Garlic – Cynthia Reyes

A Good Home, Apple Pies, Dried Herbs, Farmhouse Kitchen, Garden, Harvest, Herbs

A Messy Kitchen in the Autumn

October 27, 2014October 9, 2015 Cynthia Reyes

Life happens in our kitchen. Every day.

Which means it’s always clean but often a mess.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Our human friends like to hang out there and share their stories.

Dog friends like to sleep there and sometimes snore.

In the autumn, potted plants move in from the verandah.

English ivy sits on the window sill, Scotch Bonnet pepper sits on the floor.

Within a couple weeks, we’ll get dozens of ripe peppers….

… which we’ll give to relatives and friends. (I’m not a hot-pepper person, despite my Caribbean origins.)

Some days the whole kitchen smells of apples, cinnamon and other ingredients for pies….

…which DO include a tip of Jamaican rum, yes, and maple syrup too, since we’re a Jamaican-Canadian family.

Earlier, it was the fragrance of apple and mint jellies –

And as you can see, they’re still on the kitchen table — recent events having overtaken us…

Some days, the kitchen smells of herbs drying on a tray. Parsley, basil, rosemary and thyme.

And onions and garlic, fresh from the garden….

You’d think the kitchen is the only room in our old house.

It’s a wonder we don’t sleep there as well…

HAPPY HARVEST, EVERYONE (except for friends in S. Africa, New Zealand and Australia…. who for some strange reason are now planting their gardens and welcoming the springtime).

A Good Home, Animals, Birds, Country Living, Ducks, Gardens, Gardens and Wildlife, Garlic

Wonders Never Cease

September 13, 2014September 16, 2015 Cynthia Reyes

Every so often, I wish I had a well-behaved garden.

The kind where everything does what I want, when I want.

Where flowers don’t stray into lawns and lawns don’t stray into flowerbeds, and the strong wind didn’t break one of the arches on the arbour my dear husband so carefully built.

But this I know:

Real gardens offer up surprises each week, each day and sometimes, each hour.

Like flowers blooming in unexpected colours.

And interesting visitors.

Like this large bird in the apple tree.

And wild rabbits.

Cleaning themselves without a care in the world.

Like this mother duck, with her ducklings.

She must have squeezed herself under the fence.

This ant, dragging a dead moth many times its size. It took the moth way across the verandah.

This beet, expected to be dark red, is somehow orange.

A single squash. It’s from a vine that strayed from our neighbours’ squash plantation.

“It’s yours”, he says. The thing will grow to almost half my height. No kidding.

These onions, because they delight and surprise me each late summer.

And the garlic, just because the sight of them when newly harvested always surprises me.

The sight of our daughter’s little doggie, coming around the corner at full speed. Well, sort of.

And this shadow “selfie”, which I didn’t know was there till I downloaded it and nearly jumped in surprise.

Gardens: places of surprise and discovery.

Dedicated to all gardeners, everywhere.

A Good Home, Basil, Cilantro, Cooking, Dill, French Tarragon, Gardening, Gardens, Garlic, Garlic Scapes, Herb Gardens, Parsley

Herbs …. Ho Hum

July 6, 2014July 6, 2014 Cynthia Reyes

My blog has received its first complaint.

Seems I’ve produced fine stories about fine people and fine flowers.

My crime is that I’ve completely ignored the fine herbs and vegetables growing in my husband’s gardens.

Like the fragrant apple mint, which we use to flavour drinking water and in delicious mint jelly too. We also chop it up and mix with fresh blueberries and sliced mangoes, for dessert.

But I digress.

Husband is complaining. Reminding me that: “You can’t eat flowers. At least, not most of them!”

And along comes Vito, for reinforcement.

Yes, the vintner-gardener-historian of our neighborhood who turns up repeatedly in A Good Home, turned up at our garden gate this morning. That same Vito who believes only vegetables and herbs — and wine grapes — have a right to exist in a garden.

As if my husband needed any reinforcement….

But I digress.

Since one does not wish to upset the finest cook ( some may say the only cook) in this household, I’ve decided to make amends.

We’ll come back to the vegetables one day soon. For now, I hope you enjoy these photos of the herbs which my husband tends more faithfully than the flowers in our garden.

