Hiking in the Whites

Last weekend we went for hike up near Gorham,  NH in the White Mountains.  The weather was quite chilly - a reported 6 degrees overnight in the hut, and an early taste of winter.  It was amazing to see the gradations of seasons as we drove further north, from peak foliage in Massachusetts to snow-on-the-ground in New Hampshire.

A bear sharpened his claws on this tree.

The view from the ridge near Mt. Moriah.

Foraging

With the recent rains I've been finding a lot of mushrooms lately... my new passion. The ones above are Hens of the Woods and puffballs. The bright orange ones below are Chicken of the Woods, otherwise known as Sulfur Shelves. I sauteed each in butter, froze some and made some quiches. They're so delicious on their own but I imagine they'd be tasty in a pasta or rice concoction. I did dry the majority of them because its easier to just rehydrate and toss them in soups - and we've run out of freezer space.

Onion Drying

We dried our onion harvest on top of window screens propped up with two sawhorses. They spent about two weeks outside under a sheet. It rained lightly a couple of times but the sheet wicked the moisture away and they dried quickly. The idea with giving them the air circulation is to dry out the roots and tops to prevent rot while they're in storage over the winter. We harvested about 45 pounds of onions for the year, but I think with all the sauces, salsas and chutneys we'll use considerably more than that this year. The onions pictured here are Copra - good for storage. We also had a few varieties of sweet onions for salads and eating. Next year I'll plant some red onions and more storage ones. We interplanted with lettuce, carrots and beets - but the ones interplanted with lettuce didn't fare as well (very small). The idea is to get the tops really established and green before day length starts to decrease so that the plant has energy to put into the bulb. Onions also like plenty of water and fertilizer, and do well in fairly sandy soil, all conditions we're capable of creating... and we love onions.

Drying hops

We planted two kinds of hops rhizomes this spring, Willamette and Cascade. They grew the entire height of the deck - probably about 20 feet. The hops themselves started to develop by mid-July but we waited to harvest until the pollen grains were clearly visible and fragrant. To dry them, Conor knocked the bottoms out of the drawers of a small bureau and stapled a screen to hold the hops. By keeping the top drawer cracked and the bottom one removed with a fan blowing into it, plenty of air circulated up through the hops while reducing light entry. It took just under three days and the hops was bagged and frozen, waiting for the first estate brew.

Late Summer Harvests

canteloupes
tomatillos
cayenne, jalepeno, hungarian wax, big jim peppers


Late summer is passing quickly into early autumn. The major harvests of summer veggies are almost in, with the shelves lined and the freezer full. We've hung the 45 pounds of onions and more of potatoes, some squash are curing in the loft and more are still to pick. The melons made nice pickles, tomatillos a salsa verde, and peppers are now a jalepeno sauce.

Carrots and squash

The first harvest of carrots is in jars, nestled on dark shelves in the garage: 15 pints. The pretty purple ones are called Purple haze, the last of the 'purple' seeds from Katie (other favorites were purple basil and Purple Cherokee Tomatoes). We'll harvest the rest of the carrots as we need them, leaving some in the ground and some in cold storage for as long as possible. The canned veggies will hopefully be saved for late spring in the gap before the new gardening season begins.

A few odd squashes have appeared on our most prolific squash vines: Spagetti squash. They may be cross-breds. The acorn squash was very susceptible to the beetles and their diseases, but it looks like we may get 7 or 8 of those. There are more than a dozen spagettis, most of which are ready, and a few dozen Waltham butternut. All the cucurbits were pretty heavily hit by the cucumber beetles which carried downy mildew and a variety of other fungal diseases. The cukes and melons were especially bad so I just pulled them out as they stopped producing. Not a good year for cukes. I did put in some late plantings though, including a few melons which are getting big now, larger than grapefruits.

Eggplant