Do they EVER cook from scratch? or garden?

[SportsgalAnnie]

On 2/2/2016 at 2:34 PM, PennySycamore said:

Velveeta's biggest claim to fame is being mixed with Ro-Tel to make a dip that is frequently eaten during the Super Bowl.   Go Panthers!

Keep Pounding!

[ksgranola1]

The salt content in that block-o-"cheese" alone will kill you.

[DuggarsTheEndIsNear]

1 hour ago, justoneoftwo said:

Okay, people here seem super knowledgeable, so some advice please.  We are trying to grow brussle sprouts, but they never seem to get big enough to produce anything.  They grow and are strong looking, but no sprouts.  What are we doing wrong?

What time of year are you planting them? They're cold weather crops, so they should be planted in early spring or late fall (same with salad greens, broccoli, beets, radishes, etc). If you're planting them too late or too early, they're not going to grow properly.

[justoneoftwo]

2 minutes ago, DuggarsTheEndIsNear said:

What time of year are you planting them? They're cold weather crops, so they should be planted in early spring or late fall (same with salad greens, broccoli, beets, radishes, etc). If you're planting them too late or too early, they're not going to grow properly.

We planted them in April (we  live in Utah if that helps).  Should we be planting even earlier?  We plant them with the beets, radishes and broccoli, all of which are fine.  Should we over winter them?  

[DuggarsTheEndIsNear]

1 minute ago, justoneoftwo said:

We planted them in April (we  live in Utah if that helps).  Should we be planting even earlier?  We plant them with the beets, radishes and broccoli, all of which are fine.  Should we over winter them?  

So, I've never grown them myself (I don't like to eat them, and I don't grow anything I wont eat), which prompted me to look up the answers. Apparently, they have a REALLY LONG growing season. So, you're going to want to sow them in March or April, then they'll start cropping in September and go as late as the next March or April.

[justoneoftwo]

1 minute ago, DuggarsTheEndIsNear said:

So, I've never grown them myself (I don't like to eat them, and I don't grow anything I wont eat), which prompted me to look up the answers. Apparently, they have a REALLY LONG growing season. So, you're going to want to sow them in March or April, then they'll start cropping in September and go as late as the next March or April.

Maybe we will try starting them earlier this year.  We kept waiting until December for them to start cropping and nothing.  So frustrating as we love eatting them

[DuggarsTheEndIsNear]

6 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

Maybe we will try starting them earlier this year.  We kept waiting until December for them to start cropping and nothing.  So frustrating as we love eatting them

If it makes you feel any better, one year I grew fava beans. In Northern California, they should only grow as an early spring crop (like they'd be out of the garden by April or May because of the temperatures). They grew for the whole year. But, I never got a single bean from them. For some reason, the pods were rotted out every single time they were picked. It didn't even matter how old they were. On the outside of the pod, they looked normal. On the inside, it was just a bunch of brown mush.

[OnceUponATime]

4 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

Maybe we will try starting them earlier this year.  We kept waiting until December for them to start cropping and nothing.  So frustrating as we love eatting them

did you see any evidence of mini sprouts? are you plants generally healthy? Also do you have club foot?

Depending on your soil you may need to give them a 2nd dose of fertilizer half way through.

I'm in a hardiness zone of about 8 heat zone 2. We plant ours out (as seedlings) in July (if my FB photos are correct). it's around the time we put in the winter leek anyway. But yay for me I've already put my foot down and said we're not growing any next year (trying to reduce the brassicas and therefore reduce the asshole clubfoot thing).
 

We have had no success with okra. I am going to sow a patch outside this year to finish up my seeds though. I've been trying in a greenhouse but they don't seem to like it. Tomatillo on the other hand... omg those plants went insane. And I read everywhere that insects weren't meant to like them but that wasn't the case in my garden. Saying that I'm sure I had mutant insects last year - slugs preferring marigold/beetroot/tomato leaves to lettuce leaves. Caterpillars eating my tomatoes (on the vine!). I want a 'pet' hedgehog.

 

[justoneoftwo]

1 minute ago, OnceUponATime said:

did you see any evidence of mini sprouts? are you plants generally healthy? Also do you have club foot?

Depending on your soil you may need to give them a 2nd dose of fertilizer half way through.

I'm in a hardiness zone of about 8 heat zone 2. We plant ours out (as seedlings) in July (if my FB photos are correct). it's around the time we put in the winter leek anyway. But yay for me I've already put my foot down and said we're not growing any next year (trying to reduce the brassicas and therefore reduce the asshole clubfoot thing).
 

We have had no success with okra. I am going to sow a patch outside this year to finish up my seeds though. I've been trying in a greenhouse but they don't seem to like it. Tomatillo on the other hand... omg those plants went insane. And I read everywhere that insects weren't meant to like them but that wasn't the case in my garden. Saying that I'm sure I had mutant insects last year - slugs preferring marigold/beetroot/tomato leaves to lettuce leaves. Caterpillars eating my tomatoes (on the vine!). I want a 'pet' hedgehog.

 

There was no evidence of mini sprouts, but the plants were generally healthy.  I'm not sure what club foot is.  

