Thursday, May 6, 2021
Wednesday, April 28, 2021
Grapefruit
Last weekend we picked a lot of grapefruit. I will leave it to you to figure out which of the grapefruit in the picture is Ruby Red and which is Oroblanco. Both are a great mix of sweet and a bit tart. Grapefruits are said to have originated in Jamaica around the 1700's as a natural hybrid of orange and pomelo trees that had been brought to the island. Fresh grapefruit juice is a joy to have.
But, why do they call it grapefruit? It doesn't taste anything like a grape and is ten times bigger. The name "grapefruit" refers to the clusters of fruit on the tree that are said to resemble a cluster of green grapes. That is a cluster of young ruby red on our tree right now. An early name for the fruit was "forbidden fruit." I wouldn't say either name makes a lot of sense or helps in the marketing.
Monday, April 26, 2021
Rain? No. Weeds? Yes. --- Stinging Nettle in the Yard and on the Table.
The fun thing about stinging nettle is that it automatically arrives in our yard every year and is a legitimate food source. With a little seasoning, nettle tastes good and it is also good for you. Think of nettle leaves as kind of like spinach in that it is a dark leafy green packed with nutrients. When cooked, the nettle sting goes away and you can handle the plant without fear of stingers. There are lots of nettle recipes but we generally just pick off the leaves and use the fresh nettle leaf like we would spinach.
Tuesday, February 16, 2021
January sky
Since it never (or rarely) rains in California, we mostly have to trudge along with blue skies. Sometimes, though, we get treated to a beautiful sunset.
Sunday, February 14, 2021
The Last Mandarin Orange
Today I picked the season's last piece of fruit from our Satsuma Mandarin Orange tree. The tree starts bearing in late November and has given us a steady supply of sweet and juicy mandarins all the way through to today. The great thing about these is that they are easy to peel. The even greater thing is that they are home grown, we can walk out and pick one anytime from about November - February and they taste far better than anything you can buy at the store.
The Satsuma Mandarin has been called the "perfect" fruit tree. For citrus, the trees are hearty and are said to tolerate below freezing temperatures. They are self pollinating. And, best of all, the fruit is delicious, super easy to peel and has no seeds. In our garden, they are also the first of the citrus to bear, which means come Fall the Satsuma Mandarin gives us the welcome first taste of sweet and juicy citrus for the season. The only downside is that the tree tends to be alternate bearing with a heavy crop one year and light one the next. We had a heavy crop this year, so I'm thinking next year is going to be light.
Below you can see the loose orange peel that just breaks away clean from the fruit.
Saturday, February 13, 2021
Garden Update
The cara cara has an interesting history. They are thought to be a cross between a Washington navel and a Bahia navel orange that grows in Brazil. The orange was discovered in 1976 naturally growing at Hacienda Cara Cara in Venezuela. So, the cara cara was an unplanned naturally growing hybrid. It has been grown in the US since the 1980's but is still a speciality item in stores and restaurants.
I am watching the stone fruit trees for flowers and our Eva's Pride Peach is first up. This tree really produced last year and we had jam, ice cream and froze some peaches. Hopefully around late June we will have some peaches off this tree.