Abundance!

Summer is a busy time for bees, and it's always a busy season for us Bees, too.  I always start the season with an ambitious list of things to accomplish, and in the end, have to concede I can only do about 1/4 of what I planned.

A good part of my summers are always spent trying to capture the fruitfulness of summer, hoping to keep up with the fruits and vegetables as they ripen in the garden and appear at the farmers' markets. Last year while I was away in London, I didn't do any gardening or canning, and I really missed it!  I made up for it perhaps too much this year, having made ten different kinds of jam, frozen and canned tonnes of fruit, and put by so many pickles, that my freezer is full and my store of empty jars is very depleted, and the season not finished yet.  I hope my near and dear ones look forward to holiday gifts of jam, relish and pickles, because I can't possibly consume it all alone!

I planted my own cucumbers this year because I love French cornichons, and wanted to try my hand at making my own.  This entailed picking tiny cucumbers (about 5 cm long) every other day, and storing them in the refrigerator crisper until there were enough to make one jar. I used fresh tarragon from my herb garden in these pickles, as well as in the pickled radishes I made.  Just trying to keep up with the cucumber plants, I made a ton of dills, piccalilli, and mustard pickle relish, just because I didn't want any to go to waste.  In the end I had to stop picking them because there is no way one lady can eat that many cucumber sandwiches!

By late August, the whole vegetable garden, including my patio herb garden, is totally out of control, and I feel a little overwhelmed! I prune the herbs and hang them to dry for later use in cooking, infusions and herbal tea.

 
To keep up with the tomatoes, I've resorted to not only canning, but also oven-drying or freezing all those I can't eat.  Oven-drying couldn't be easier.  Simply halve small tomatoes, such as plum, paste or cherry tomatoes, or slice larger tomatoes, such beefsteaks or heirlooms.  Place in a bowl,  drizzle lightly with oil and toss to coat. Spread in a single layer skin-side down over parchment lined baking sheets.  Sprinkle with salt and pepper, and any herb you desire (thyme, rosemary or basil are my favourites).  Place in a preheated 275 F oven, and leave for 1 1/2 to 6 (yes, six) hours, depending on the size and juiciness of the tomato, and desired dryness.  I like to leave them semi-plump (about 3 hours).  You can pack them in oil, but I prefer to freeze them on a tray and then place them, once frozen, into a freezer bag, to use in sauces and as pizza toppings in the winter for a taste of summer.

Seedy Spring

It's finally springtime, and all the Bees have been very, very busy getting our gardens ready. We love getting our hands dirty at the Beehive.

Towards the end of last summer, I dug out the ornamental garden in my backyard to make more room to grow my own food. And with two newly built raised beds this year, I'll have more room than I know what to do with. I'm growing some of my favourites from previous years (tomatoes, rhubarb, arugula) and lots of new things too. Beans! Watermelon! Cucumbers! Sunflowers! Kale! Collard Greens! Beets! Radishes! A full bounty.  

I attended Seedy Saturday in Hamilton in February, and picked up some organic seeds from Hawthorn Farm and Tree and Twig.

The garlic that I planted last fall is poking through, and this is the crop that I am most looking forward to. Every good dish starts with good garlic.

Meg and her husband Kevin bought a new house last year, and Meg is looking forward to start their new garden in their new downtown backyard. They made a trip to William Dam Seeds in Waterdown to get all the essentials to do so.

With the help of their housemate Joanna, Meg has already started seeds for lettuce, kale, peppers, onions, basil, thyme, oregano and rosemary and lots of lavender. They have plans to do some direct seeding, and to purchase some plants, mostly tomatoes. I'm excited at the prospect of trading some crops with my new neighbours!

Last year I recieved some beautiful cut flowers from Jen's peony bushes as a gift, and I told her that she had a real knack for flower arrangement. She confided in me that she had always been interested in the art of doing so. This year, Jen is planting her first cut flower garden, and I'm so excited to see the beautiful bouquets that she will undoubtedly fill her home with.  She loves floral arrangements but can't splurge on them all of the time, so she is very excited to have these blooming in the back garden ready for picking and experimenting with different combinations all summer long.  Such an easy and affordable way to bring cheer into your own home!

Jen's husband Mike is a real tobacco aficionado (and expert gardener), and for the first time this year he is trying his hand at growing his own tobacco! As a pipe smoker for the past 10 years he has become more and more serious about tobacco blends, experimenting with his own using a variety of cured tobaccos.  He even has a diary rating each of the hundreds of tinned tobaccos he has tried.  This year he is growing a Virginia and an Oriental, which he is planting at the farm that the Bees help out at.

