Monday, August 15, 2011

Harvest Monday - August 15, 2011

Harvest Monday is here again. Still nary a ripe tomato to be found in the garden but the eggplant is starting to produce so there is something other than green veggies to show. This is a platter of Orient Express Japanese eggplant and Diamond eggplant. The Japanese eggplant have beautiful deep purple caps and the Diamond have green caps. Both varieties are seedless at this this stage of development. Last year I grew a Malaysian Long Red eggplant which was prolific, beautiful, and very tasty, but quick to develop seeds. I think I prefer the less seedy Japanese variety.


I pan fried slices of the Diamond eggplant and then served it topped with a chopped tomato salad seasoned with capers, olives, chopped dried aji peppers, marjoram, basil, mint, and garlic and grated ricotta salata cheese over all. My eater in chief said it was a keeper. Last night I used the Orient Express eggplant in a stew that is similar to Ratatouille but with green Shishito peppers instead of sweet red peppers and I seasoned it with pomegranate molasses and chopped dried Espelette peppers. That was another winner.

Here's the first two Green Fingers Persian cucumbers and one rat nipped Tasty Green Japanese cucumber. I think the Persian cucumbers rival the Japanese cucumbers for sweet seedless crunch. The cucumbers have been going into my lunch salads.



Here's the harvests for the past week:

Piracicaba broccoli - 12 oz.
Di Sarno Calabrese broccoli - 1.3 oz.
Capers - .9 oz.
Green Fingers Persian cucumbers - 3.8 oz.
Tasty Green Japanese cucumbers - 2.9 oz.
Diamond eggplant - 1 lb., 10.2 oz.
Orient Express eggplant - 15.6 oz.
Sweetie Baby Romaine - 1 lb., 11.3 oz.
Pimento de Padron peppers - 5.9 oz.
Shishito peppers - 3 oz.
Zucchini - 1 lb., 12.1 oz.

The total harvests for the week were - 7 lb., 15 oz.
The total harvests for the year have been - 256 lb., 4.35 oz.

Harvest Monday is hosted by Daphne on her blog Daphne's Dandelions, head on over there to see what other garden bloggers have been harvesting lately.




7 comments:

  1. Glad you're harvesting eggplants. I have Ichiban coming out of my ears, I must have collected over hundred something from those 2 plants. I pulled Little Fingers and Malaysian eggplants yesterday, LF tasted bitter to me, and the Malaysian is ok, but I have had enough eggplants this summer. I still have Fairy Tale in a container just for looks because they are so cute, I might try to pickle some of those cuties when I'm in very good mood, there are too many produce to deal with this time of the year, something has to give.

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  2. hmm, maybe I need to learn more about eggplant! I have tried it but have not liked it yet! But I wonder if I would do better with a less seedy one. Yours look beautiful.

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  3. Such pretty eggplant. I tend to like the Japanese eggplants better too. This year I'm growing an Italian type and wish I had put in the Japanese one instead.

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  4. Wow I've never had eggplant but no tomatoes - certainly tomatoes but no ripe eggplant but never the other way round. Have you tried talking to them? Or perhaps a spell on the naughty step - that occasionally works with my 4 year old...tomatoes may be similar...

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  5. Your eggplants are beautiful! Mine are not doing well this year. I also like the less seedy varieties of eggplant.

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  6. I am amazed that we are getting ripe tomatoes before you. Not that we are getting all that many, but still I think that is a first.

    Your recipes/preparation of your produce always sound just heavenly. The eggplant with tomato salad topping particularly had my attention. Wow that sounds yummy!

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  7. Those are BEAUTIFUL eggplants. This has been a good year for Japanese eggplants in my southern California garden too, but not tomatoes. Last year was tomato heaven. Good thing I still have some canned marinara sauce from last year, because I'm not going to have enough tomatoes to can any this year. I've only frozen two quarts so far, and may get another quart or two before the season ends. Kinda disappointing. Thanks for posting what varieties you are growing. It helps me learn.

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