Mango Salsa Recipe
I am starting to get some cherry tomatoes turning red but not enough to make salsa so yet again so I decided to make some Mango Salsa. It is great to eat on tortilla chips the same you would for regular salsa or black bean corn salsa. One of my favorite things to do with is as a topping to blackened salmon (salmon grilled with dusting of Cajun seasoning)
CVG Mango Salsa Recipe
- 3 mangos
- 2 cloves garlic
- 1 small onion
- green onion
- 5 sprigs of cilantro
- juice of one lemon (or lime)
- 1 jalapeno pepper (seeded)
- sugar
Directions: Finely chop 1 mango (or blend in blender/food processor) this will create a base for the salsa. Coarsely chop remaining mangos, onion, and green onions to have more defined texture and add to bowl. Finely chop garlic, cilantro, and seeded jalapeno pepper and add to mixture. Squeeze in juice of lemon into bowl and mix thoroughly. Let sit for 10 minutes and add sugar until salsa does not have a spicy aftertaste (normally 2-3 teaspoons)
Now if you really like the spice you can leave the seeds in and/or skip the sugar but for the blackened salmon it give a good contrast to the spicy meat and people just are not usually expecting fruit to be spicy.
I can proudly say with the exception of mangos, lemons, and sugar the remaining ingredients came right out of my garden.
Tags: cheap, cilantro, garden seeds, garlic bulbs, led, pepper plants, salsa garden, tomato plants, vegetables
Doing recon at the local farmers market
15.3 years ago corn, farmers market, garden planning, garlic bulbs
Your mission, should you decide to accept it is to infiltrate a local farmers market to gain intelligence to help aid your personal garden.
Sure, the farmers market is a great place to find some fresh food you can’t or didn’t have time/space to grow in your garden. It is also a great place to get seeds/starts for your garden. It is also a great resource to figure out how various fruits/vegetables grow in your area.
Even if you are growing everything you want/need in your own garden a quick stop at your farmers market can help you check out your competition and see for example in my case, “hey their garlic grew just as bad as mine this year.”
This is also a good time to try out new fruits and vegetables you are thinking of growing next year. There is nothing worse than growing a bed full of arugula and figure out at that point you hate the stuff. If you are lucky enough you might even get a meal and some seeds to plant with next year depending on you seed saving ability.
Now as always you don’t want to blow your cover while doing surveillance, so make sure you have a good cover store. In my case I used a few people known as “my wife and daughters” to appear less conspicuous. You can even use techniques of taking a picture of your “daughter” to get some recon picture of their products for further analysis.
In the end it looks like my little spy helpers had a good time and we even contributed a little to the local farmers economy and got the secret ingredient to CVG Black Bean and Corn Salsa Recipe (ok, it was corn).
This post will self destruct in 10 seconds (sorry had to say it)
Tags: cheap, garden seeds, garlic bulbs, outdoor plants, salsa garden, vegetables
Grow box during the summertime – UPDATE
15.3 years ago computer, indoor growbox
UPDATE: With weather climbing my grow box got up to 111.5 degrees today with the lights off. If I was using one of those fancy computers with temperature sensors it would have turned itself off by now. Turning off computer so I will have something working this winter…
[July 25, 2009] I was planning on growing my jalapeno peppers in my grow box this summer, but given the higher than average weather we have been having.
With the weather being in the 90’s 100’s and given the CFLs on average increase the temperature by around 10 degrees the grow box has not been great place to grow plants unless I was thinking of growing cacti. Looking at my historical data the highest temperature this summer was 107.6 111.5 degrees.
As you can see above I have been making some progress on the computerized grow box, which I will plan on writing it up soon…
Tags: cheap, grow lights, growbox, outdoor plants, pepper plants, vegetables
How to fertilize/side dress tomatoes/peppers in your garden
15.4 years ago alfalfa pellets, compost, fertilizer, peppers, tomato
When your fruiting plants are flowering and bearing fruit this is a good time to give them a little extra boost. Though you don’t want to throw any old fertilizer at them at this point. You want them to get the nutrients they need to produce high yields of produce, though you don’t want to shock them with an abundance of nitrogen to stimulate new vegetative growth when you would rather the plant expend its energy making you food.
The solution to this problem is to provide your plants with a low dose of balanced fertilizer. I couple of my favorites are compost and alfalfa pellets applied every couple weeks while the plants are blooming/fruiting. This ensures the plants have all the nutrients they be lacking without throwing the plant into a growth spurt.
If you have a little extra time take the compost and add some water and let it sit in the sun for several hours and water or spray onto the foliage for a great dose of compost tea.
