The Inadvertent Gardener » Exasperation

Roasted fingerling potato salad

inadvertentgardener — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 01:16:23 +0000

The Unicorn has lots of lovable qualities, but among them is this: He is a fantastic giver of gifts.

He is not a fan of the gift list—he’d much rather pay attention to the recipient, think hard about something they would love to have but would never buy for themselves, and then give them that. I don’t know many people who operate like this, and it’s pretty spectacular to be on the receiving end.

This year, that meant he gave me a controller that turns my slow cooker into a sous-vide machine, along with some other accessories perfect for making the sous-vide process easier. Not only would I not have bought one of these, I didn’t even know it existed. How The Unicorn found the dude in Canada who makes these things, I do not know, but he made it happen.

Of course, as I am wont to do, this meant that I let my excitement about my new toy get the better of me. I planned out four recipes, all vegetable-based, to start with in the cooker. None of them required long cooking times, but they did require the water to stay at a pretty hefty temperature.

I could not get the water to stay at that temperature on the first try. I should also mention that the first try lasted about ten hours, while I became more and more freaked out about the amount of raw ingredients I’d just bought for these dishes and how they were going to go to waste. Let it not be said I can’t turn what starts as a fun cooking day into something akin to a panic attack. I have mad skills in this area, folks. Mad skills.

One of the dishes I was going to make was a fingerling potato salad, and when it became obvious that the sous-vide solution was not forthcoming that evening, I varied the recipe to use the oven instead of the slow cooker. The result was outstanding: a bacony, rich dish that rides the line between German potato salad and the American rendition.

Even if it meant I didn’t get to use The Unicorn’s gift for this dish, it yielded a recipe I’ll return to. I hope you will try it, and return to it yourself.

Roasted Fingerling Potato Salad
(Serves 8-10)

3 pounds fingerling potatoes, cleaned and skins left on
2 TBSP olive oil
1 TBSP salt
¼ pound bacon, diced
2 carrots, diced
3 shallots, diced
2 garlic cloves, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
¼ c. homemade mayonnaise (To make this, I recommend following the directions located here, but substitute red wine vinegar for the lemon juice, and leave out the garlic and basil.)
2 TBSP apple cider vinegar
2 TBSP Dijon mustard
2 TBSP chopped parsley
1 TBSP chopped tarragon

Boil the potatoes in heavily salted water until they are just starting to get tender. Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
Drain the potatoes and let them cool a bit. At this point, if you have a lot of variation in size, cut the larger ones in half, then toss the whole batch into a roasting pan. Drizzle with the olive oil, then toss with the salt. Roast in the oven for about 25-30 minutes, or until the potato skins are crisping and starting to brown.
While the potatoes are roasting, saute the bacon in a pan over medium heat until it begins to crisp and the fat begins to render. Add the carrots, garlic, shallots and celery to the pan and cook approximately five minutes, or until the shallots and garlic become soft.
Remove the potatoes from the oven and place them in a large bowl. Add the onion-garlic-bacon mixture and mix.
In a separate bowl, mix the mayonnaise, vinegar and mustard. Pour that mixture on top of the potato mixture and mix well. Sprinkle the herbs on top and serve immediately.

Running out of tomato time

inadvertentgardener — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 04:21:25 +0000

While I might have ripening tomatoes in the works, what I don’t have is a whole lot of time.

You might think I’m talking about the change in seasons, but the problem has nothing to do with the rotation of the Earth around the Sun. No, no. This is closer to the kind of problem I might have been able to avoid had I the right set of gardening skills.

A couple of weeks ago, I noticed the tomato plants were no longer just browning from the bottom up, as they have been for most of the season. In fact, they were also developing spots. Mildewy, fuzzy spots on almost every leaf.

For a moment, I despaired. This was, in fact, before I’d managed to even get a single tomato to ripen, so I had this flash-forward to pulling out all the plants, no harvest whatsoever, which would also mean, so far this summer, absolutely no harvest from this container garden at all. I’m still rolling with stunted basil and sage, after all, and scrawny single baby lettuce leaves barely worth watering, much less eating.

