You can do your part in saving our oceans!

Small Bayou

When I was a kid growing up in Lake Charles, Louisiana, we lived just a few hundred yards from “Small Bayou.” It’s a tributary of Contraband Bayou where it’s rumored that master pirate Jean Lafitte buried a huge treasure trove.  Every day after school I would drop my books and grab my fishing pole, dig up a few worms from the backyard worm bed, and snatch a couple of slices of Wonder Bread for the resident alligator. The bayou was an enchanted world of dissonant characters that wielded a grip on me every bit as strong as Milne’s ‘Hundred Acre Wood’ or Riordan’s ‘Camp Half-Blood.’ Among the cast of bayou characters were a three-legged alligator named Long John Silver, legions of croaker fish, spine-chilling water moccasins hanging from moss-covered tree limbs, gigantic jumping frogs, darting dragonflies, and blood-thirsty mosquitoes. I was after croakers—the indigenous fish that swam to the surface of the water and croaked obstreperously in obvious competition with the frogs. I could catch two croakers in about 10 minutes. Sometimes I would hook a stray catfish, but the croakers were the staples of the bayou.

Every afternoon, after gutting and scaling my two fish, I would toss about a half stick of butter in a frying pan and plop the two fish into the sizzling butter. When they were a nice golden brown I ate one as my after-school snack and I wrapped the other one in aluminum foil for breakfast. To my parent’s horror, the next morning I ate the left-over croaker cold, right from the fridge. I still love leftover fish--cold from the fridge-- for breakfast.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but the bayou was horribly polluted. I found out much later, years after I moved to Texas, that a part of Calcasieu Parish is a superfund site. Pollution has made the recreational waters in southwest Louisiana lethal. Much of the aquatic life has disappeared and humans are warned to avoid eating the few species that remain. Clean-up operations are helping, but with all of the refineries producing contaminants faster than they can be remediated, efforts to restore these vital waterways have not been able to achieve adequate cleanup.

But the problems experienced in Calcasieu Parish are indicative of larger issues. All of our water resources are in jeopardy. Climate change and pollution are impacting our oceans by increasing the acidity of these vital waters; coral reefs are dying, Florida and the Gulf Coast have lethal red tide problems, and we are seeing massive fish and turtle dye-offs. Some of the fish and shellfish farming operations are not sustainable and it is imperative that we understand that there are healthy, sustainable seafood choices available to us. We can all do our part to make these waters healthy and supportive of sea life again.

The Monterey BayAquarium in Monterrey, California, is on the forefront of oceanic sciences in research, conservation, and public education. Recently, it has embraced the plastics problem that is so prominent in the destruction of our sea life. Its Seafood Watch program provides a platform for business and the public to make sustainable choices in the seafood we consume at home as well as in restaurants. It has made available a downloadable app that assists individuals as well as businesses in making the most appropriate choices for seafood consumption. My old friends, the Croakers, are a sustainable “Best Choice” when caught with Beach Seines in the Northwest Atlantic. They are still plentiful around Louisiana oil rigs but those are not considered to be a sustainable choice. Like most other species, there are no longer plentiful reserves of these wonderful fish.

Another one of my all-time favorite fish is tuna. If you love canned tuna as much as I do, look no further than Fishin’ Families. Their tuna is pole and line caught and is certified by MSC (Marine Stewardship Council) as sustainable. Not only is it a Seafood Watch “Best” choice, it actually (in my opinion) tastes better than the leading grocery store brands. You can mail-order it from their website or from Amazon. One of my favorite ways to eat it is in a big salad. It's a delicious, healthy choice for not a lot of money.

One of our family traditions is to have a really large salad on Wednesdays. We use our garden veggies and sometimes have a 25 or more ingredient salad. We amp up the nutritional level with beans—sometimes dried beans that we cook the day before, sometimes steamed Asian long beans from the garden, and we add a can of tuna. In cool months we use various lettuces and herbs, asparagus, beets, and blood orange slices. In the summer months when lettuce dies off, we use a couple of types of sorrel, beet greens, kale, and chard.

