Thursday, May 17, 2012

Brown beauty and garden goodness

The first open iris.

These brown ones always open first. I know; they aren't really brown, but for lack of a better description we call them brown or rust.

Another brown Bloom, the year's only ewe lamb.

I was noticing this morning that Bloom's gulmoget eye flashes extend much further down her muzzle than my other gulmogets. Interesting how much variation there can be within one pattern, like At, Ab, Ag.

We've had our first garden harvest – and we haven't even planted our garden yet! Last Sunday Rick tilled the garden, and found some beets and carrots from last year – along with a nice row of onions. Some of the beets were woody and some of the carrots rotten, but many were salvageable and have found their way onto our plates in dishes like pasta primavera and vegetable quesadillas.

On Monday I stopped at a favorite produce stand after Brian's violin lesson, and they had some boxes of very ripe tomatoes on sale for $5.00 each. I weighed my time and the cost, and decided to get one. (Our average nighttime lows are too cool for good tomato production here.) I would have been able to salvage more if I could have gotten to them immediately (not that the chickens minded!); I wasn't able to sort through and puree five quarts until yesterday afternoon. This morning I made that up into condensed tomato soup. Sooo much better than Campbell's!

It is rather startling to be eating garden produce and canning so early in our season, but I'm not complaining! That reminds me. I have rhubarb to pick!

That's it for today from . . .

4 comments:

Mama Pea said...

Your brown iris and your little brown Bloom are both gorgeous.

Now if some of the rest of us gardeners could be harvesting veggies before we even planted them . . . ;o}

Your homemade tomato soup made me hungry for some. I, too, have a great recipe that puts Mrs. Campbell's to shame!

Christine said...

Believe it or not we have rhubarb to pick here, too. Freaky, freaky weather around here this year.

I have an iris that is a very similar color. I've never known what to call it either.

Tina T-P said...

Your iris pictures always remind me of my Grandma (the one in my story) She loved "flags" as she called them - and had a huge patch - and your soup looks delish! T.

Anonymous said...

Ooooo love the "brown" iris... Tell you what, if you ever get the chance to divide them, I'd be thrilled with a tuber or two for my consolation prize. Yummy looking soup. Recipe please?