This, I must say, is not my most successful gardening season ever.

But then I decided to just wait it out. I’m sure there’s some kind of remedy for the blight on the plants. There probably is something I could have done in advance to avoid it (and I’d love suggestions if you’ve got ‘em). But at this point, I’m pretty much focused on just keeping each plant alive long enough to harvest at least one tomato off each plant. I’ve had success with one, there’s a nearly-ripe tomato on another, and there are green tomatoes on the third and fourth.

And when I’ve gotten what I can off the plants, I’m going to tear them out and start over, this time with an eye toward what actually grows in this strange, strange climate out here.

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The plucky herb

inadvertentgardener — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 13:11:30 +0000

When I got home from work Monday night, Fatemeh said, “There’s an herb growing out there on the patio.”

“A what?” I asked.

“An herb,” she said. “I don’t know what kind it is, but Stella tried to eat it.”

Sure enough, when I went out to water the containers, there it was, grown big enough that it was more than a mouthful for Stella, the tiny French bulldog. I pinched off a leaf and smelled it to be sure, but it was, most definitely, a slightly fuzzy clump of sage.

Of course, unlike the rest of the plants, which are growing in relatively expensive, allegedly good soil, this sage plant is growing in some sandy, tiny dirt that separates our patio stones from each other. I’ve never watered it, nor even given it any attention until today.

“Unbelievable,” I said when I got in from watering. “It’s the most successful plant out there.”

We’re leaving it and seeing how much it’ll grow. After all, the sage in the container garden continues to grow in a stunted, sorry manner, so why mess with the one real success outside?

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Watering results in only partial success

inadvertentgardener — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 13:27:33 +0000

The experiment in which I actually water the plants has now been in effect for approximately two weeks, give or take a watering or two. While I was gone to New York for a family reunion, Fatemeh picked up the slack in my stead, and had the pleasure of learning just how much water two gallons really is. (The answer: A hell of a lot of water.)

The plants look better than they did. There are still yellow leaves, but not nearly as many as before. The basil has started growing again. And the bean plants have started putting out a couple of runners.

But everything still looks sickly and sad, and though I have myriad yellow blossoms, there are no tomatoes fruiting yet. In fact, there are a few yellow blossoms that have taken suicidal dives into the sand below the pots.

This is not how I define success.

I have some excellent ideas on how to remedy the situation from a certain tomato doyenne in Tennessee, but haven’t made to any store that sells the right stuff (including a garden spray bottle) to actually try out said remedy. That’s going to have to wait until next week, for any number of reasons, many of them starting with B and ending with LogHer. I’m spending the rest of the week and weekend in New York City, slinging back martinis with the rest of the Lady-based Blogerati, and doing very little thinking about gardening and yellowing plants.

But when I return, I have to buckle down and figure this out. Now that I’ve tackled the water deficiency, it is clear to me that something else is missing, and that something else is, most likely, some sort of plant nutrient.

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Water: It’s a good thing

inadvertentgardener — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 13:40:53 +0000

My very first California tomato blossom did not, indeed, yield a tomato. Instead, it fell victim to whatever was causing the yellowing of the plant. It browned. It shriveled. It most certainly did not transition to a fruit.

This, which in my world constitutes an emergency, spurred my research into what might be killing all my tomato plants. I began by looking up information about blight.

This, of course, is kind of how I operate: Assume the worst-case scenario is true. If it turns out to be so, then really, it won’t matter, because whatever…you’re already mentally prepared for it. If it turns out not to be so, then really, it won’t matter, because whatever…the outcome’s much better than you expected.

I find this an excellent way to move through life. The constant state of near-panic drives a person forward in a much more efficient manner than, say, a laid-back attitude. We shall not speak here about blood pressure issues. No, we shall not.

But in my early research into the blight I was so certain my plants carried, I stumbled across this other, disconcerting explanation of what could be causing the problem. It appeared I was obtusely missing the obvious signs of drought in my own wine barrels.

