With this week’s harvest I don’t remember anymore that we’ve been having a weird summer here in California. Look, just what you would expect in late august, the makings of a nice ratatouille: a basket heavy with tomatoes, eggplant, red peppers and zucchinis.
The tomatoes in the basket are mostly Early Girls, still the most productive variety in my garden, although I was able to harvest a few cherokee purple, green zebras and a lone Brandywine. The long and thin peppers are Jimmy Nardellos and those larger ones to the right, Corno di Toros. A few raven zucchinis are peeking behind the peppers, next to a bouquet of kabocha squash blossoms–there are a couple zucchini flowers in there too. The kabochas are producing a tremendous amount of very fragrant male flowers and very few female ones. I hope the ratio changes soon because as much as I like to add squash blossoms to taquitos and enchiladas, I much rather have a good squash crop.
This gigantic Brown Turkey fig is the first one ready this year. It is about 3 inches across, moist and sweet, but it could have benefited from an extra day or two on the tree. I am picking them slightly under-ripe, hoping to beat the birds that are devastating my orchard. Better under-ripe fruit that no fruit. I need to keep my guard up, though, or I’ll have no more figs.
Another beginning: purple tomatillos. This year I may be able to let them ripen fully on the vine. I am usually in a hurry to pick them before powdery mildew eats away the whole plant. So far, no mildew on my tomatillos. I am keeping my fingers crossed…
I am still getting lettuce, onions, nopales and herbs from the garden, still have a good supply of carrots and garlic in storage. Lemons are also plentiful at the moment. All in all, the garden has finally picked up its pace and is starting to produce beautifully.
For more delicious pictures and stories of harvests and to add your own, head on over to Daphne’s Dandelions, host of Harvest Monday, and take a look at what other gardeners have been up to this week.
August 30, 2010 at 12:37 am
Are those small peppers in front hot? I have similar to those and the packed said they are not hot, but they are…
I don’t think my figs are ever going to ripen. They are all still green, and our daily temperatures are very low for this time of year.
August 30, 2010 at 8:43 am
They are very sweet. Instensely flavored but sweet. They are originally an Italian frying pepper variety that some Italian immigrant to the US brought with him, or so the story goes…
If your figs won’t ripen, you can harvest them green and make a very sweet dessert with them. A friend of mine makes it and I can find the recipe for you if you’d like to try it.
August 30, 2010 at 9:06 am
That is a table full of summer bounty! Beautiful.
Ratatouille sounds so good right now, I’ll have to see if I can scrounge enough peppers from my dismal pepper plants to make a batch, the rest of the ingredients are abundant in the garden now.
I’m so glad that you beat the birds to that luscious fig.
August 30, 2010 at 10:34 am
I am so glad to finally have some summer bounty. I am not sure I’ll have much to preserve, but definitely enough to enjoy right now.
Good luck finding enough peppers. This was not a good summer for nightshades in California.
August 30, 2010 at 9:12 am
That’s a lovely selection of peppers, and I really love that fig! Ours die back each winter, so we only get a fall crop. The Brown Turkey is loaded this year, as is Chicago Hardy. Too bad the birds are getting after yours. They seem to prefer tomatoes here!
August 30, 2010 at 10:28 am
I like fall figs the best, it seems to me that ripening through the hot days summer concentrates their sugars in a nice way. I didn’t know one could grow figs in your climate. I am glad you can, it so nice to eat a fig fresh from the tree, with the little bit of milk still glowing in the cut stem!
August 30, 2010 at 4:55 pm
Oh wow! That is a wonderful harvest! Are those peppers sweet or spicy? Yummy, figs!!
August 30, 2010 at 9:43 pm
They’re sweet, all sweet. I guess I didn’t include hot peppers in that photo but I’ve been harvesting some too.
August 30, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Beautiful harvest, love those peppers. I have a fig tree but I don’t know what it is, the plant was not what the tag said it was.
August 30, 2010 at 9:51 pm
But are the figs good? They look good on your photo. As long as the taste is right and they like your conditions…
August 30, 2010 at 6:35 pm
First time here from Daphne’s Dandelions. Nice harvest and blog! The spicy prawn paella in the post below this one looks tasty.
August 31, 2010 at 7:11 am
beautiful photo! look at all those peppers!
and I am so jealous of your figs. Mmmm baked figs with a little goat cheese are a fall time favorite- but fresh figs are so hard to find!
August 31, 2010 at 8:29 am
Oh, great idea. Sharp goat cheese and warm sweet figs, yes!
August 31, 2010 at 4:12 pm
I second this, sweet baked figs with tangy goat cheese sounds so delicious! I’ve only found fresh figs at some farmer’s markets. I’m not sure if regular grocery stores ever carry them. If they do, it must be pretty rare, because I can’t really remember ever seeing them!
September 1, 2010 at 12:03 am
Although you’ll only find them in the farmers market if they grow in your area… Both farmers markets and fancier grocery stores in my area carry them, but then, figs do grow well here.
August 31, 2010 at 7:27 am
Those chilies are beautiful! And how I envy your fig. I didn’t get any from my new trees this year. Oh well.
August 31, 2010 at 8:30 am
If this is any consolation, my first year tree has not produced any figs either. We need to give them a little bit more time.
August 31, 2010 at 4:05 pm
I’m hoping to have figs one day too. I do love them. But I confess to never eating them fresh. I’ve only had them in dishes in restaurants and well in fig newtons.
August 31, 2010 at 11:59 pm
When they come ripe from your own tree, it is hard to resist eating them fresh. You’ll see!
August 31, 2010 at 4:15 pm
Angela, so glad to hear that you’re getting enough heat in CA to harvest some summer veggies, finally! Hopefully you’ll have a nice warm September. Do you know what the weather forecast is for September? If I remember correctly, Sept/Oct are typically much warmer than the summer months in coastal CA. Your peppers look just gorgeous. I’m not really familiar with sweet peppers that are not bell peppers. Must expand my pepper experience, I think! And that giant juicy fig is totally drool worthy.
September 1, 2010 at 12:06 am
I certainly hope that we’ll have a warm and long fall. But go figure, the weather is crazy this year. Try Italian sweet pepper varities, they are much tastier than bell peppers.
August 31, 2010 at 5:19 pm
It’s been fig central over here. I’ve beenc ooking with them for a month now. But they are finished
Your harvest is spectacular! mmmm ratatouille
September 1, 2010 at 12:07 am
Oh, lucky you. A month of figs!
September 2, 2010 at 11:47 am
After two blisteringly hot summers, and this unseasonably cold one, I’m wondering if we’ll see a ‘normal’ year…I’m even sure I know what ‘normal’ is anymore!
Your pepper and tomatoes look great though, and I just want to grill that monster fig, and drizzle honey over it…yum! Thankfully, our tomatoes are finally on a roll. We’re up to our elbows in basil…but alas, our peppers so far this year have been a major disappointment. 100F+ one day, 68F the next. Our peppers are clearly crying out for some sustained heat, I’m just not sure this year they’re going to get any. We’re also swamped with male squash blossoms, and constantly on patrol so we don’t miss pollinating the very few female ones. I hope next year is little closer to ‘normal’…whatever that may be 
September 2, 2010 at 10:03 pm
Normal might never come back at this rate. So you are also having a lot of male squash blossom and very few female ones? Same here, I was wondering what this was about. At least pollinating squash is easy, much easier than pollinating melons.