We had great success with okra, the biggest issue we had was that you absolutely had to pick it every day, or they would get too large.  

[OnceUponATime]

@justoneoftwo Club foot (oops it's club root) is an evil thing that makes the roots swell (and if they ground it wet too long - rot). I think it mainly a brassica (cabbage/bok choi/ broccoli/cauliflower...) illness.
clubroot pics can be found in the link. It is one of the reasons why crop rotation for cabbages is so important. Pretty much time is the only way to get rid of it and even then it doesn't really.

[justoneoftwo]

1 minute ago, OnceUponATime said:

@justoneoftwo Club foot (oops it's club root) is an evil thing that makes the roots swell (and if they ground it wet too long - rot). I think it mainly a brassica (cabbage/bok choi/ broccoli/cauliflower...) illness.
clubroot pics can be found in the link. It is one of the reasons why crop rotation for cabbages is so important. Pretty much time is the only way to get rid of it and even then it doesn't really.

Thank you, I don't think this happened, but I will have to look.  We are letting most of the garden have a fallow year this year so maybe that will help?

[OnceUponATime]

7 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

We are letting most of the garden have a fallow year this year so maybe that will help?

I don't know but it might. If it's empty I recommend growing Phacelia tanacetifolia. It's on of those nice green manures that is good for the bees, covers the ground really well (suppressing weeds) and is pretty. If planted early enough when it dies off you can rake the stalks back and depending on the weather it may regrow the same year.

[justoneoftwo]

5 minutes ago, OnceUponATime said:

I don't know but it might. If it's empty I recommend growing Phacelia tanacetifolia. It's on of those nice green manures that is good for the bees, covers the ground really well (suppressing weeds) and is pretty. If planted early enough when it dies off you can rake the stalks back and depending on the weather it may regrow the same year.

Thanks so much, we will try this.  Anything good for our bees is helpful.  

[ksgranola1]

My FIL did that. He was such a quiet man who studied accounting, worked in an airplane factory his whole life & yet he knew so much about so many things. He lived into his 90's. I miss him.

 

[refugee]

On 2/4/2016 at 9:56 PM, samira_catlover said:

What the cat's sake did you do?--water them with bleach or lye?  From where we are, you plant one zucchini seed in cement paving, mulch with concrete blocks, grease down the area with motor oil so the leaves don't break down in growth, and then stand back----it'll sprout. 

As I said before, SOMEONE is gonna figure out a way to crossbreed zucchini with kudzu and the world food problem is going to be solved in a hundred acres or so.

In our part of the world, there's a thing that lives in the soil. Microbe? Fungus? It can render your garden unable to produce squash or melons. I don't know if that's the cause of blossom-end-rot syndrome (where you start to develop promising fruit and then it all rots) or if something else causes that. It's been a few years since I had a garden, and I remember reading about that microbe/fungus/thingie when I was trying to figure out why I could not get zucchini to harvest size. I remember the problem I had with tomatoes rotting had something to do with lack of some kind of nutrient in the soil, so I invested in organic fertilizer and was able to get beautiful tomatoes (and green beans, amazing amounts of green beans) the next year. I've never had luck with zucchini or other squash, though, at the house where we used to live, even though I had beautiful, friable soil (worked it for years before I started having problems with arthritis, man that was wonderful dirt, just full of organic matter).

We haven't put a garden in here, yet, though I'd like to.

Nobody living here is handy enough to build raised beds, for one thing, and the soil is pretty compacted -- has not been gardened before, so far as I can tell.

I just know that it's one reason they tell you to rotate your crops, and things like never plant tomatoes where you've had potatoes, and vice versa.

[refugee]

On 2/4/2016 at 0:44 AM, SoybeanQueen said:

(snip)

@alye I love to cook from scratch, and I can usually come up with a meal or two by just scrounging in the fridge, but I agree on the beauty of the crockpot. The chicken sounds yummy. My favorite crockpot meal starter is pulled pork. I made a huge batch this week. Some of it went to make pulled pork tacos, and the rest made BBQ sandwiches. Yum, yum, yum.

Good advice. And a random story - my parents met as extension agents. My mom was what was known then as a home ec agent (now family & consumer science). One day her boss came into her office with a guy who was interviewing to be the county horticulture agent. Later, my mom went and told her boss he should definitely hire that guy. He did, and I am the eventual result of that day.

Cute story about how your parents met.

I used to swear by my crockpot, especially when the weather started warming and I didn't want to heat up the house (no A/C in our neck of the woods).

But I've replaced my crockpot with the 7-in-1 Instant Pot. It's been on my list for awhile, and I finally got one on Black Friday last year for half price. It has a crockpot function, and holds as much as my old crockpot did (6 qt), but it also sautes and steams and pressure cooks (all of which I've done) and has a yogurt maker setting (which I haven't tried yet, but I want to see if I can make coconut milk yogurt without the additives of the stuff in the store). I can make bone broth in just a few hours, instead of several days in my crockpot. I can make pot roast or other tough cuts of meat that fall apart, in a fraction of the time that oven braising (or again, crockpot) used to take.

