We're still eating free food

When I was young, I would plant a couple of hundred-foot-long rows of green beans, then pick and can them like crazy.  Once I had enough of them canned, that was the end of my green bean planting for the year. This year, I've had four tiny plantings and canned none.  

This is the row I'm picking from now; it's about eight feet long.  Today I picked from it for the fourth time.   

 This row of green beans is just about to start blooming.  

The beans I picked filled this two-quart pan; the onions are store-bought.  Behind the beans is some smothered okra, otherwise known as okra and tomatoes.  It's slim pickin's around here with the tomatoes, but I was able to get two cups chopped to put with the okra.   I like to cook these dishes for the same meal because two slices of crisp, crumbled bacon is really good in the smothered okra, and the resulting bacon grease flavors up the beans.  No waste.  Bacon, of course, is neither healthy or diet-friendly.  But I figure two slices aren't going to do much harm.    

This head of cabbage ought to be ready to eat in a week or so.  

I'm still bringing in bell peppers.  These are from this morning.  


There are tiny cabbage plants up that probably won't mature before frost, although cabbage can take a certain amount of frost.  Carrots are up, too, and some lettuce.  I know that lettuce can germinate, then go dormant for the winter, and start growing again in spring.  I don't know if this is true for cabbage and carrots, but I'm about to find out.  


So, that's how my garden grows today.