Monday, June 29, 2009

New Beginnings

Today I ripped out all the broccoli plants and composted them. I could have left them in to harvest side shoots but I am going to try harvesting more big heads this season with a second planting. This may or may not work depending on how hot the summer is. If it is to hot they will button and only produce tiny heads and if it is a cool summer they should produce very nice heads. So that is the gamble I am taking.

Here is the bed cleared and weeded. There was lots of weeds from my compost, I am having tones of tomatoes & potatoes coming up all over the place from seed. The squash growing under the trellis will now have much need light. The squash are Red Kuri and Delicata from Skippy's Vegetable Garden. In front are the Romanesco Broccoli surrounded by onion sets. The Romanesco was planted a few weeks later then the broccoli was.

Here are my starts and there is 14 'Early Dividend' Broccoli & 4 'Jade Cross Hybrid' Brussels Sprouts. They were growing two to a cell so one was sacrificed before planting.


Finally here they are all planted out. The brussels sprouts are the back row and all the rest are the broccoli. Lets hope for a good second harvest and many side shoots after that!


To end things off here is the broccoli that I blanched and froze from the first harvest. We consumed about a third of the harvest fresh and two thirds I froze. The blanching was done my trimming the heads, stems included into pieces. They were then boiled for a couple minutes in salted water, then transferred into ice water to cool. Once cooled I placed them on a kitchen towels to dry, then transferred to the freezer on a cookie sheet. Once they are frozen I will seal them in freeze bags.

10 comments:

  1. WOW! Two broccoli plantings in a season? I'm wholly envious. I'm going to try to do enough this fall so I can freeze them as well.

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  2. Ah broccoli. I hope my fall planting goes better than my spring one did. I should have more space for them in the fall and they ought to grow better then. We will see. I would love enough broccoli to freeze.

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  3. Super looking tray of broccoli florets for the freezer! I never seem to have enough broccoli to freeze as much as I would like. I plant more and we just eat more! Probably because it is one of my favorite veggies.

    The vining crops will appreciate having the sun exposure opened up for them. I bet they really take off now.

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  4. Dan~

    I should just call you the broccoli master. I can't believe how much harvest you're getting! My broccoli plants are about as big as your new plantings so I hope we get broccoli around the same time :D Good Luck!

    ~Cynthia

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  5. wow so much broccoli! Bet it will be tasty for the days,weeks,months to come!

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  6. Dan, I applaud your intensive planting schedule! I'm about to pull some things from my garden, as well. Man....those peas in the previous post look fantastic!

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  7. Wow! Those are great! I NEVER have luck with broccoli.

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  8. Dan, could you direct me to your old post about saving tomato seeds? You don't have a search box....Thanks!

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  9. Hey EG, I do have a search box but it is way up in the top left corner. I should really add one to the side though. The link to the tomato seed saving is : http://veggiegardenblog.blogspot.com/2009/02/saving-tomato-seeds.html

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  10. Lol, I've had all sorts of things growing from the compost also.

    What an excellent crop of broc you've had. Nice !

    I was planning on a fall crop, I guess I'd better get a move on !

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