Bike ride to the garden

I am trying to fit everything into my schedule. It's tough. If I drive to the garden, it's a 40 or so minute round trip. If I bike there, it's a 1 hour 45 minute or so round trip. That doesn't count the time spent weeding or watering. I do drive there sometimes but sometimes, I just have to hop on my bike...to save on gas money as well as to fit in some much needed exercise time. So I do spend an extra hour commuting when I take my bike but it's time well spent to me.

When I take my bike, I put my rear panniers on to carry some clothes to protect me from the thick misquitos, a pair of shoes and sometimes a container if I think I may have some produce to bring home.



The ride to the garden is mostly more rural roads...at least compared to the roads around my house. The closer I get to the garden, the less traffic there is, except for one road I have to take for a few minutes. Then it's back to rural roads.







We had our first picking of green beans and got enough for a very hearty amount for each of us. There are a few more beans on the vine now...but they're still growing. We finally have pea blossoms and the bush beans look like they might produce something soon.


And of course the squash are trying to produce something as well.


On the ride back, I take a different route. This route has 4-5 fig trees lining the road at one point. Each time I ride past them, I stop and grab a handful to snack on for the next couple of days.


Here's the green beans after I got home and washed them. There's some kind of caterpillar eating holes in them so I have to do research to find out how to get rid of them.


Dinner that night was homegrown green beans, foraged figs, homemade sauerkraut, homemade wheat bread with honey and butter and a small bowl of lentil slaw (which is sprouted lentils, shaved carrots & diced tomatoes, with a apple cider vinigarette).

forgotten park

Yesterday, I spent my lunch break at a forgotten park. It used to be beautifully maintained but in 2009, we had a lot of flooding and it was abandoned. The trails were covered in mud several inches thick and logs were strewn in various places. Trash had washed up all over as well. The trails are overgrown and the trash cans are past overflowing. It may not be as pristine as it used to be but I still enjoy taking a walk around the lake and eating while looking at the lake.

I thought it would be perfect to pick some blackberries to go with my lunch. Sadly, most are gone now. I only found three worth picking...although looking at this picture makes it look like I had more I could have picked.

This is on a jetty into the lake.

The patio where the table I eat at has what I call the secret garden. There are so many flowers (though they only seem to bloom one kind at a time. Today, it's the black-eyed susans, my favorite!

My lunch was homemade corned beef, with homemade sauerkraut on a homemade soaked bun....and three tiny foraged blackberries.

That's the picnic table below, overlooking the lake.

They have a guard driving by now and then and he knows my car. He used to come down and find me every time to see if anyone was up to mischief but he realized it was the same car over and over and no longer comes looking for me since I am not trouble.

summer cooking begins

Thanks for the suggestions of summer food. Adam broke down and turned the AC on, he couldn't take it anymore. It had been in the 90's for weeks with really high humidity. But since then, it's climbed into the low 100's with really high humidity. I am still going to do my best to make summery foods...and I have plans on cooking outside (we dont have a grill so I'm formulating a plan) when possible. At the very least, I am really going to try not to do any baking in the house, other than bread. I still want my bread.

To start off our summer food, I made this fruity chicken salad. It had cooked chicken (I had cooked it before and frozen it), 3 kinds of lettuce, sprouts, frozen strawberries and peaches (and pecans on my portion). It was yummy and nice and cool during the heat wave.