Speaking of diaries, Kate's mom gifted her a 10 year gardener's journal this year, and she has been putting it to good use already. Logging your exploits in gardening is such a good organizational and planning tool, and is often overlooked.

I ran into Kate and her husband Erick at Seedy Saturday and they were there picking up some organic seed from Hawthorn Farms as well.

For now Kate has only started kale and lettuce. She plans to direct seed more once it's warm enough, and is planning a trip to Tree and Twig's Tomato Days to pick up some of her great tomato plants! Kate and Erick built their own raised bed last summer, so they have lots of space to grow delicious food for themselves.

When I need help with a gardening question, I often to look to Thea. She is a wealth of knowledge, and has a delicate, intrinsic way with the natural world. I only hope to one day have half the green thumb that this lady possesses.

Eggplant, tomatoes, radishes and greens, including baby kale mix. Thea grows lots of different varieties, and likes to plant heirloom seed whenever she can.

Thea not only plants her own food, but being a textile artist that specializes in natural dyeing, she grows her own dye plants as well to harvest for their spectacular colour. Her mother grew cotton last year, and got Thea interested in growing some of her own this year! I can't wait to see how this turns out for her.

So there you have it! Hopefully you all have been busy bees in your gardens as well. We'd love to hear about your green plans, too - whether it be food or flora. We love it all!

Back Forty Living in the Lanark Highlands

A while back it was mentioned here that I became a scout bee this spring and left the hive and Hamilton and moved to the country in Eastern Ontario. I thought I would pop in and give a little tour of where we live and what we've been up to these past few months.

Tucked back in the woods in the Lanark Highlands, an hour west of Ottawa, is our little board and batten house.  Originally built in 1867, it's now renovated into a cozy open concept home with a little loft and a wood stove.  When we first moved here it felt like we were at a cottage, and some days, especially when we have a fire on outside and it smells like summer camp, it still does. But most of the time it feels like home and we can't believe we've only lived here four short months. 

We have a few acres of forest, where we have been chipping away at building trails, and a few acres of field, which are now filled with goldenrod that I hope to harvest soon for dyeing. There are a few dozen apple trees, lots of wild berry bushes, and a couple little ponds where our dog swims everyday.  The land behind us is mostly hay fields, with nothing on it but old barns.  We walk the fields daily and often try to time it for when we can see some of the most amazing evening skies. Between the sunsets and the storm clouds it's pretty great how much of the weather and the sky we can see out here.

  

With fall on it's way were preparing for winter. We're canning all our vegetables, stacking wood. It's that kind of work that takes labour and time and we don't really mind because there's something nice about readying yourself and your home for a new season.

When we first moved here one of the first things we did was put in a garden. There had been sheep on this land for over ten years so we were pretty confident we had good soil but since this was our first vegetable garden we didn't want to bite off too much. We kept the garden small enough to manage as beginners, but big enough so we would have a nice selection of veggies to eat and preserve this year. At first it was cute. I laid hay on the rows and made trellises with found sticks.

But everything grew so well that many of the supports didn't hold, plants went horizontal, and we can barely walk down the rows anymore. We've learned a lot from this first garden and now that we know how well things will grow we have plans for an even bigger one next year.

 

The garden sits between the house and the old sheep barn, which we have converted to a studio for my screen printing business. It's bright and airy and really is a special place to work.  I often head out with a coffee first thing in the morning as the sun is rising. I'm finding it such a nice creative time of day. I used to really like having the studio separate from my home, but I am really starting to appreciate this new set up and being able to easily work early morning or late into the evening if I want to.

    

Having my husband, Jeff, working from home too makes it that much better. Along with the farm we also took over a cheese making business called Back Forty Artisan Cheese. Jeff apprenticed with the previous owner over the winter, learning the recipes and tricks of the trade and he is now a full time Cheese maker, creating raw sheep’s milk cheese in the commercial kitchen off the side of our house.  

 

 

 He makes four different kinds of cheese. The Highland Blue is a milder blue cheese with a nice buttery flavor. I never even used to like blue cheese until this one. It is so good. The Bonnechere is semi-firm with a toasted rind- he actually torches the rind with a flame.

He also makes a feta and a white rind cheese called Madawaska, which is slightly creamy under the rind and chalky in the centre. It is my favourite cheese in the world. It's pretty amazing always having such yummy cheese on hand. We've had lots of visitors this summer, including a few of the Bees, and each time the one thing we know we'll definitely be serving is a cheese plate. No one seems to mind.