Saturday, June 30, 2007

picking green beans in the rain

Welcome to all you visitors from Hearthkeepers.com, whatever on earth that is. I've signed up to join, just to see who linked to this entry in my blog, and why. Sitemeter is very handy for letting me know where my readers are coming from. Hey folks, there are lots of other entries here, so don't leave so quickly.Ideally, one should stay out of the garden when it's rainy and muddy; the soil is compacted by your feet, and the plants don't take well to being handled when it's wet. You can see the tiny ponds made by my bare feet. Also, it's hard to get the beans cleaned off well: some are muddy from lying on the ground, and dead leaves and blossoms cling to each bean. However, when you're wanting a pot of green beans for the company that's coming, there isn't a lot of choice. So this morning I put on a rain slicker, took off my shoes, and headed out to pick green beans. Some of them were a couple of days past their prime, but they'll cook up all right. So after rinsing them off about half a dozen times, I broke them into a big pan and added an onion from the garden and some Oscar Mayer Turkey Polska Kielbasa (2/3 less fat). This flavors the beans up quite nicely; I don't add any salt at all, but I use lots of pepper! Would you like to see how the rest of the garden is thriving on this rainy day? That's Iohief corn, my mom's favorite variety of sweet corn, developed in 1951. I prefer peaches-and-cream corn, but it's $8 a pound for seed. So I'll just say Mother knows best, and pay 1/4 that price. You can see the cucumbers are doing nicely, too. I like to eat them, skin and all, with no salt. How long do you think it will be until these roasting ears are ready?