My garden is looking a little ‘between seasons’ at the moment. Winter stuff has come out and some summer plantings have gone in – this should decrease my yield over the next two months or so.
1 bunch Coriander and 20 Curry Leaves
This was the first harvest from my new curry tree. Despite the aroma of the crushed leaves (that I find offensive) I really enjoyed their flavour in a curry I made during the week. I’ll be posting the recipe as part of my Tuesday Night Vego post tomorrow.
2.2 kilograms Root Vegetables (carrot, daikon, swede, turnip)
I harvested the remaining root vegetables this week, which leaves me without carrots for another 3 months at least. I’m going to use them in a bacon and root veggie pie.
1 Cauliflower
This was one of my ‘mini cauliflowers’. Not sure I’d grow it again because the plant took up almost as much space as a full-sized cauliflower. I used this one is a cauliflower and cheese soup.
Large bunch Silverbeet
I used this as a side dish during the week. I steamed it and added an oyster/soy based sauce like they serve over gai lan at yum cha. I also added chilli to my serving.
4 Asparagus spears
The asparagus has mostly woken from its slumber. Not all the crowns have put out spears, but one in particular is going great guns – 3 spears at once. I’ve been collecting these in the fridge, and I’ll use them once I have 6 of them.
2.5 kilos tomatoes
I pulled out the last of my tomato plants during the week and harvested the 2.2 kilos of tomatoes hanging on the plants. With these I made 4 bottles of tomato sauce (ketchup.)
That’s all for this week. I might have a few more weeks of decent harvests before the hungry gap hits, but the seedlings are mostly all up, so it won’t be long before the bulk of the garden gets stripped and the new plantings take their place.
For more harvests from around the world, visit Daphne’s blog.
500m2 in Sydney 
Ketchup! Wow! I would love to make my own ketchup. I wonder if my kids would eat it, but fear they wouldn’t eat anything but Heinz, unfortunately.
My kids seem to really like it. I’m a Heinz lover too personally, but in Australia people seem to prefer what we call ‘tomato sauce’, which is used identically to ketchup, but is a little bit thinner and has a slightly different flavor. The tomato sauce recipe I used said it would make almost 3 liters with the amount of tomatoes I started with, but I cooked it down much more to make it thick like ketchup, making less than 2 liters.
Tomato sauce looks great, I love home made sauce! I too have a pretty bare looking garden – especially after Mr Good trampled my need seedlings trying to fix the pea frame! Oh well.
Oh husbands! Mine likes to let the chickens out, and they then eat everything. They do mean well though, don’t they…
With asparagus and chard to lean on, your hungry gap should not be too lean and hopefully not too long. We are going into the transition season for our fall/winter garden. Still lots and lots of the summer garden crops though so it is much more abundant than the spring transition period.
Oh asparagus! How wonderful! And your ketchup looks delicious! I made my very first batch of ketchup a couple of weeks ago and am looking for my “perfect” recipe 🙂 Having never made it before, I figure it will take a while to find a recipe we can all love and agree on. It’s a fun (though long) process, though!
I know what you mean. I’ve been experimenting with recipes too. This time I used Sally Wise’s recipe from her book “a year in a bottle”. The proportions are the same as here http://www.abc.net.au/tasmania/stories/s1328175.htm
But I changed the seasonings slightly, reducing the cloves significantly, adding a teaspoon of mustard powder ( for 2 kilos tomatoes) and adding celery seed and salt.
Ok, how did you process the ketchup in those containers?! Fermented Maybe? Please share! Asparagus YAY!
Australians seem to be very relaxed about canning methods – scarily so at times! The book I used for this recipe simply said to sterilize the bottles, pour in the hot ketchup, then invert. I ended up water bath processing them for about an hour because I like to be cautious, but frankly, I keep my ketchup in the cupboard for months after opening, and it hasn’t killed me yet. He integrate I used in he recipe is a really strong undiluted apple cider vinegar too, so the final product would most likely have been high- acid.
Nice harvest. Your ketchup is drool worthy. My kids are too stuck on those dumb plastic bottles. We’d DIE unfathonable deaths without those stupid bottles. LOL.
Hehe. I love Heinz too 🙂
Hopefully your summer gap won’t be too long. I’m envying your asparagus right now. It is one of my favorite spring treats.
It amazes me that you are able to over winter tomatoes in your area. The ketchup looks fantastic. We are about 3 or 4 weeks away from the transition from summer to fall in our garden. So right now we are at our peak production of veggies!!
Oh that sounds wonderful Rick. That’s a great time of year.
I agree, what’s the point of a mini vegetable on a full sized plant? Oh I wish I could get a curry plant to grow. I’ve got one now but it just isn’t happy, I think it just isn’t warm enough here.
Maybe I’m forgetting how it a normal plant is, but it still seemed very big. I don’t find broccoli and cauliflower are very good use of space.
Do you can your sauce in those bottles or just keep in the ‘fridge? Would love to have the directions for canning if you do; here in the states they only tell us to use regular canning jars.
Mary, I’ve just given the details in one of the comments above. I don’t think my methodology would pass the strict American guidelines but it is definitely better than the recipe stated. The bottles vacuum seal after water bathing.
I am so envious of your late winter harvest. I am so barren at the moment. I really must plan better. Love your sauce.