I can't eat grains, so I can't testify as to how well the rice cooker setting works, but if I *did* still eat rice, one of the things I would appreciate about this cooker is it has a stainless steel insert, not plastic like most rice cookers I've seen.

I roasted a small turkey yesterday, and today I'm going to turn the carcass into soup. It won't be too difficult, which is great, because I'm getting over a nasty virus and have the energy of a sloth.

But my instant pot is going to fix dinner for me, with just a little help, and I'm going to have some nice, hot, steaming soup to treat my cold, soon.

I think I'm in love.

[Bad Wolf]

I just had to research your instant pot. I want one. I have a crockpot, a rice cooker and a large ppressure cooker for canning (it wouldn't replace that). It's on my wish list. FJ is amazing.

[rainbowbabycakes]

On ‎2‎/‎2‎/‎2016 at 1:34 PM, PennySycamore said:

Velveeta's biggest claim to fame is being mixed with Ro-Tel to make a dip that is frequently eaten during the Super Bowl.   Go Panthers!

That's the only thing I use Velveeta for, lol

[SoybeanQueen]

On 2/6/2016 at 4:33 PM, refugee said:

But I've replaced my crockpot with the 7-in-1 Instant Pot. It's been on my list for awhile, and I finally got one on Black Friday last year for half price.

I have instant pot envy! All of my friends who have one rave over it, for the same reasons you do. I'm pretty sure my crock pot is developing a crack in it, so I will probably look to replace it with an instant pot. The size was one of my questions, but I think 6 qt is what my crockpot holds. We're a bigger than average family, so I need the space or I'd have to get two pots.

[OnceUponATime]

1 hour ago, SoybeanQueen said:

The size was one of my questions, but I think 6 qt is what my crockpot holds. We're a bigger than average family, so I need the space or I'd have to get two pots.

@refugee

i must look into this. But is 6qt too large for two? I'm OK with making enough for 4 but not ok with more than that. Opinions?

[Alye]

The instant pot looks good but we use our crockpot to cook a leg of lamb regularly so I don't know if it'd work for us. It's probably the wrong shape.

[jcanglin991]

When we were growing up we always had a garden. Daddy had a green thumb and we always had fresh vegetables and fruits. If we wanted a watermelon, all we  had to was pick one.  Mama made zucchini bread,  fried the eggplant, spaghetti always came with our own sauce. We also had the prettiest flowers on the block. I didn't know you could buy pillowcases in the store because all of our were handmade and beautifully embroidered. Parents who lived through the depression and world wars knew about  doing things for yourself. Although they both had professional jobs,  and stressed education for all of us,  the lessons of their childhoods stayed with them. Along with a decent education, the Duggar kids are not learning how to be self-sufficient or to think on their feet. Unless something changes drastically, most of them will not be prepared to function as adults outside their bubble.

[cindyluvs24]

They also do not know how to pursue anything seriously - probably because the kids have never been allowed to develop their own passions and interests.  Everything is a half-assed effort.  They have never been in a typical classroom situation where you have to turn in assignments on time or work at subjects that are difficult.  I suspect that if if they don't do their homework, JB & M don't even know or really care.  Remember, they can't do anything that might look like they are surpassing JB. 

If they want to garden, they could get on the internet and read about gardening, find out what zone they are in, check out plans for setting up plants etc.  Play with some lumber and set up raised beds.  God forbid they should call the local ag extension station for soil testing.  And learn about sustainability and biodiversity (my son built a butterfly garden and bench for his Eagle Scout project, so there)    Their SOTDRT didn't teach them HOW to learn.  They can't do anything that's not pre-chewed and fed to them.  Having said that, I'm going to start my seeds in mid-March, right after I get my taxes out.

[DuggarsTheEndIsNear]

16 minutes ago, cindyluvs24 said:

They also do not know how to pursue anything seriously - probably because the kids have never been allowed to develop their own passions and interests.  Everything is a half-assed effort.  They have never been in a typical classroom situation where you have to turn in assignments on time or work at subjects that are difficult.  I suspect that if if they don't do their homework, JB & M don't even know or really care.  Remember, they can't do anything that might look like they are surpassing JB. 

If they want to garden, they could get on the internet and read about gardening, find out what zone they are in, check out plans for setting up plants etc.  Play with some lumber and set up raised beds.  God forbid they should call the local ag extension station for soil testing.  And learn about sustainability and biodiversity (my son built a butterfly garden and bench for his Eagle Scout project, so there)    Their SOTDRT didn't teach them HOW to learn.  They can't do anything that's not pre-chewed and fed to them.  Having said that, I'm going to start my seeds in mid-March, right after I get my taxes out.

That would require them to know how to do all that stuff. I really don't think they know how to properly use the internet because their parents limit it so much. Plus, all that research could lead to learning about things like evolution, which is evil. So it's probably not going to happen.

[jcanglin991]

They aren't allowed unlimited internet not only because of seeing sinful things, but also because they could learn more than JimBob knows. He is the all-knowing headship. The internet is powerful because it contains actual knowledge that has not been filtered through Gothard. If people are allowed to learn anything outside what he wants them to know, there is the possibility that they could see what a crock of shit he is espousing. The best way to keep people under your control is to limit knowledge.