Plants: They need soil, sunlight, nutrients and, um, water. Water is key to the whole growth cycle. And apparently, yellowing plants, when accompanied by curling tomato leaves, indicates a plant that is gasping for liquid.

I thought back to how I’d been watering, and realized I’d been using about half a watering can every day, or, well, sometimes every other day, because sometimes a girl is busy, and sometimes she might forget, or sometimes she might have been out too late the night before and she might be running late to work and then she might have something after work and then suddenly she might realize it has been three days since she watered the tomatoes.

And it occurred to me that perhaps, in a giant wine barrel of dirt, half a gallon of water every couple of days for two tomato plants plus, in one case, lettuce and sage and, in another case, basil and beans, is not even close to enough.

Then I noticed that, when I put any water to the soil at all, it sucked it in like it had never heard of water before. Like water was a beautiful tonic. Then, after pouring an entire two-gallon-watering-canful of water into one wine barrel, I noticed something I had not noticed the entire time I’ve had those tomatoes on the patio: Water running out from under the pot. Water that clearly had finally made it to those drainage holes I created with such drama. Basically, this whole time? I’ve barely been watering the surface.

So now there’s a new watering regime in town. I’m hoping it’s not too late to save the tomatoes. And if it does, in the end, turn out to be blight, at least I can rule human stupidity out of the equation.

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Tomato plants should not be yellow

inadvertentgardener — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 13:10:06 +0000

“Do you realize the tomato plants are turning yellow?” Fatemeh asked one day.

I probably turned a little yellow myself. I had, indeed, noticed, but in my usual manner, had been trying to ignore it. I had also developed a convoluted set of theories that explained the problem.

For example: We are downwind of a meat smoking business, which means smells of delicious smokey pork waft over at regular intervals. Tomato plants are vegetarian, right? Therefore, couldn’t it be possible that they were dying from the smell of ham?

COME ON, PEOPLE. If your kid came to you with this theory, you would call them VERY CREATIVE.

But the truth is, I feared blight. I feared air pollution. I feared lack of enough sunlight. Regardless, I know this: The only thing that should be yellow on a tomato plant are the blossoms that lead to actual tomatoes.

And it wasn’t just the tomato plants suffering. The bean plants looked like they were gagging on their own selves. The basil had grown to a certain level and stopped. And even the sage was looking, um, yellow instead of green.

It was time to start doing a little research into the problem.

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Watering cans: Actually functional

inadvertentgardener — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 13:47:18 +0000

I’ll admit it. I used to think watering cans were stupid.

I mean, sure. They’re fine if you’re Peter Rabbit and need to hide from Mr. MacGregor or whatever, but for ordinary gardeners? Really?

After all, when I looked around our kitchen, I saw plenty of vessels perfect for carrying water outside and dumping it into the dirt.

It took one trip out, though, with a pitcher filled with tap water, before I realized exactly why people get watering cans for their container gardens. Particularly container gardens on patios that don’t have hoses with sprinkler attachments. The distribution of the water without some kind of sprinkley functionality? Absolutely stupid. As I poured, I was just making holes in the dirt, thereby displacing basil and sage seeds and whatever else was there.

The day after planting, I went to Target for other reasons and came home with glowsticks (not for the garden, although they would make a nice nighttime decoration on a tomato plant) and a watering can. Those of you who are smarter than I am will agree: watering cans? They’re for more than hiding. They do, indeed, assist with proper water distribution.

In other words, I stopped putting divots in my own dirt.

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Casters on

inadvertentgardener — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 13:07:30 +0000

I will admit that though I completely expected to have to drill holes in the wine barrels, the thought of installing casters is not one that particularly occurred to me in the initial planning stages of the whole patio garden deal.

But as I stood on the BART platform in San Francisco one night with my friends Melissa and Derrick, Melissa pointed out to me that it was going to be sheerly impossible to move the planters without some ability to roll them.

“OK,” I said. “That sounds like a good idea.”

Inside, my head said, That sounds like something else I’m going to have to figure out how to do with a power tool. Hence, that is a terrible idea.

