A Little Rant About Weather

I have a dead computer =(

It's kept me from blogging because honestly, I find it uncomfortable to blog from a public computer in my apartment building. Mostly because I don't want my neighbors creeping up behind me reading as I type. Is that weird? I am sorry for the lack of posts this past month, hopefully I can get on top of things quickly!

But with that straightened out, let me just throw this out there...

This summer's weather sucked. It sucked so much that I don't feel the same level of gratification over my garden as I did last season. Even though I took much better care of it this season, even beating out an aphid infestation and disease, this weather just sucked. And it still sucks.

What's the deal with that!?

Some people think I am crazy and that this summer has been similar to recent summers, but i'm telling you, it's not. And as my boyfriend says, "you're always right", I know i'm right when I say this..

It sucked and still sucks.

Look, I have some evidence to back this up. And I blame the weather for my somewhat lackluster gardening season. For example, by this time last year I was enjoying numerous banana peppers, bell peppers and jalapenos. This season all I've enjoyed is a frankenpepper from hell. The only thing that has done well so far is the patio tomato. Even the mint isn't as robust as last year, the oregano went meh, the lemon tree is still just chillin with some green lemons and the blackberry is just off on its own doing its thing and growing like a giant bean stalk to nowhere.

Frankenpepper

In fact, the humidity has been so bad in the area, that I have had mushrooms growing in my containers. I've never had shrooms, and I keep the containers well drained. But it has been impossible to keep the shrooms from growing all over and as harmless as some people say they are, every time I saw shrooms in the container, the plants did not do well. I've been spraying my plants once a week with the anti-fungal spray because the disease, although it is under control, it is still around. And so, I blame this lame summer weather of high humidity, little sun, and moderate temperatures for a very slow and somewhat crappy growing season.

I'm not a gardening expert by any means, but my garden certainly did better in the record triple digit heat of last season than it has done in the mild temps and ridiculous humidity of this season. Freakin' mid-atlantic weather.

I don't know if it is global warming, aliens, the apocalypse or my imagination, but whatever it is, it is ruining my yield for this season and i'm not happy about it.

Ok, rant over. Anyone else ranting about the weather this year?

PS. While my garden has struggled, the local orchards seem to be doing just fine. Just look at all these peaches and blackberries I picked up a couple of weeks ago! I am officially annoyed and jealous.

I froze most of these so I could enjoy them in smoothies and what not throughout the coming months. I have been contemplating buying a chest freezer so I can freeze all sorts of veggies and fruits for this upcoming winter. Anyone have one of those? does it really hike up your energy bill? 

I think I need to remind myself that I live in an apartment in DC and not on a farm... a chest freezer might not be the right investment at this point in time. 

Honey Lemon Glaze Chicken

So as you can see, I am obviously still having computer issues and struggling to upload new posts to the blog on a regular basis =( but hopefully in the coming months I will be able to replace my computer! In the meantime, bare with me, I will be borrowing computers every weekend so that I can upload new posts as well as facebook troll and check emails.

For today, I have an easy honey lemon glaze chicken recipe. The flavor is mild and a little sweet, but it is simple and delicious. It is from my favorite cookbook La Tartine Gourmande.

Ingredients

Juice of 1 lemon
2 tbsp of honey
1 tbsp of chopped oregano
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 cup of olive oil
sea salt and pepper
8 chicken drumsticks
4 green zebra tomatoes
1/4 cup of unpitted kalamata olives
1/4 cup cold water
1 tbsp chopped parsley
4 chopped potatoes
2 corns cut in half

Directions

Mix the lemon juice, honey, oregano, garlic and oil in a bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Arrange the chicken in an oven dish and coat with the sauce. I marinated the chicken for a few hours in this sauce for extra flavor! Preheat the oven to 375 and add the tomatoes (quartered), olives, and 1/4 cup of the water to the chicken and bake for 50 minutes or until golden brown.

Take the potatoes and cook them in a pot with boiling water and a little bit of salt until done. Also place the corn in a pot of boiling water and cook until the kernels are soft and have a little bit more color to them. If you leave them cooking for too long, they will get too crunchy. 

When the chicken is done, allow to cool, and serve with the potatoes and corn. Add the parsley to the chicken. I like to use the extra sauce from the chicken to drip over the potatoes for some flavor. 

I had lots of left overs for the next couple of nights and it re-heated well. This is a quick and easy recipe to make during the work week. You can also slice up some french bread to dip in the sauce with your meal, yum!

Mid-Summer Garden Update

Hey guys!

So it's been a while since I've written a post.. so sorry about that! My 7+yr old Macbook is finally on it's last leg and it has made blogging, emailing, facebook stalking, and pinterest drooling impossible. But I have finally managed to get it to somewhat work for a quick post! (I am pretty sure this quick post will take me an hr to load/type at the rate this is going).

I have to say, 7+yrs with a laptop is pretty good, right? Someday I will be able to afford a new Macbook, but for now I hope this thing gets me thru at least a few more months. I started out as a PC user, I've had Compaq (remember those! haha man I am old), Toshiba, Vaio, Dell, HP, and not a single one of those lasted me more than 2 yrs. This Macbook though, has made it for so long that I don't think I could ever go back to PC. Although the new Windows tablets do look much more intriguing (and budget friendly) than the iPad of even a Macbook.

Anyway, enough about that, let me give you a quick garden update!

Remember this?! This is my blackberry plant! It used to be just a wooden stick growing out of a pot (that stick broke btw) and now look at it! It is almost as tall as I am! Which brings me to a quick question, how tall are these supposed to get? And how long until I get some blackberries over here!

In my last post I talked about how I was growing these frankenpeppers and how I was praying that they were sweet peppers given I already had too many hot peppers growing thanks to Merrifield's crappy labeling system... well... they are not. And I found out the hard way. These things are freaking hot. I could not feel my lips or my tongue for a good half hour. Anyone want a shipment of super hot peppers? I am guessing these are anaheims? FML

And this right here.. well.. on the far right is my container lemon tree. Totally worth the investment! I have a good 6 lemons growing and the plant is still blooming. Bring it on lemon tree! Right next to that is my Patio tomato plant. That plant is worth every penny, I have had so many tomatoes come from that, despite the fact that it is still battling some disease from earlier this summer, it has held up pretty well. And right next to that.. guess what that freakishly huge plant is.. It is a pepper plant! Isn't that ridunkulous? That plant is taller than my blackberry plant. And it is dropping a motherload of peppers. It is supposed to be a Giant Marconia pepper plant.. we will see if that's what it really ends up being or not.

You may have noticed these giant bamboo sticks coming out of some of my pots. I got these sticks at Home Depot to help support my plants, including my tomatoes. The cages are too cumbersome for a balcony garden so I opted for these sticks. I got a pack of 6 for $2. Crazy cheap considering one plastic stick costs you a little over $2. I just used some twine to tie the plants to the bamboo and voila! It made a huge difference and I will probably buy more as the plants continue to grow. Thanks for selling such a great deal Home Depot! Speaking of great deals, they are currently having some of their flowers on sale! I bought some new mums to replace my older ones that were badly injured during the disease and aphids infestation from earlier this summer. 

I got some new recipes and projects to blog about so hopefully this laptop makes it long enough so I can add some new posts more regularly! Otherwise, can I get an early christmas present? hahaha