usually stops raining by April. Here in Missouri we have rain year round, though never on a certain schedule, which is probably one of the reasons my garlic suffers some years. Garlic heads left in the ground too long will also start to split apart, and this invites rot and insects into the exposed cloves.

Unfortunately I ended up in the hospital right about when my garlic was ready to harvest, and then it rained a couple of times. When I finally got around to digging it up on July 27th—by which time the stalks had completely dried out—I was pleasantly surprised by what I found.

A lot of the papery outer layer was gone from most of the heads, many of the cloves were separated, and there was some insect damage, but overall it wasn't too bad, and the cloves were bigger than any I'd harvested in years.

I brought the loose cloves straight into the kitchen and laid the rest of the heads—with the stalks still attached—in a single layer on a big plastic shelf in the greenhouse, which I then blocked from most of the light with a piece of tin siding I found hanging around. You want the garlic to cure for two to three weeks in a dry, well ventilated place, out of the light. This was the best I could come up with. During previous years I've cured garlic and onions (though onions need to cure in the sun at first) on an old screen door laid horizontally and resting at the edges on boxes of canning jars up in the second story scary part of The Shack (lots of good ventilation that way), but these days it's just too scary up there.

I'm definitely going to hold back some of my harvest for (hopefully!) fall planting. But the rest will be put to good—and tasty—use. Need some fresh garlic inspiration? Below are some of my favorite ways to use it.

Did you grow garlic this year? How did it go? Any garlic growing tips, tricks, stories, or other interesting tidbits you'd like to share? Anybody ever plant theirs even later than I did? What happened? If you've written about your garlic growing adventures on your own blog, you're welcome to include a link to the post(s) in your comment.

What I like to make with fresh garlic? All kinds of things!

Quick and Easy Gazpacho (Cold Vegetable Soup)

My Favorite Lower Fat, Fuller Flavor Basil Pesto (made with almonds & fresh tomatoes)

Arugula Pesto and Arugula Pesto Pizza

Purple Basil Pesto and White Bean Pesto Dip/Spread

Linguini or Farfalle with Sun Dried Tomato and Artichoke Pesto, Cherry Tomatoes, and Fresh Basil

Linguini with Olive Oil, Garlic, Romano, and Parsley (and a wonderful book for art loving foodies)

White Bean and Artichoke Dip/Spread with Rosemary, Romano, and Kalamata Olives

Hot Swiss Chard Artichoke Dip

Low Fat, Full Flavor Fiesta Cottage Cheese Veggie Dip (and factory tours)

Mexican Jumping Bean Slaw with High Kickin' Creamy Tomato Dressing

Garbanzo Bean Salad with Red Onion, Scallions, Cilantro, Parsley, and Feta

Caramelized Beets with Garlic (I love these)

Kohlrabi Purée (this stuff is amazingly good - really!)

Three Onion and Three Cheese Pizza (and my favorite pizza dough recipe)

Swiss Chard and Artichoke White Pizza (a great way to sneak in some greens)

SOUPS

Garlic Lover's White Bean Soup (fat free, vegan, and delicious)

Roasted Red Pepper Soup with Onions, Garlic, Garbanzos, and Artichokes (and lambing season with my mom)

Quick and Healthy Cream (or Not) of Artichoke Soup from the Pantry

Simple and Healthy Swiss Chard Artichoke Soup

Thick and Hearty Italian White Bean Soup (and a book review: Keeping the Feast)

Hearty Lentil Soup with Carrots, Tomatoes, and Smoked Sausage

Quick and Spicy Black Bean Soup/Chili

LAMB RECIPES

Grilled Lamb Burgers with Roasted Red Pepper, Parsley, and Kalamata Olive Relish (and a great farm to table cookbook)

Lamb Burgers with Garlic, Shallots, and Feta on Homemade Rosemary Focaccia

Onion and Herb Crusted Lamb Spareribs & Grilled Lamb Steaks

Slow Roasted Greek Style Leg of Lamb with Lemon, Oregano, Potatoes, and Swiss Chard

Slow Roasted Dutch Oven Lamb Shoulder Roasts or Shanks with Tomatoes, Onions, Garlic, and Rosemary

© FarmgirlFare.com, the garlic breath foodie farm blog where try as I might, I am obviously incapable of writing a short garden blog post—and isn't it wild how different the colors are in the sunny garlic bed photos vs. the cloudy one?

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