But I did like the sound of being able to move the damn barrels without requiring several chiropractor visits, and I’d already proved able to use the drill, so on to the next step. I had decided to go three to a barrel in a cockeyed triangle formation, which meant 24 bolts to place.

Luckily, the magnetized bolt setter made this easy. Right? Right. Except for the part where I put the fifth bolt up to the bolt setter attachment on the drill and promptly managed to lodge it in there at such an angle that it would not come out. The magnet held it there, wedged and ornery, and by this time in the day, the hardware store was closed. There was no option to just ditch the attachment and go buy another.

I pulled out my trusty toolbox and decided to try pliers. No luck. A wrench? Useless. Prying with a screwdriver? Pointless.

This is the point at which I channeled my inner toddler and threw a temper tantrum. I banged the bolt on the patio, though I managed to control myself enough not to slam the whole drill to the concrete.

Apparently? This is how you dislodge a stuck bolt. It popped right out on impact, and I returned to attaching casters, one at a time, until both barrels were done.

And then? Just because I could? I rolled those wine barrels around the patio a couple times before putting them in their permanent place.

Sometimes it pays to be a combination of petulant and stubborn. Sometimes, it even pays in tomatoes.

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The patio garden and its stay of execution

inadvertentgardener — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 01:39:33 +0000

A funny thing happened on the way to the patio garden: we ran into a bit of legal trouble.

OK, to be fair, it wasn’t REAL legal trouble. There weren’t cops involved, and no one was led away in handcuffs. But there were rules and regulations tossed about via some very stern emails, and for awhile, I was a bit stymied about how exactly to explain this to all of you.

No garden? Again? After all that?

The risk was there. For about a week, the wine barrels hung in the balance. I had been told to have them removed (and let me tell you how thankful, right about then, I was to have been too lazy/scared to figure out how to get holes drilled in the bottom and dirt up to the patio…), but I asked for a stay of execution.

Please, ma’am, can I have some more tomatoes?

The stay, indeed, arrived by email on a Saturday night. “Yes to tomatoes!” hollered Fatemeh from the other room. “Check your email!”

There it was: The homeowners’ association of the condo building where we rent had relented. The tomatoes…and their wine barrels…had passed muster. Finally, it was go time.

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A bit of a water retention problem

inadvertentgardener — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 12:23:14 +0000

There is no question that I should, by now, have dirt in my wine barrels. I should have them fully prepped, and I should be ready for Pilar’s seedlings to show up, since she swears they’re almost big enough to send home with me. In fact, I should probably already be growing lettuce. Or herbs. Or something.

“How’s that garden coming?” random people ask me, and I do what I am Very Good At as a Communications Director.

“Fine,” I say. “A lot of work to do.”

Or some variation of that. It’s my talking point, see? It does not give any more information away than is necessary, and it’s absolutely and unassailably true. It works, for now.

But soon, people are not going to be satisfied with a lack of photographic evidence of something akin to progress.

My excuse? There have been barely any weekends when I’ve been home AND have had time to garden AND it has not been raining since I moved into my new apartment. And really? This has not been a gentle soaking rain of the type that is lovely to walk in. It has been pouring rain.

Which led to the next situation. An email. From the property manager. Asking me if perhaps I needed some assistance. With some drilling of drainage holes.

See, there is an actual, professional gardener who maintains the communal plants on the property—lovely grasses that create a natural border between our wall and the next rooftop. And apparently he noticed that I had not, um, done anything yet with the wine barrels. And that they were collecting water at an alarming rate.

Me, being an unprofessional gardener, had not paid any attention to this water retention situation.

Also, though I lived in Africa, and Iowa City, and therefore know a thing or 35 about mosquitos, it did not occur to me that standing water? Breeds the annoying little buggers. Did this occur to the pro? Why, yes it did.

So I dumped the water over the weekend, and now the barrels are on their sides, drying out. The property manager has intimated there might be an engineer on her staff who just might be able to meet me for a drilling expedition. The kind, that is, that creates drainage. And once that little task is done, I’m bringing in the dirt.

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