Harvest Monday - July 29, 2013

There has been a slight change in the contents of the harvest basket this week, but first, the usual suspects. 

Purple Peacock broccoli, a few Sugarsnax carrots harvested as needed, and Di Ciccio broccoli side shoots.

Zucchini, zucchini, zucchini, three harvests of zucchini and there's more waiting out on the plants even now. I'm afraid to see what they've done while I went and played in San Francisco for a couple of days. The Romanesco zucchini has a new nickname - QuadraZuke - it has sprouted a new stem so now I can harvest 4 zucchinis off of it at once. The tally to date for the one plant (not including what it is sporting at the moment) is 35.6 pounds. One plant, two months, 35.6 pounds (16 kilos) of zucchini. Add the 9.7 pounds of zucchini from the Ortolano di Faenza and that's 45 pounds of zucchini so far this year. Zukezilla!

But look here!

The critters have allowed me to harvest a few handfuls of raspberries and that's the second fig (half the crop) from my Violette de Bordeaux fig tree (ha, really just a bush). Not impressive in quantity but truly impressive in flavor. But not enough to add a few lines to the tally.

I only photographed one day of harvests for the past week, the basket on other days contained more runner beans, enough French Gold filet beans to finally serve two, the first 3 Musica beans, more cucumbers, and the first 3 Pimento de Padron peppers. Nothing much new in the kitchen other than my preparation of the French Gold filet beans - I prepared them simply by steaming them in a skillet with a splash of water and a tablespoon or so of butter, cooked until the water mostly evaporates leaving a buttery sauce. But what really got my husband's attention about the beans was the vinegar that I used to finish them - a Late Harvest Viognier Honey Agrodolce. The honey flavor in this vinegar is quite distinct but doesn't predominte and the fruity qualities of the viognier wine come through as well. I don't usually put in a plug for products on my blog, but I really like this unique vinegar and the producer makes a few other vinegars that I really like and they often times are the finishing touch to my vegetables or the sparkle in my salads.

The weather has returned to the usual for this time of year. I'm not complaining, it's been warm but not too warm. The fog rolls in around 7 or 8 in the evening and retreats mid morning. Plenty of sun during the day and nice sleeping weather at night. And the tomatoes are happy that the nighttime temperatures have stayed above 50ºF.

Here's the harvests for the past week:

French Gold pole filet beans - 3.5 oz.
Runner green beans (St. George and Moonlight) - 12.2 oz.
Spanish Musica green beans - 2.4 oz.
Baby Ball beet - 1.1 oz.
Di Ciccio broccoli - 5.4 oz.
Purple Peacock broccoli - 3.3 oz.
Sugarsnax carrots - 6.8 oz.
Garden Oasis cucumbers - 1.7 oz.
Green Fingers Persian cucumbers - 9.5 oz.
Tortarello Abruzzese cucumbers - 1 lb., 7.1 oz.
Pimento de Padron peppers - .7 oz.
Ortolano di Faenza zucchini - 1 lb., 8.1 oz.
Romanesco zucchini - 4 lb., 5 oz.

The total harvests for the past week were - 10 lb., 2.8 oz.
Which brings the total harvests for the past 7 months up to - 250 lb., 5 oz.

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