Another delicious option is a nicoise-type salad with grilled tuna, green beans, potatoes, tomatoes, nicoise olives, boiled eggs, greens, asparagus, and herbs. Be sure and check the Seafood Watch app for sustainable varieties of fresh tuna.

Our all-time favorite is a Mexican salad with black beans, jicama, cilantro, cojita cheese, bell peppers, tomatoes, pickled sweet peppers, and mild green chilies. Add a can of sustainably-caught tuna and toss everything with plenty of greens and serve with oven-heated tortilla chips. You can feed a family of four a healthy meal for less than ten bucks—way less if you grow your own veggies.

Sustainably-caught or farmed seafood might cost you a little more, but it won’t break the bank and you can feel great about serving it. You are, after all, making positive contributions toward a better, more sustainable world with healthy oceans and abundant seafood!

         

Celebrate spring with fennel and sage!

Fennel is one of those beautiful spring plants that provides huge dividends! The bulbs are an aromatic vegetable, the fronds are an herb, and the seeds are a spice—the bulbs are a wonderful addition to a mirepoix, or tossed in a salad, and are delicious braised. Fennel fronds make a tasty pesto. The seeds are used in sausage-making as well as an ingredient in soups, stews, and sauté dishes. And you can harvest the pollen before the fennel goes to seed and use it as a coating for lamb or pork chops, a real delicacy. 

Spring Fennel

When harvested in early spring fennel is sweet and mild. While it is a perennial here in south central Texas, if you let it go until fall to harvest it, it becomes woody and acquires a harsh or bitter taste. Fennel is a host to the black swallowtail butterfly and draws other pollinators, as well. Many gardeners will tell you that fennel makes for a bad neighbor and that it discourages lush growth of vegetables or other herbs planted adjacent to it. I have never found this to be true. Fennel is related to dill and carrots so avoid planting too close to them.

Bees love sage

There are hundreds of sage, or salvia, varieties, so make sure you grow the culinary one, (Salvia officinalis). Like fennel, if sage is harvested in early spring it is mild and is a great addition to soups, stews, and sautés. Its beautiful purple blossoms attract bees. Sage is a tough, drought-tolerant perennial that is a beautiful addition to any landscape. It is easy to dry (you can dry it in your microwave). Lightly salted fried sage is a true delicacy.

Both fennel and sage are deer-resistant.

Viva Tuscany’s Fagioli all’Uccelletto!

I’ve rarely met a bean that I don’t like and I consider myself a bean connoisseur. I’ve grown all kinds of heirloom beans over many years and, on the rare occasion that I don’t like a bean dish, it’s invariably because of the cooking method, not the bean.

When I came across a recipe for “White Beans with Sage, Garlic and Fennel” in March/April 2018 issue of Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street Magazine I knew immediately that I wanted to make it. With an abundance of sage and fennel in the garden and both at their sweetest right now, this seemed the perfect recipe.

You can use dried beans or canned ones. I do not eat canned beans because of the BPA content in most canned goods and because, in my opinion, they have an “off-taste.” I do use Costco’s canned diced organic tomatoes for the reason that they do not contain BPA. 

For this recipe I used a one-pound package of dry Great Northern beans and one can of Kirkland’s canned diced organic tomatoes. From the garden I used three small fennel bulbs and a couple of long sage branches. I made several small deviations from the published recipe. I had some Red Table black pepper, garlic, and white wine salami in my refrigerator and I diced 2 oz. and cooked off the fat. I drained the salami and wiped out the pan. Saturated animal fat is not something that I consume on a regular basis. 

Next, I fried the sage leaves (in grapeseed oil) in the Dutch oven that I planned to cook the beans in, and used the fragrant oil to sauté the aromatics (onion, fennel, garlic). When the aromatics were soft and translucent, I added the red pepper flakes (from our homegrown Texas Bird Peppers), sage, and salami. I deglazed the mixture with a half-cup of pinot grigio, then added water, soaked dry beans, tomatoes, herbs (2 fresh bay leaves and a sprig of thyme), and salt/pepper to taste. I covered the pot and simmered the beans for a couple of hours until they were done.

