Tag Archives: Cold Frame

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October – Endings and New Beginnings

greenonions

While the rest of the garden is coming to a close the cold frame is just getting started. We are still probably 2-3 weeks away from our first frost but the garden plants are winding down as the days shorten and the nights cool off. Everything I planted in the cold frame a couple of weeks ago is up and growing strong. I dug up the other side, incorporating a little manure/humus mix into the soil today. I will probably plant some more radishes and spinach in there this afternoon or tomorrow. In a week or two I should have some good sized lettuce transplants from the basement. I still need to build the lights (lids).

These green onions may or may not do anything going in this late but as with everything else I never know till I try.

I read that the sweet potatoes are to be dug just prior to the first frost. I’ve never grown them and if we even get a couple of sweet potatoes off each of the 30 plants I planted that will be more than enough for us for the winter.

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Raspberry Syrup, hot poppers and planting time

Raspberry Pancake Syrup:
Yesterday I pulled the raspberries out of the freezer that I had been gathering every other day for the past two weeks. They filled an 8 qt pot to overflowing while frozen and once thawed and mashed took up about 3/4 as much space. This was heated slowly for the better part of two hours while I did some much needed weeding and painted the cold frame. The hot raspberry mess was poured into a colander lined with a double layer of cheese cloth and allowed to drip till cool. Last night I stuck the whole contraption in the fridge and let it drip overnight. I ended up with about 12 cups of clear juice.

I used blackberry pancake syrup recipe, keeping the sugar @ 2/3 cup per cup of juice. I ended up canning 8 pints this morning. Most of these will be given away this Christmas.

Hot Poppers:
I love hot poppers aka jalapeno bites. Halved jalapenos stuffed with cream cheese. I grew 8 jalapeno plants this year just to have some to try my hand at making them up and freezing them. Right now I have about 2qts of the halved, seeded peppers soaking in water to mellow them out a little. I scoured the net and found a recipe I am going to tweak a bit and will make them up tonight.

12 oz. cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup grated cheddar or jack cheese
25 jalapeno peppers, seeded, cut in half
1 cup milk
1 cup flour
1-1/2 cups dried packaged breadcrumbs
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tps onion powder

Mix up the cheeses and spoon into jalapenos. Mix garlic and onion powder with bread crumbs. Drop in milk and coat with bread crumbs. Freeze on cookie sheets. Package. To eat, bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes until hot all the way through, golden brown, and crisp.

Cold Frame Planting:
The cold frame is painted, situated and half planted. Actually I probably didn’t need to put these things in the cold frame yet as they will all withstand a frost or two. I just wanted to plant something in there.

I dug a bag of manure/compost mix I had laying around into one half of the cold frame (4×4 area) . I sowed some spinach, cherry belle radish, daikon radish, green onions and raab broccoli. The onions as well as the cb radish and spinach were planted in wide rows as we will eat the thinnings. I have yet to make the covers but they really aren’t necessary yet. If anything I may make them and put screen on them to keep bugs out. If this is a typical fall it will be another month before our first frost and even then frosts are generally sporadic till late November. I’ve actually picked broccoli in December with no protection at all but that wasn’t a typical year. Generally “serious winter” takes about 6-8 weeks and usually fills January and February.