Final Harvest Meal

Well, the final harvest of the above ground vegetables has come and gone. We had our first frost on November 2nd. We harvested most of the vegetables a few days before and the last of the sweet potatoes on that day. The only thing left in the ground now are the red potatoes we planted to see if we could get a fall crop. They were bit back a little by the frost, but are still green and growing slowly for now.

We had a little bit of this and that, so I decided to make a meal of it. I brought in the first batch of sweet potatoes we dug and sorted out a few that were cracked to cook first. We don't usually add anything to our sweet potatoes, just peel, slice, cover with foil and bake.

We had just a handful of green beans, so I put them on with a dash of salt and a little bacon grease.
 

The first batch of lima beans we cooked up we did not enjoy. This is all I got from the last picking and this time I tried something different. This onion is sprouting and needed to be cooked. I had an abundance of peppers that needed to be eaten. 

And I had a little bacon in the frig. So it was time for another experimental meal. I fried the bacon then took it out of the skillet. Then I sauted the onion, lima beans and peppers with some salt and pepper. After a while I added the bacon and some soy sauce. It took longer for the beans to cook than I expected, so I put the lid on to let them steam a little.

It's rather eclectic, but here is our final harvest meal. The green beans were good. The sweet potatoes really didn't have much flavor at all and were rather disappointing. We hope the rest will taste better after they have had a while to develop more of their characteristic sugars. I read somewhere that sweet potatoes really aren't much good until they have been stored for a while. I tried to find that information again in one of my books, but haven't run across it again. The lima beans? Well, I will continue to go with my original assessment. Next year we will devote the time, space and effort into something that produces more and tastes better. Now who can I give those seeds to?

It is almost a relief to put the garden to rest for the winter. The days are now much shorter with the change in time and there is little daylight after coming home from work. We will be having one set of baby goats around Christmas time, so there will always be plenty to do. But for now, a little slower pace and time to get things organized and ready for winter is a welcome opportunity. There are some things we feel the need to complete and have ready for the coming months. What about you? Are you ready?

Until next time - Fern