The recipe calls for quite a bit of sage and fennel. It seemed like a lot to me, but I used the exact amounts specified in the recipe.

I made some gluten-free Parmesan corn muffins to accompany the beans and I have to say that the meal was a big hit. The beans are meaty and succulent with a background sweetness of fennel. The sage isn’t overpowering at all and it definitely adds a lot of flavor. Red Table Salami is wonderful and contributes a delicious layer of flavor. It’s made from heritage breed hogs sourced from local farms.

We had three meals (six servings) of the beans and froze the remainder. They held up very well and did not get mushy as beans tend to do after a few days. This recipe is a keeper!

Recipe courtesy of Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street Magazine, March/April 2018

Ingredients

6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, divided

1 large fennel bulb, trimmed and finely chopped

1 medium yellow onion, finely chopped

4 large garlic cloves, finely chopped

3 tablespoons finely chopped fresh sage, plus 20 whole leaves (for frying)

1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Kosher salt and ground black pepper

1 14 1/2-ounce can diced tomatoes

2 15 1/2-ounce cans white beans (see note), 1 can rinsed and drained or 1 pkg. dry white beans, rinsed and soaked overnight

Shaved or grated Parmesan cheese, to serve

Note: If you use canned beans discard the liquid from one can and reserve the liquid from the other one.

Directions

In a large Dutch oven over medium, heat 3 TBS. of oil until shimmering. Add the fennel, onion, garlic, chopped sage, pepper flakes and 1 tsp. salt. Cover and cook, stirring until softened, about 15 minutes.

Stir in the tomatoes, beans and, 2/3 cup of liquid from the cooked or canned beans.  Cook, uncovered, stirring and maintaining a gentle simmer, for 10 minutes. Taste and season with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, in a 12-inch skillet over medium-high, heat the remaining 3 TBSP oil until shimmering. Add the sage leaves and cook, flipping once, until the edges begin to curl, about 1 minute. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate; reserve the oil.

Transfer the beans to a bowl, then top with the sage oil, fried sage leaves, and Parmesan.

Recipe courtesy of Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street Magazine

Too Hot to Trot!

Last week, on March 15, I checked the temperature of our garden soil. I was shocked--it was 82 degrees in the shade. The air temperature was around 50 degrees and I was wearing a jacket. I thought that my thermometer was broken so I found another one and re-checked--82 degrees. We had an unusually cold winter with an ice storm, 2 snow storms, and prolonged cold in the teens and twenties. The next morning I checked again--78 degrees. How could that be?

I usually follow Texas A&M guidelines for planting. They have calculated realistic soil temperatures, optimal temperatures, and a maximized temperature at which few seeds will germinate. For most summer vegetables such as cucumbers, squash, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, beans, etc. the optimal temperature for germination is 85 degrees but realistic temperatures are much lower. Our final freeze date is typically early April, but sometimes we see frost in May. I usually plant my seeds the second or third week in April. I have to admit that I have serious misgivings about planting my tomato plants in the ground right now. I have a few seeds that I'm hoarding and I'm not willing to risk, but, for the most part, I could lose some of them and not really notice. 

A few days later, I planted a dozen squash seeds and put a floating row cover over them. This weekend I will probably plant a few cucumber seeds and if I'm feeling brave, I might put a couple of tomato plants in the ground. And maybe a few bush bean seeds and just two or three pole bean varieties and keep my fingers crossed. And okra, basil . . .

What would you do?

Here's the link to the A&M post on soil temperatures.  https://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/newsletters/hortupdate/hortupdate_archives/2001/apr01/h2apr01.html

Crazy Beans!

On March 27, 2013, I planted two rows of “French Filet” beans and two rows of pinto beans separated by a row of tomatoes. I had never planted pintos before, and the package stated that they were “Indeterminate large bush type pinto.” The green bean seed packet prominently states “Bush, A Favorite of Chefs.”

