Good times on the deck

Oh deck. How I adore you.

The realities of leaving home smacked me in the heart all of my last week at home. I tried to soak it all in- cuddling the crap out of my cat, staring off my deck, enjoying the witty rappeur I share with my mother. None of it felt real and yet I was either up at night, all jittery, unable to sleep (like when I began drafting this blog post) or catatonic (like in the Biochemistry class I was finishing). Anyway, I finally got the news that I’d gotten my paws on a JOB!!! (update soon) and I received the reassuring news that I was going to be able to move my bed to the INCREDIBLE KINDNESS OF FAMILY THANKS KATHY AND TOM WHO ARE READING THIS AND LENT STEPHEN YOUR BIG SUV TO MOVE MY BED THANKS THANKS.

So I dealt with my anxiety as best I could, like reminiscing about my beloved deck. The deck is a really great place to relax and lie in the shade.

I also love the deck for cooking burgers.

From a source without reproach- Lebanese Butcher, a place I was sad to leave behind, which supplies halal, organic, local, and delicious meat.

In this case, herb-packed Lamburger!

With lettuce ‘n tomato ‘n dijon.

 

With burgers with a twist, one must have fries with a twist. Steamed sliced sweet potatoes, tossed ‘em with oil and cajun seasoning, plopped them on the grill. Fab.

Plus grilled asparagus. Clearly this meal occurred when asparagus was still in season.

The next meal we enjoyed on the deck showcased our wonderful oregano! It always winters over, and it always produces in comedically large quantities in the summer.

Used to season some chickennnnnn. Along with olive oil, lemon, s+p. Very Greek, very simple.

Gorgeous, no? Sadly, slightly overcooked. My fault. It is what it is. Steve still inhaled it.

Rounding out the meal, a fun little salad I semi got from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: quick steamed cauliflower, capers, parsley, olive oil, vinegar, and bread crumbs toasted in olive oil atop. Mm.

  

It’s very funny for me looking at the teeny plants in this earlier phase in garden development since they’re so ALARMINGLY huge now.

 

Basically, if you’re dealing with a project that involves putting in a lot of work with questionable future payoff (childrearing comes to mind…) you should plant a garden. Everything just skyrockets.

Exhibit A: Mint.

 

Also in the produce department, we have beautiful basil (left) and sage (right). The basil is a heirloom variety and both my aunt (who gave me the seeds) and I have observed that it simply doesn’t grow as large as conventional varieties. Though its leaves are no less delicious.

The dill sprouted up valiantly but never seemed extraordinarily happy, truthfully. Too much sun?

Big pepper! I have two pepper plants and this one produced a pepper very early on in its growth and it just kept growing and growing and growing, then reddening and reddening.

   

It wasn’t 100% red when I picked it just because it had a teeny little soft spot developing, and I didn’t want it to spread!

    

I used this to make DEE-LICIOUS homemade salmon cakes. I added:
- Peppers and sweet onion, chopped very fine and briefly sauteed in olive oil
- 1 can of salmon
- whole wheat breadcrumbs
- homemade mayonnaise (yesssss)
- chives and basil from the deck (also yesssss)

Pan fried ‘em in a bit of oil and they were MONEY! Albeit unphotogenic, so you’ll just have to use your imagination.

As for the other pepper plant, it produced WEIRD PEPPERS! Not bad, but like I’d inadvertently created a hybrid: in size, they were neither tiny (like hot peppers) nor large (like bell peppers). Instead, they were medium smallish, and as they mimiced a halfway point between the two types of peppers in size, they also did in taste. Half spicy. Very exciting!

On the tomato front, most of my tomatoes were green when I skipped town. My mom sent an email that a less charitable person might describe as snarky telling me all the delicious things she’s been making with the tomatoes that I GREW. (No I jest, I just begged my family to water them as I pulled out of the driveway for the last time. I didn’t want all my work to be for naught!)

I think roma tomatoes are super bizarre looking on the vine!

