I harvested the first Stregonta borlotti beans as shell beans.
The newly shucked beans turned out to be white with purple markings.
One pod had beans with a reverse pattern, purple with white markings.
The rest of the crop is maturing quickly so there will be more of these in future harvest posts.
And there is more purple to be seen in another harvest of eggplant. These are some Black Beauty eggplants.
I also harvested all the Amish Paste tomatoes that showed any sign of ripening, plus a few other blushing tomatoes, some yellow and green (ripe) cherry tomatoes, and a few Diamond eggplants. Truly, a nice colorful harvest for early November.
The previous harvest of blushing Amish Paste tomatoes ripened on the kitchen counter and I used part of it to make an incredibly delicious tomato sauce from Marcella Hazan's book The Classic Italian Cookbook. It is a deceptively simple recipe, just tomatoes, butter, salt, and a touch of sugar. I made a double batch and froze it in portions. For tonight I have the makings for one of my favorite vegetable stews, a Turkish dish of lentils, eggplant, green chiles (to be harvested today), tomatoes, onion, mint, and pomegranate molasses. Mmmm, just the thing for a cool autumn night. The recipe can be found on the Food and Wine Magazine website.
Last night I made a warm salad of chanterelles from the farmers market sauteed with olive oil, pancetta and sweet onions, and then I tossed in strips of napa cabbage from the harvest the week before last. I just wilted the cabbage and then seasoned it all with salt, pepper, and moscato vinegar. That was good!
Here's the harvests from last week:
Stregonta Borlotti beans - 9.5 oz in the shell, 5.8 oz. shucked
Black Beauty eggplant - 2 lb., 8.7 oz.
Diamond eggplant - 14 oz.
Pimento de Padron peppers - 2.6 oz.
Amish Paste Tomatoes - 4 lb., 12.1 oz.
Aunt Ruby's green cherry tomatoes - 2 lb., 1 oz.
Black Krim tomatoes - 15.4 oz.
Chianti Rose tomaotes - 1 lb., 1.4 oz
Galinas cherry tomatoes - 1 lb., 4.1 oz.
Japanese Trifele tomatoes - 8.3 oz.
The total harvests for the week were - 14 lb., 13.1 oz.
The total harvests for the year have been - 538 lb., 11.6 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.
Interesting borletti beans, I'm not sure I have the patience to grow shelly beans.
ReplyDeleteVegetable stew and warm salad sounds good this time of year.
I've been thinking about Japanese Trifle for a while but never got around to grow it, what do you think of the taste as compare to Black Krim or other black tomatoes?
Lovely harvest. Will the beans stay purple after cooking?
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful and colorful harvest you have there. The recipes sound wonderful.I didn't do much for the summer and have missed the chiles, tomatoes and eggplant. Ah Well I'm sure I"ll make up for it next year!
ReplyDeleteMac, I'm not so sure that this is the year to pass judgement on tomatoes, it has just been too cool and even my favorite tomatoes aren't as flavorful as usual. So, keeping that in mind, both the Black Krim and the Trifele were new varieties for me this year and the Black Krim was better tasting. Actually, the Black Krim was the best tasting of the whole lot this year. But who knows how it would fare in a warmer year or warmer climate. Both of them turned out to be equally productive, I grew one plant of each and they both produced 11 plus pounds. The only variety that was more productive was the Amish Paste which produced 40 pounds from 3 plants in the same time period. My favorite black tomato is Paul Robeson, but I didn't grow it this year so I can't really compare it to the Trifele.
ReplyDeleteNorma, the beans lost the purple color when I cooked them. :( But they are delicious.
ReplyDeleteI always loved those beans that occasionally throw out beans that are reversed. Usually for me that is cranberry beans, but the rattlesnake beans did it too.
ReplyDeleteOur harvests are pretty much green and white these days. It's nice to see some color in yours!
ReplyDeleteI'm fascinated by the one pod of reverse color beans. I think I would have kept them for planting next year. Too bad they didn't keep their color after cooked. I'll have to look up this variety to see what's known about its color. So many wonderful different bean varieties. Your photos are lovely too, especially those glossy eggplants. Nice harvest.
ReplyDeleteDaphne, it is interesting how some varieties do that, last year the Petaluma Gold Rush beans threw off a few reverse colored beans.
ReplyDelete----
Lou Murray, I've though about trying to grow other varieties of beans that have done the reverse colors. I still have a chance to collect some of this years beans if I can figure out which plant is producing them so that I can try to let them dry on the vine.
What a wonderful harvest! I think I might try to grow some eggplant for the first time next year...I've heard it's a bit persnickety, so I've been hesitant, but I think it's time!
ReplyDeleteI do like the sound of that Turkish dish. Those beans look just perfect - I love how they both look perfect and are lovely and tactile as well. I've put some borlotti beans in for the first time this year.
ReplyDeleteLove the reversed colored beans - really pretty to look at! I am so jealous that you are getting tomatoes and eggplants. Tomatoes are a memory now from our garden and it will be a LONG time before we enjoy them fresh again. (sigh) It does not help that we had a miserable tomato production year in 2011.
ReplyDeleteWhat beautiful beans! And you're still picking aubergines - we picked our last ones last week...I'll miss them!
ReplyDeleteBee Girl, I would say that eggplant is no more persnickety than tomatoes or peppers, although I generally give them a later start since because they seem to prefer a warmer start to life in the garden.
ReplyDeleteHey Michelle,
ReplyDeleteDid the Stregonta seed come from Franchi. I actually like the color deviation, but I bet they'll want to know. We love your site!
Dan, the seeds didn't come from Franchi, I bought them off a seed rack in a department store in Switzerland, it was their house brand of organic seeds.
ReplyDeleteMichelle, I didn't find out anything about color variants in the Stregonta borlotti beans. They are apparently the Italian version of French green beans, according to one site, but that sounds wrong since they are to be eaten as shelled beans. Seeds are available from Seeds of Italy. Those dark beans may be a real rarity. Hope you can find more, or at least saved the ones you found.
ReplyDeleteOh wow! What a beautiful harvest. I love the look of those beans. It's cool how the one pod was opposite. They looked really pretty together. I hope they taste as good as they look.
ReplyDelete~Lynn