We had the luxury this year of a cool, rainy spring—not a normal phenomenon in the Texas hill country. All of the beans quickly sprouted and produced beautiful, full plants. The problem is that they have not stopped growing. The four-foot by eight-foot raised bed in which these beans are planted has no fence or trellis for them to run so we placed several tall tomato cages in the bed. They covered the cages is just a week.  Next, we tied string from a neighboring lima bean bed that has a trellis and let the beans grow from one bed to another. The problem is that their prolific growth is blocking the lima beans’ sunlight. Next, we clipped the ends of the runners in hopes that they would stop their vining behavior. They are still growing. In fact, many of the runners are more than twenty-five feet long.

I contacted both seed companies and their respective customer service representatives were gracious and polite and immediately offered to replace the seeds. Neither offered an explanation of why these seeds produced vining plants.

We don’t use chemical fertilizers--our soil is amended with compost. In addition, we spread a mulch of used chicken litter under the plants. We have sprayed the plants with liquid seaweed and both of the bean varieties are producing. The green beans’ production has slowed somewhat with our hot, dry climate, but it has been rainy lately

and there are plenty of blossoms on both the pintos and the green beans. The pintos are producing clusters of large pods.

If any of you have experienced a similar problem with your beans, please let us know. We are completely befuddled.

Wasting away in Agaritaville

If  you happen upon a Mahonia trifoliolata out in the south Texas landscape, you would be wise to give it a wide berth. With its clustered three-prong leaves it resembles a holly, but that’s where the similarity ends—its gray-green leaves are stiff and as sharp as razor blades. In spite of its armor, this plant is a treasure. The Mahonia trifoliolata, common name agarita or wild currant,  is a carefree indigenous shrub common not only in central Texas but in the desert areas of Arizona and Nevada. It’s a tough plant and extremely drought-tolerant. It can easily survive in full sun, but actually prefers light shade. It can take temperatures down to the teens and grows to a height of six feet and can become as wide as it is tall.

The agarita’s yellow flowers in late winter are followed by delicious tart red berries in April and May. Because its leaves are painfully sharp, harvesting the berries is tricky. The easiest method of collecting the fruit is to spread a sheet or tarp on the ground around the plant and striking it with a large stick. The berries will fall on the sheet. They can be eaten as is or made into jams, jellies, pies and cobblers, or dried and used as a refreshing tea. Agarita berries can also be used as an ingredient in margaritas and fermented into a delicious wine.

Snails and slugs got you down? Try some home remedies.

Snails from my garden

Snails may have a reputation for being slow, but that is little consolation for anyone who has experienced a disastrous over-night decimation of an entire hosta or vegetable bed by garden snails and slugs. This morning I found the typical kind of snail damage on some of my cucumber leaves—ragged holes and chew marks along the edges. Snails are nocturnal and unless you want to sit out in your garden all night with a flashlight, they are seldom seen and difficult to catch. There are some inexpensive, organic remedies, however, for repelling snails.

Ragged leaves are typical of snail and slug damage

Copper: Snails and slugs are slimy and if they come into contact with copper a chemical reaction occurs and they receive an electrical shock. You can buy copper flashing at a hardware store and surround your garden bed with it or place pennies on the sticky side of a strip of tape and use these strips around your garden beds. 

Sharp materials: Crushed egg shells and diatomaceous earth (DE) have sharp edges and will physically injure the soft bodies of snails and slugs. Use food grade DE from a reputable nursery. The DE used in pool maintenance is a much different substance will not act as a deterrent to snails. Coffee grounds also work fairly well in controlling these pests.

Beer: One of the best methods of controlling snails is with stale beer. Sink a small container (I use small clay pot saucers) into the soil and pour some stale beer in it. Snails and slugs are attracted to beer and will fall into the container and die happy.

Sink a small container of stale beer into the soil to drown snails and slugs

There are also commercial preparations (such as Sluggo) available for killing snails and slugs. Most are expensive and contain chemicals that I prefer to avoid in my garden.

Do you have a remedy for controlling snails and slugs? I would love to hear about it.

