Squash Beds

An executive decision was made last year that all of our squash and mellon type plants would be direct seeded this year. They are now all in. We spent the better part of the day clearing out all of the beds to hopefully get rid of any lingering squash bug larvae. The grass has been cut for the first time this year and we used the clippings for mulch. This photo gives a pretty good view of the five beds we planted (they're the green fuzzy ones). In each bed we also planted a few nasturtium seeds to help deter pests and eventually add some peppery zing to our salads. This now marks that 18 of our 22 beds are planted. All that's left are our peppers, tomatoes and some random last minute herbs.

While Huffing Sage

I have no idea how to introduce this post...
I was gathering some sage and thyme this afternoon for a batch of cabbage and potato soup. Although this is all we have going on in our garden, other than some root veggies, I do like to hang out in there and mentally map out our possible plant rotation.

So there I was, huffing sage, staring off into space, cogitated, when I realized, "Man we are going to need a shitload of nasturtium seeds." You see, our squashes (oh yeah, all of them) were eradicated by squash bugs. After the disaster we discovered that nasturtiums are great companions to squash plants, specifically to keep away these types of pests. As I was daydreaming about our garden for next year I realized that we are planning to have a good deal of squash in all sorts of varieties. Since the squash bug will suck on anything in the squash family I figured that we were going to need, you got it, a shitload of nasturtiums.

Meg and I have been trying our best to save seeds this year and have done fairly well in our quest. Now most of our garden is cleared out and turned, but there are some flowerbed corpses that still have not been scoured for seeds. I ventured to the shade garden area to see if I could scrounge up some yellow-nasturtium seeds, but soon realized that I really wasn't too thrilled with digging through all kinds of frozen debris for little brain-looking seeds. However, I did manage to grab a few more cardinal climber seeds (pictured above) that were dangling nearby.

Bad Photo of Great Soup

Sorry about the photo; the light in our kitchen is something awful.

So far this soup is my favorite that Meg and I made. It's nothing fancy, it's just squash soup. I have found that some of the best soup recipes are the ones that can be passed verbally (very few ingredients with basic cooking instructions).

Ingredients: (I wasn't given any amounts, so you won't be either)

Olive oil
Garlic (none of that store bought garbage in a jar)
Onions
Squash (preferably zucchini and yellow summer squash)
Parsley
Thyme
Vegetable broth
Salt and Pepper (optional)
Heavy cream (not heavy "whipping" cream)

Cooking instructions:

In a pot bring your olive oil up to a good non-smoking temp and toss in your chopped garlic. Cook the garlic just long enough for you to grab your already chopped onions, and then add the onions. Sweat the onions and garlic until the onions begin to clarify. Then add your chopped squash, parsley, and thyme and sweat the hell out of it. (Now some folks will remove the seeds and what not from the squash before they cook it to reduce the amount of water they give out. Meg and I like the squash juices, so we leave them in.) When the squash looks like it has had about enough, start warming up some vegetable broth in a separate pot. You won't need much, it is mainly going to be used as a thinning agent. With a hand blender, puree the squash. While the blender is on and in the pot, add vegetable broth until the mixture is the consistency of runny cream of wheat, grits, porridge, or what ever other visual reference you're savvy with. This is your base. Freeze what you don't plan on using in serving size portions. With the base you do plan on consuming still on the heat, add salt and pepper to taste, and stir in heavy cream until the soup is the color of your liking. Serve and enjoy.