   

They also grow like weeds! Though I did have a couple of the regular kind too.

Now, let’s talk squash. I had two squash plants: one was an heirloom zucchini variety that my aunt gave me the seed to grow. The other was a yellow squash plant that my thoughtful boyfriend got me when I was concerned that since I only had one squash plant it couldn’t have the squash plant sex necessary to make zucchini (yes, my knowledge of plant reproduction is extraordinary). Anyway, the yellow squash plant dutifully blossomed and produced two small yellow squash:

And promptly never did anything again.

Meanwhile, the zucchini blossom regularly produced beauuuuuuuuuutiful flowers.

 

Then off they’d plop, leaving a bare stem. Agh! My working hypothesis, supported by my buddy at the farmer’s market whom I’d brief with weekly updates, is that it’s a boy plant, and only produces boy blossoms (i.e. not the kind that produce squash. The USELESS kind!)

So, basically the only homegrown squash I ate this summer consisted of two small yellow squashies. I made a really good scramble though!

Farmer’s market eggs and spinach, regular old carrots, lotsa garlic and herbs, and the squashies.

Served atop a wrap, in brilliant sunlight.

 

lately i’ve been

Lately I’ve been gardening like it’s my job. I mean, it isn’t. Obviously. Fortunately, since I’m not all that good at it yet.

Still, the adventure of growing plants from seed is going surprisingly well- here’s a shot of my overcrowded deck, taken Sunday.

I thought I’d recount a bit of my journey, to encourage those of you who’ve wanted to start a garden but have doubted your abilities. Believe me when I say that if I can do it, anyone can do it.

After planting my seeds, my first sprouts were greeted with joy. You’ll recall that they began their lives indoors, with consistent warmth cultivating their growth at a crucial and delicate phase of their lives.

Tomatoes and basil grew reliably (with the heirloom romas being particularly hardy). 

I worried about the heirloom zucchini because it took forever to sprout and I was afraid I wouldn’t get anything. Well, I needn’t have worried, as it turned out it was just taking its time below the surface, ultimately rising in an impressively large sprout.

The dill were the absolute cutest, reaching for the sun.

Once we had reliable sun and warmth outdoors, and the plants were hardy enough to be relocated, they got potted on the deck.

You produce an amazing quantity of seedlings when you grow from seed. Keep that in mind, particularly if you’re doing a potted garden. (I am by necessity, since deer freely wander our yard, entirely unafraid of us, eating absolutely whatever they want).

Here are just some of the pots required to contain just what the tomato seeds successfully produced:

Transplanted a few of the little basil guys, but had to keep most of them in the pot til I had space for them. So precious!

I’d bought a pepper plant at the farmer’s market, then suddenly panicked. Don’t plants need to cross pollinate? Isn’t that necessary for plant sex? (The fact that I call it “plant sex” is a good indicator of how much I know about cross pollination, obviously).

So my thoughtful boyfriend bought me an additional pepper plant and an additional squash plant, so my lonely plants could have necessary companionship.

They came in the neatest containers, where you rip off the plastic rim around the top and then everything else is biodegradable, so you can plant it directly in the pot.

The pepper department looked good (and its leaves bore a striking resemblance to basil, which I thought was interesting)

He also got a boyfriend for my lonely squash.

And so some more time passed, with me visiting my plants each day to top them off with water if needed (tricky, knowing what’s not too much and not too little- a Goldilocks esque quandry). It’s so nice visiting them, talking to them, cheering them on in their progress. I was explaining this to my mom, who agreed that it was so amazing watching things grow and then said, “It’s just like being pregnant!” And then I changed the subject, eurgh. Plants are quite enough responsibility for me for the foreseeable future.     

And now? Now all my plants are doing swimmingly!

The tomatoes are big and beautiful (and I need to stake them sooner rather than later)

 

The squash are glossy and abundant.

And the peppers are filling me with delight! I am growing them for the first time so am particularly enchanted by their growth progression.

You see, they have little baby bulbs!

