I am posting these pictures at random. I will admit that I increased the saturation of these images because they just look more luscious.The 1st is a purple tomatillo that was sent to me instead of some pepper I ordered. It did not set fruit until just a few weeks ago which irritated me greatly. Maye it's just me but it just might not be a great crop for my Pittsburgh climate. I also was greatly irritated by my pineapple sage's reluctance to bloom until a few weeks ago. I think I won't bother with either next year.
Next we have cardoon, a close relative to the artichoke. It is the plant in the pot in the center. I guess I posted this picture to give you an idea of how chaotic my garden 'plan' is. Anyway, I ate some of this cardoon twice this summer. The 1st time it was OK, but the 2nd it seemed bitter. I don't get it I guess. I mean, kale and other stuff is easier.The dark green foliage cascading down my step is a holy mole pepper plant. I got this as a 4 pack from Michaels Bros and it performed really well. I only harvested 2 really ripe peppers from it but the green one I got were plentiful, quite long, flavorful, and just a little spicy. They were wonderful stuffed with sausage though these guys are skinny so stuffing them was harder than most peppers.
Here's a cross section of one of these ripe holy mole peppers without benefit of saturation, no cheating here, just to show how pretty they are. Perhaps if I had gotten them in the ground earlier they would have ripened earlier.
Honestly, this past season I got a late start. I had to clear away a lot of weeds and english ivy before I could plant things. So the mole plant sorta survived 2 frosts, but I don't think I'll be getting anymore peppers from it.
Next we have some good stuff on my chopping block. My garden could loosely be called a 'kitchen garden'. I frequently step outside and grab a bit of this and some of that. Some of this in this instance is dinosaur kale, lacinato kale(same thing) that is looking good post-frost, some cinnamon basil, all killed, and red mustard, very nice and very spicy.I sometimes use recipes. Sometimes I wish I used recipes but often what I make is just fine.
