Pepper Time

Despite the unseasonable mild weather, the peppers are ripening. It's pepper time! This is a big basket full of Biker Billy jalapenos. They are delicious and hot!

And here is the whole harvest for the day: onions, peppers (jalapeno, anaheim, cayenna, and big jim), and eggs. We're getting 5-7 eggs a day.

The sunlight coming through the egg basket caught my eye.

I keep trying to get a good shot of the flowers. They certainly were worth the small amount of effort.

The Boston Marrows are starting to really shoot out. They are already huge and full of fruit in my yard, but running quite a bit later here.

Since I'm already starting seeds for fall, I got to work on my potting table/greenhouse/shade structure. I laid out the boards and ran surveyers string to make a nice edge. I made sure the table top was situated such that my feet can be fully on the concrete, The cement there is just big enough. I won't be able to access the back half until we clear that area out, however.

I screwed all the boards down with my trusty drill tool. The plan is to raise the cold frame up and let it serve as the roof. I'll add greenhouse plastic all around the sides. I haven't decided how best to make the sides, but PVC is a likely choice.

Cooper helps Reny pick some tomatoes.

But as usual, we spend most of our time doing what we do best....

Hair

Yesterday wasn't super hot. In fact, Catherine questioned an assertion that it was 88 degrees. So we checked and she was right... it was only 85 degrees. For a Chico July, that's downright balmy.

I finished getting the mulch put in back of the flower garden, so the melons can cross the area and climb up the trellising.

These are the Tigger melons, and they're starting to fruit.

The flowers are really pretty also. That shot of hot color really wakes up that bit of the yard. The orange cosmos are particularly nice. The sunflowers aren't blooming yet, but they're certainly tall.

Here's a closer shot of the marigolds, zinnias, and cosmos.

Rick communes with his corn, which has come up very nicely.

The girls are starting to lay regularly. Here are 4 eggs in the nest. The bottom one turned out to be double-yolked

The rooster is really an attractive bird, even if he is sorta unnecessary.

When the sun shines through his comb and wattles, they almost glow.

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What We're Eating
Glen shared this wonderful recipe with us, so I had to try it. The anchos are not from our garden because I couldn't wait. These peppers are stuffed with shrimp and dover sole, topped with pepper jack cheese, and nestled in a bed of home-grown tomatillo sauce. I served them with cilantro/lime creme fraiche. It was really delicious.

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Oh yeah and the hair thing. I got my hair cut yesterday. Not really farm related, but I haven't had short hair in a long time. I really like it. It's so much cooler and lighter. Besides, what's the point of long hair if it's always up in a bun? So Catherine insisted on taking some shots of me. As usual, I look dorky but....

I put these pics way at the end in the hopes that most folks have stopped reading by now...

Buddy's BD

Last Friday was Buddy's birthday. We all hoisted a glass.

The beans are climbing their strings, and starting to throw some late afternoon shade on the anchos, as planned.

The Anaheims are getting ripe.

And the Bidwell melons are finally starting to take off. Rick C. says he has some fruit on his. His are about 3 weeks earlier along, because the ones we set in at the farm got munched, and I had to start over from seeds.

Rick C goes tomato hunting.

Rick and Catherine are gleeful, thinking of all that salsa-to-be.

Salsa day

I gathered fixings from my house and the farm and put together this spread for salsa. I roasted all the peppers but I did jalapenos separately and made paste out of them so that everybody could hot up the salsa to there own taste. These are the roasted jalapenos.
This is the tub-o-salsa .............looks good enough to eat doesn't it.
Two jars of jalapeno paste and a jar of hot tomato paste.

Plum Wine part 2

Last night Karen and Glen forced us to drink beer with them at Sierra Nevada. We discussed the winemaking, and of course I was doing it all wrong. So we took a hydrometer reading, then added a lot more sugar so the yeast could make enough alcohol. We used up all my sugar, and all of Karen and Glen's, and even some ancient stuff Rick had from brewing days. Apparently it doesn't go bad. We melted the sugar in hot water before adding it. We put in 14 more cups of sugar to go with the 2 cups of honey.

We also took it out of the carboy and put it in an open pot, so it could do the primary fermentation with lots of air.

By this morning, it was nice and foamy. I've been stirring it several times a day.

Plum Wine

I finally got around to processing the entire vege drawer full of plums. I cut them up, ran them through the blender, then put them in a couple of big gallon jars. It was hard to find a way to refrigerate them, so I had to put one in the ice chest. This didn't actually work very well, as it got warm enough that it started to naturally ferment.Then when I opened the lid, it sort of exploded. Note to self: Be ready to make wine sooner next year. Don't wait till the last minute.

So I cleaned this all up, and cooked it to a boil (while stirring contantly to avoid scorching) to kill the wild yeast and sterilize it. Then Rick got out the carboy, and I borrowed a little yeast from Karen, and I got it into the carboy, where it can ferment safely.

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What We're Making

Plum Wine

1 vegetable drawer full of plums. About 30 pounds?

2 lbs honey

14 cups sugar

1 lemon, juiced

about 3 gallons of filtered water

3 teaspoons of wine yeast

As noted, I had to cook the plum puree. I then cooled it and poured it in the carboy.

I mixed the honey with some water, and cooked it until it was well melted, then added this to the carboy and sort of shook it around.

Wait for it to cool to room temperature, then pitch the wine yeast and put in fermenter.

I'll let this ferment, then it needs to be racked twice, bottled, and aged at least 6-8 months. We decided we'd try it about the time the plums blossom, so we can decide it it's worth doing again.

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Meanwhile, back at the farm, Buddy checks the sunflowers.

The cosmos are a lovely pumpkin orange.

And we caught this spider making a web, with the late afternoon sun making it glow in rainbow colors.

Rick C's Yard

Yesterday, Rick C. and his crew did a big bunch of work on his yard. This is where the hot tub used to be stored. It gets great sun!

This area used to have a fish tub in it. That got hauled out and now this area will get good morning sun.

Rick started his corn a lot sooner, and it's huge and already making tassels.

Here's his main area, filled with peppers and cukes in the background, climbing the fence.

And he's getting cukes already. He was threatening to make hot pickle relish.

He pulled the hot tub out and got it cleaned up. I was there not only to take pictures and disrupt the work, but also to bring a small amount of bromine to help shock the pool clean.

Here's his hardworking crew: Billy, Ricky, and Johnny.

Corn's Up

Rick and Rene check out the corn, which is just sprouting.

It came up pretty fast. Rick C seeded it on 7-13 and this was taken a week later.

The girls are now pumping out about 4 eggs a day. It's fun to see the slight color variations.

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Weather Note

Hot. Not as hot as it is some summers, but even an El Nino summer is hot in Chico in July. It's been in the high 90s and low 100s.

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How hot is it? Well....