Everything's Coming up Roses

It is an absolutely gorgeous spring day here in the hill country. Our rose bushes have burst into full bloom over the past few days. According to folklore, the rose hails from ancient Persia and has even been discovered in Egyptian tombs. In the fifth century BC in China, oils were extracted from roses for use by royalty. And, of course, there are the immortal words of Shakespeare, "a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." To me, the most interesting folklore about the rose comes from the Cherokee. During their long, grueling march down the Trail of Tears, roses sprang up on their path as they walked and gave them comfort.

Catch of the Day

It seems that every week or so our TV weatherman tells us that there is "chance" for rain. Most of the time that chance passes us by. After only an inch-and-a-half total for the first three months of this year, mother nature brought us a bountiful inch-and-a-half today. We sat on our deck and watched a fabulous light show with lots of thunder and a drenching rain. Our rain barrels caught about seventy gallons of pure hill country gold--enough to last for a while. Earlier in the day, in anticipation of the wet stuff, I finished planting corn and Mitla black bean seeds as well as a few pintos and haricot verts. Which leads me to the topic of when to plant. I inherited my appreciation of gardening from my grandfather who planted his seeds according to phases of the moon. Our full moon for March occurred on the twenty-seventh of the month--the worm moon. It was an uncommonly cold, windy, drab day and after planting about half of my corn and bean seeds, I quit. So which batch will grow up to be the hardiest plants--seeds planted on the day of the full moon or put in the ground just prior to a good rain? We'll see.

Gardening on the edge--the lure of the Texas hill country

One week ago, on March 20, we transplanted our tomato seedlings into the garden. It had been an unusually warm February and long-range weather forecasts indicated no frosts in sight. Every year I plant seeds in flats in the greenhouse on the day after Christmas. After first being transplanted into four inch pots, then into one gallon nursery containers in February, by mid-March they are large and healthy and ready to thrive in the great outdoors. We usually use tomato cages to shelter them from the strong hill country winds, but this year my husband constructed a sturdy cattle panel fence down the center of the eight-by-four foot raised tomato bed.

We pulled up the carrots that were in the way, dug a trench, and amended the soil with layers of shrimp shells, compost, pulverized egg shells, and a liberal sprinkling of epsom salts. We removed the bottom leaves of the plants (two Roma, four Oaxaca Pink heirlooms, four Sweetie, and four Brandywine heirlooms--I saved San Marzanos and persimmon tomato seedlings for our second crop) and burried the bottom two-thirds of the plants in the soil. We used old pantyhose to gently tie the plants to the fence. Pantyhose are stretchy and they don't "bite" into the stalks of the plants--and they're free!

Our tomato plants certainly seemed to be very happy--that is until Sunday night when we were surprised by a forecast for a light freeze. We gently covered our tomato fence with sheets covering the plants and felt pretty confident that they could easily withstand the sudden, cold temperatures. But the weather man was wrong! I woke up at three o'clock that morning and checked the temperature--twenty-seven degrees. 

I panicked, of course and was delighted to find that other than a little frostbite,our tomato plants looked alive and well. Tuesday night (also a freeze warning) we added a blanket over the sheets. The tomato plants survived, thank goodness. Serious gardeners here in the Texas hill country plant their tomatoes in the ground as early as possible because we all know that by the first of July, temperatures will likely register at the one hundred mark and the tomatoes will collapse from the unrelenting heat. 

The Texas hill country has been likened to Tuscany and the south of France. It's virtues are so extolled that city and county governments cannot possibly keep up with the rapid growth by city-dwellers seeking a peaceful, country life. This is a beautiful place to live with its quaint, picturesque German villages, numerous wineries that dot the countryside, and breathtaking views of rolling hills with wide expanses of lavender and bluebonnet fields. There is a culinary aesthetic here that satisfies the pickiest foodie and the music that swings through these hills rivals Nashville. But, as newcomers soon find out after they settle here, the Texas hill country is a lure and a trap--as Robert Caro wrote in his first award-winning biography of President Lyndon Johnson, The Path to Power. Only a thin layer of heavy, caliche clay soil covers an almost-solid limestone foundation, thwarting efforts to successfully raise all but native vegetation. But new arrivals to the hill country are shocked when they discover that THERE IS NO WATER.