Here’s how my summertime days go (yes, it’s summertime here!):
- Knit or play on the computer waiting for it to be light enough to go let the chickens out.
- While out with the chickens, I decide to walk through the garden . . just to see how much things grew during the night! 🙂 I never intend to stay there long and I’m usually in my pajamas.
- After a few hours, I realize . . I’m in my pajamas, Vince will be home for lunch soon and I rush into the house, take a shower and get lunch ready.
- Vince leaves to go back to work and I do a few things in the house then soon end up back in the garden piddling.
- After a few hours, I realize . . Vince is going to be home soon and dinner isn’t ready. I usually manage to find one or two more things to do in the garden and he drives up while I’m still out there working.
- Vince comes out to the garden and I enlist him to help me do something.
- After a couple of hours, Vince says “I’m hungry! What’s for dinner?”
At that point, my mind begins to scramble. I can open a jar of beef tips, cook a quick pot of rice in the pressure cooker. I can scrounge up some leftovers. I can say “would you mind having a sandwich?” Then we end up eating late and it’s bed time!
I don’t like for our dinners to be that way but there are only so many hours in my day and I’d rather be outside than doing anything else this time of year. Soon it will be so hot that I can go out at daylight but will be back in by 10:30 a.m. due to the heat. Then I can go back out after 6 p.m. and that will help with the lunch and dinner situations but for now, neither of us are skipping too many meals.
Yesterday, three different times I was out in the garden and thunder seemed to be getting close enough that I went back inside, though it never rained. I used the inside time to create a nice dinner for a change.
Dinner
It was basically Pork Chops with Apples and Pancetta, though I used bacon instead of pancetta and since I was using sweet onions, I didn’t add any sugar. I didn’t have apple juice so I just left that off. It was delicious!
The pasta was Giada’s Baked Lemon Ziti, though I didn’t have ziti but had some similar pasta. Again, I used bacon instead of pancetta and halved this recipe and still got enough for the two of us to have for 3 meals.
We also had spinach salad which is probably the end of the spinach. It has all bolted and I’ll probably pull it up this weekend and plant okra in its place.
Both the recipes I used were great and I’ll make them again.
Rebecca in SoCal says
I know “bolted” is a gardening term, but I can’t ever help picturing the spinach making a run for the border!
You do eat well.
JudyL says
Sorry! I remember not too long ago when reading about lettuce and spinach bolting and I had the same thoughts you did . . I could just see the plants grabbing their purses and phones and taking off through the woods!
For some plants, the heat seems to trigger it, and for some, the longer daylight hours seem to trigger it. Since both longer hours and heat go hand in hand, it’s probably a bit of both but things like lettuce, spinach, broccoli .. they will put up shoots with flowers and seeds and once that happens, the leaves get quite bitter.