Delights From The Garden

I really need to get better at taking pictures of vegetables. But here are a few shots of treats from the garden. Lots of things at peak these days.

Beans in abundance. The packet of seeds claimed purple, green and yellow beans, but there don't seem to be too many yellows. No matter, I have yellow bush beans in another location, an undisclosed location. Now, who's the Bean Queen?

These are my beloved Pimiento de Padron peppers. Some of these were not harvested early enough and may end up blowing somebodies head off. But the small ones are tender and delicious. Saute in a little olive oil, sprinkle with coarse salt, and pop like candy. I planted 2 plants, one is thriving and doing all the heavy lifting of supplying us with peppers. The other one is struggling to produce a few measly peppers. It has labored in the shadow of a zucchini plant and been besieged by chickens TWICE, so I forgive the poor production.

We aren't getting tons of tomatoes, as I lamented in a previous post, but what we are getting is just what you'd imagine; plump, succulent, juicy and oh so flavorful. I have enjoyed them many ways, but my favorite remains crusty bread, a generous slathering of mayonnaise, slabs of ripe tomatoes, coarse salt, black pepper. This is best enjoyed over the sink.

My Dad once described some particularly gorgeous tomatoes as pornographic, and I have to say that when the lewd fruits are plump, juicy, meaty, ripened to perfection and warm from the vine, well, it's tough to find a better word.

And here are the Manzano peppers. They are about as big as a golf ball so far. Both plants are carrying about 10-12 peppers and I think there will be more to come. These peppers will ripen to yellow. The smaller Rocoto pepper plants are coming along fine, but I still don't expect to get any peppers this season.