Sunday, October 5, 2008

October Harvest

edamame

Started to harvest some edamame this week. Edamame means "twig beans" as the pods grow in clusters from short twigs attached to the main stem. Edamame is the name used in English nowadays, but in fact edamame are just immature soy beans. They are boiled lightly in the pods and then eaten mostly as a type of "bar snack", though I read that in the West they are served at expensive Japanese restaurants. I prefer to let the beans grow full term when they become Kuramame, black beans. The crows took most of the beans I planted, so I tried starting some in pots and they succsessfully transplanted, so that's the way I'll do it next year.

eggplant pickle

Still picking tons of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants. Eggplants grow so easily and are so prolific that people don't know how to use them all and many just rot in the gardens. The best way I have found to preserve them is with this Sri Lankan Eggplant Pickle recipe. It's a lot of work, but well worth the effort.

3 comments:

  1. Wow Ojisanjake, the pickled egglplants sounds wonderful.

    Would love to try it sometime.

    Cheers,

    Taintus

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  2. Thanks for the eggplant recipe. It looks like we have all the ingredients in the area (except cinnamon and tamarind). I'm getting a bit tired of the "regular" pickled eggplants that all the neighbors make, and it will be nice to have something "different" to take when we visit people.

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  3. It's a little "karai" for most Japanese :)..... I love oit as a spread on fresh bread...

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