I cannot say they are the most interesting photos I ever saw. Take this parsley.

And this French Tarragon. For a plain-looking herb — exemplifies uber-exuberance. N’est-ce pas?

Not that I’m complaining. Herbs taste very good in the dishes my husband makes. Basil, for example, goes well with tomato dishes.

Some herbs grew from last year’s seeds. We got lots of re-seeded dill, which goes well with fish, especially salmon. Cilantro, below, is great in salads. And goes well with avocado, shrimp dishes, etc.

But I digress.

My issue: Herbs tend to have small flowers, and most of them are white. Why aren’t some red or blue or yellow? This onion flower would look great in red.

Not that I’m complaining.

Chives, above, go well with omelettes and scrambled eggs.

And did you know you can eat garlic scapes? Great in a vegetable stir-fry.

And did I say that garlic is easy to grow? If you let the scapes go to seed, then drop the seeds in a small part of your garden, and lightly cover with soil, you’ll have garlic next year.

Not that I know anything about such stuff, of course.

I’m a flower garden person.

Photos by Hamlin Grange

A Good Home, Autumn, Garden, Homes, Jelly, Nature, Thanksgiving, Vegetables

The Harvest

October 7, 2013October 10, 2013 Cynthia Reyes

Photos by Hamlin Grange

It’s just days before Thanksgiving here in Ontario and the harvest is in.

So much to give thanks for, once you think about it. From having a family and a home to having food to eat.

At this time of year, I’m reminded of something my mother used to say: “You don’t have to be rich to plant a garden.” No matter how little money our families had, my mother and my husband’s mother always planted a garden. (My mother-in-law still does.) And I have lovely memories of their abundant produce that sometimes came from just a small plot.

Our own vegetable garden has yielded abundantly this summer and fall: eggplants, beans, peppers, onions, zucchini, cucumber and raspberry. And a profusion of tomatoes.

In a fit of late-day ambition, the pumpkin vine has even flowered again and put out several perfect tiny pumpkins.

It’s a Jamaican pumpkin, grown from a seedling that came from neighbours Paddy and Jacqui. Only one of its pumpkins made it to maturity this summer, and now, in early October, this intrepid vine is trying again. I thank it for the effort, but warn that it’s indulging in a lost cause.

“You’re in Canada now,” I tell it – one of the foolish ‘conversations’ I tend to have with plants and shrubs when I walk through the garden. “Cold weather is just around the corner.”

But last time I checked, the vine had sent out yet another flower, atop yet another tiny pumpkin.

We’re thankful for the one mature pumpkin it gave us, and decide to treat it as if it’s a whole crop. So we call Paddy and Jacqui to come get their share of “the pumpkin harvest”.

“What about the bird pepper I gave you?” asks Jacqui soon after she comes through the kitchen door.

“It got overshadowed by the asparagus and raspberry bushes”, my husband says. “We realized it too late. It’s just blooming now.”

“But the raspberry bushes you gave us a few years ago are on their second or third yield this summer,” I chime in, wanting to atone for our inept treatment of the bird pepper plant and our failure to get more than one mature pumpkin.

Along with a half of the pumpkin, we give Jacqui and Paddy tomatoes, herbs and garlic. They’re happy with their share of the harvest.

The garlic bulbs were yanked out of the soil in late summer, and left to dry in baskets and boxes. The biggest ones are given to family and friends like Paddy and Jacqui, the smaller ones left behind for our own use. These garlic bulbs have grown by themselves each year. Untended, even unplanted, offspring of the seeds of a single garlic plant my mother-in-law gave us years ago. Who was to know that garlic is so easy to grow?

Before the harvesting of the garlic, there was the red currant. For years the birds got to the currant bushes first, picking them clean before we got to them. So now we get to them first, leaving behind about a third of the crop for the birds. The result of that harvest is beautiful red jelly, a surprising taste of sweet and tart. It’s perfect with cheese, crackers, toast, ham or even as a baste for roast pork or chicken. Or Thanksgiving turkey.

Here’s my question to you: What are you harvesting from your garden, if you have one? And what will you be giving thanks for this Thanksgiving (whether it’s the Canadian one in a few days, the American one next month or wherever you are?) I’d love to hear from you.