Late May to Early June garden harvests + dinner ideas

For the last two months we have been eating many varieties of greens. For a little over a month now we have been harvesting a big salad every day to eat. The more you pick, the bigger the leafs get --the Collards especially.

This year so far, the collards and kale have out performed the rest of the salad greens in size and abundance. The lettuce has been plentiful too. I have been especially enjoying the Buttercrunch variety. I am definitely getting loads of Vitamin A and K.

In the following photos, I show you the greens we have been harvesting for the last two weeks. I also show you the salads I make with the garden greens.

May 31st 2015 harvest



May 29th 2015 greens harvest





Collard wraps with grated carrot, tomatoes, zucchini noodles, avoado

June 1st 2015 harvest

June 2nd salad harvest

Lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, avocado, sunflower seeds

June 4th 2015 harvest

June 5th 2015 greens harvest

Lettuce, tomato, peppers, avocado, squash noodles

June 6th broccoli harvest

June 7th harvest

I found it odd that the three large cauliflower plants have not started to make a head, but the three tiny plants have formed heads. At least these will be ready to harvest soon.

Besides showing the harvests, I wanted to provide a quick update on the rest of the gardens.

We have planted over 150 tomatoes, and many of them have fruits that will ripen in the next two weeks. I think we have over 30 Peppers plants, which also have fruits setting. The peppers will be growing and ripening around the same time as the tomatoes. It seems though I start harvesting Zucchini and yellow squash before I start harvesting Tomatoes and peppers. I wouldn't be surprised considering the squash garden is looking big and healthy.

I expect to harvest beans, corn, cucumbers in the next month, and the winter squash and melons will be ready to harvest later in the growing season.

The melon patch is flourishing with different varieties. I think the Hugelkultur mounds create the perfect growing conditions for melons. Hugelkultur mounds retain moisture in the decaying wood, which creates fungus that builds fertility in the soil. 

There are a couple watermelon plants and cantaloupe, flowering and setting fruits. Two weeks ago we added over 50 Golden Honeydew seeds within the melon patch, and they have their second set of leaves. And, several days ago I added Santa Claus melon seed. I also planted Golden honeydew, Santa Claus melon, and Canary melon seed in various places around the garden and yard.  

I really like this relationship I have with fruit. I eat the melons, and throw out the hundreds of seeds that came from one fruit which has the potential to grow a hundred more melons.