The Damage is Done

During end of last year till New Year we experienced hot extreme weather about 40 degree Celsius. This has caused a lot of damage with our plants. Well we lost many plants and I don't feel like we have any summer garden at the moment. Pictures that we are showing are only a part of of the garden and only taken from the back of our backyard fence. Surprisingly, chives are very hardy plants. However, in front of those chives used to be alpine strawberries that I transplanted end of winter last year. It cannot be seen in this photo but these chives and alpine strawberry is actually a row with a length of more than 3 metres. I am not sure how many alpine strawberry plants I lost but roughly it should be more than 30 plants including the dead ones in the container. Lucky that we don't spent fortune on them because there were from volunteers or divisions from the original parents that we grown from seeds almost 3 years ago. Fortunately, their parents survive in partial shade and hope provide some babies for next planting.

Where did all the green plants when?

We can't even see much of bare soil before surrounded by foliage.

However, now all perished.

We used to have 4 potato plants and 3 spagetthi squash plants, inter-planted with sweet corn on this patch. I should dug died potato plants out to see whether there are some spuds. But I really don't have the motivation to do that and on top of that I don't even know where the plants were because hardly no trace of those plants. Cherry tomato plants patch next to this patch also look really bad. Not sure whether I can save it or not.

Vietnamese mint/laksa leaves herb plants were also burned badly by the scorching sun. The right Vietnamese mint plants look very crisp isn't it. Five plants at least damaged like that. Lucky again before the hot weather I took some cuttings in our kitchen to propagate new ones.

Farewell our carrot and parsnip plants.

Many of the carrot and parsnip plants top were burned to crisp.

I had to dig blindly to harvest the roots.

Because there were no trace of the tops.

Harvested roots were not juicy but they were still very sweet.

Our kids enjoyed them in Fish soup.

From the front row: Lebanese zucchini not sure if they bounce back; Red capsicum bell some died and some of them lack of growth since germinated; Purple top turnip leaves wilting: Bonica eggplant has bloom but it won't set fruit and young lemon grass plants hanging tough.

Somehow one of the volunteer Evening Sun Sunflower managed to bloom the next day after the 40 degree Celsius day. Sigh, not much left to look forward in this summer garden this year.

The weather has cool down.

We even have some shower today.

Hopefully will help some of the plants to stay alive.

Rigatoni with Zucchini, Lemon and Mint

We have started to harvest some of our topweight carrots that were sowed end winter (August) on the sunniest patch in the garden. It is grown on hard clay soil. So we got a funny looking roots but the roots are strong enough to grow through hard soil. Before we have some several days of hot weather it will be best  to harvest all those carrots before it become bake carrot in the soil. The exposed carrot root are becoming blackish instead of normal greenish. We harvested our last florence fennel as it is not growing that much due to the warm weather we have during the day. The location that I planted them was too sunny and dry for them I reckoned. Contemplating at the moment to try growing them in container during this summer.

Yellow currant tomatoes are still very prolific. It takes a long time to harvest them. There are also many self-sowed yellow currant tomatoes near this plants. Our volunteer yellow pear cherry tomato plants also has some ripen fruits. But it did not make it to the harvest basket as it is consider as rare item in the garden at the moment. So it is always pick and pop in the mouth.

Harvested some Lebanese zucchines and Lebanese eggplants last week.

Just for fun, the total cost for us to make this dish is less than AUD5.00. It says that it is for 4 servings. But it was quite a lot that it was for lunch and dinner for us. This is the first time we tried zucchini with pasta.

Rigatoni with Zucchini, Lemon and Mint ( The Australian Women's Weekly-The $ Smart Cook)

Ingredients:
500gram rigatoni pasta (coles brand AUD1.00)
60ml olive oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed (home-grown)
3 medium zucchini (~360gram), grated coarsely (home-grown Lebanese zucchini)
180 gram ricotta cheese (I used less from leftovers for leek and fetta triangles)
1 cup coarsely chopped fresh mint (home-grown used less 1/2 cup cos not many leaves at the moment)
70gram roasted slivered almonds, if desired ( in a rush I forgot about them)
2 tablespoons lemon juice (from neighbour)

(1) Cook pasta in large saucepan of boiling water until just tender; drain.
(2) Meanwhile, heat oil in large frying pan; cook garlic and zucchini, stirring, 2 minutes. Add cheese; cook, stirring, until just heated through.
(3) Combine zucchini mixture and pasta in serving bowl with remaining ingredients.

We harvested all our Nero Black kale and Red Russian kale leaves last week as I wanted to clear some patch for warm loving vegetables. My husband seems to be allergic eating Red Russian kale but not Nero Black kale. Do you know whether this allergy to particular kale is common? My hand itch too when I harvest Red Russian Kale especially at the part that has been cut probably from the oozing liquidy thing.

I am only successful at growing small cabbage head. 

Some potatoes, leeks and kohlrabi harvested yesterday.

Visit Daphne's Dandelions to see different kind of harvest from different season such as winter or summer and the all year round tropical climate.