And the first has begun to transform into a sweet little pepper flower! So excited.

 

In the herb department, we have thriving basil and wintered-over sage. The sage I raided to make succulent bison meatballs just the other day.

Very excited for the harvest! Will continue to update, mostly for my own scrapbook-like memories!

Lately I’ve been eating this for breakfast a lot.

   

It’s a (subtly) healthified version of an absolutely delicious Steve creation. I combine:

- yogurt (1/2 a cup or so; Steve uses full-fat vanilla yogurt, I use lowfat or nonfat plain yogurt plus a little milk, plus a little vanilla, plus stevia)
- a whole buncha whole flaxseeds (crunch!)
- sliced banana
- frozen blueberries (which I don’t bother to thaw; I use the Trader Joe’s frozen organic wild Maine blueberries which are tiny and packed with flavor)
- peanut butter
- oats

Steve also adds honey.

 

Guys, this is DELICIOUS. And difficult to photograph, obviously.

Lately I’ve been trying to be a runner.

My primary motivation for this is that I got shoes that are THE CUTEST. I know nothing about running shoes, so I went to DSW and looked for shoes that cost
-$85 or less (my dad was kind enough to get me these. We’ve been playing racquetball twice a week and my old shoes- which I’d gotten in high school, were understandably junky)
-Well padded with good support (I didn’t like the minimalist shoes at all. I also tend to do a lot of arc trainer at the gym, and that machine necessitates well-padded toes)
- Didn’t make my knee hurt when I ran up and down the aisle at DSW

So I ended up with these cute Nike Airs.

Lately (ish) I’ve been eating a lot of hardboiled eggs. After Greek Easter, we had a tonnnn of them. For reasons best understood by her, my sister’s godmother, who hosted Easter this year, asked us to bring three dozen Easter eggs… then already had that amount made herself.

Anyway, Jacques Pepin has a great recipe for hardboiled egg and tomato gratin and I made it a coupla times, with my own spin

The gratin must contain tomatoes and hardboiled eggs. Beyond that, one can add
- cubed stale bread
-onions, slow-cooked until soft
-cheese
-fresh herbs

Duh-lish.

 

Lately I’ve been taking organic chemistry. Pray for me.

Thank goodness I have Sheila helping me study.

Lately I’ve been making a TON of fruit compote. I finally, finally found rhubarb at the farmer’s market (I completely missed rhubarb season last year, SAD) and made a truly delicious strawberry-rhubarb compote. It involved agave nectar and a little powdered ginger.

It was magnificent on whole-wheat pancakes with a ton of chopped almonds.

 

Fruit compote is great to use up fruit that’s still good but perhaps a little squishier than you’d like it. My most recent rendition contained nice farmer’s market apples that were a little too wrinkly to eat raw mixed with a few soft cherries and strawberries from otherwise nice containers of them.

Lately I’ve been interrogating orthopedic surgeons because my poor baby sister is getting knee surgery tomorrow. I hope everything goes well!

Lately I’ve been apartment hunting in the Chapel Hill/Carrboro area and I think I at last have success! I’ll share more once I’ve dotted i’s and crossed t’s, since apartment hunting is a volatile business, as I’ve learned the hard way.

Lately I’ve been eating not the best, mostly because I’ve had such bizarre sleeping habits. Sleeping ridiculously late, setting alarms and being unable to get up when I need to. Not cool. Staying up late, feeling really buzzed, eating junk food, then waking up with no appetite and skipping breakfast. Not cool! I want to get back into a healthier routine. I know I do better when I wake up at a reasonable hour; I’m happier and more productive in the morning. I like being a morning exerciser. Etc. I need a way to make this schedule happen in an organic way. I think these not so fun habits may be connected to a slightly lowered mood, which probably has something to do with imminent life changes, a course that demands skills that are far from inherent for me, and fears about getting the job I need in NC. And another thing, my next point…

Lately I’ve been watching the new episodes of Arrested Development on Netflix and boy are they awful.