If you forgot to apply a little bone meal when you planted your peppers/tomatoes this is also a good time to sprinkle a handful under your plants and work into the couple inches of soil to provide your plants with a boost of phosphorous and also a little calcium to help prevent blossom end rot.
Hopefully with these tips you can help your green tomatoes turn into bright delicious red tomatoes.
If you want to learn more about the chemistry of organic fertilizers I have a whole post on that subject
Tags: alfalfa pellets, cheap, compost, organic vegetables, outdoor plants, pepper plants, tomato plants, vegetables
How to freeze berries
15.4 years ago blackberries, freezing, raspberries, strawberries
A well proven way to save money on your food budget is to stock up on produce while they are in season. Not only do they taste better but they also can be significantly cheaper. Now these “purchases” can be from your local grocery store, U-Pick farm, fruit stand, farmers market, free roadside berries, or even from your own garden.
Given the attractive prices of these fruits it may be tempting to buy more than you need. Which I would say go ahead and buy to your hearts content. After you have made all the jam you can eat in a year (don’t make 15 jars of jam when you only consume 4 per year) one effective and easy way to store your extra berries for winter is freezing.
For the impatient one you can simply dump the berries into a Tupperware or freezer bag and toss them in the freezer. Though in the end this will give a solid clump of berries which you would need to pull out an ice pick to separate the berries if you only require a few.
The more preferred technique is the following:
- Wash your berries: Give your berries a quick rinse and let them dry in a colander for about 10-15 minutes
- Spread your berries: Lay down some wax or parchment paper on a cookie sheet and spread your berries on a single layer just ensuring that the berries are not touching. If a couple touch it is not the end of the world they will just be close friends in the freezer.
- Freeze your berries: Carefully put the berries in the coldest part of your freezer overnight.
- Pack your berries for the winter: When it comes to freezer storage and fruit air is always the enemy. If you have a vacuum sealer that would be your best option but if you are like me and don’t here is a cheap alternative. Take a regular old Ziploc freezer bag and insert a straw on one end, close the bag as tight as possible around the straw, suck air until you get dizzy, and quickly seal the bag. Just to be extra cautious I will then throw that bag in another bag for an extra layer of protection. Note: You have a little time to complete this step but don’t want to allow enough time for your berries to begin to defrost and refreeze stuck together.
- Label the bag(s) and throw them in the freezer
Now to avoid getting too scientific (size/speed of water molecule formation) the faster you can get your berries frozen the better the quality your berries will be when you pull them out. If you have enough berries (or not enough cookie sheets) you can also add your berries and some broken up dry ice to a metal bowl (be sure to wear gloves) and stir to replace step 3. This will get you the fastest freeze and best quality though unless you are freezing many flats of berries I would recommend the cookie sheet method.
Following these steps you should have some tasty berries you can pull out individually from the freezer all winter long.
Tags: cheap, vegetables
How to grow seeds in your garden
15.4 years ago cheap, seed saving, seeds
Because of a strange heat wave we had in June, I seem to be growing more seeds than vegetables this year. Now as they say when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. In that spirit I am planning on increasing the number of plants I will allow to completely go to seed this year.
I have always saved cilantro seeds, the first time it was almost an accident my daughter liked the pretty white flowers and after neglecting my garden at the end of the summer I had perfectly dried cilantro seeds on the plant. Free and renewable supply of seeds, what could be better. If I don’t have you convinced here are some more reasons:
Cheap: You really can’t beat free. With the price of seeds increasing depending on the variety of seeds you grow this could save you a considerable amount of money per year.
Easy: The creation of seeds of seeds is a completely natural process that has been happening for millions of years. In many cases you can do practically nothing other than harvest the seeds before the birds do.
Natural selection: With a little attention you can hand select only your best plants to harvest seeds from. If the plant survived to produce seeds it has to be at least a little disease tolerant and if you intentionally pick plants that bolted early you can also establish your own slow bolting variety.
Limited availability: Even with all the resources on the internet your favorite seed company may not always carry your favorite varieties or in some cases just a few seeds might be hard to come by. If you play your cards right you may even be able to make a few bucks selling your rare seeds.
Seed Exchange: If you collect seeds you more than likely will get more seeds than you need for the next 2-3 years from a single plant. This is a great supply to use for local or mail seed exchanges. Not only are you supplying someone else with seeds they need but also adding seeds to your collection which you can harvest and repeat the process again.
Growing sprouts: If you are paying for seeds growing sprouts for some plant varieties can be pretty expensive…unless your seeds are free. This is a good healthy way to use up some of those extra seeds you can’t get rid of any other way.
This year I am planning on harvesting spinach, pea, carrot, and radish seeds (along with my previous onions and cilantro) so stay tuned for more details.
Tags: birds, cheap, cilantro, garden seeds, outdoor plants, vegetables
