As much as I enjoy not having to worry about watering the garden when I’m home, I was much more concerned about it getting water when I’m away. The big reason we installed the drip system when we did was because we knew we would be traveling to Mount Hood, Oregon for a little over a week. That’s enough time that nothing in the garden would have survived without water. But the drip system performed well and everything is looking great.

Zucchinis grow fast. We cut every zucchini from the plant before we left. There wasn’t even a hint of any that had started. We returned to find 3 monster zucchinis. Now to figure out how to use them.

The tomato plants have grown like crazy. I think there are several tomatoes on each plant. The peppers are also doing well. I think I counted 7 or 8 Jalapeños on a single bush. This is shaping up to be a great year for the garden.

The herbs in the front yard started blooming, so I had to cut the tarragon, basil, chives, and cilantro back down to size. I think the flavor changes once they go to seed, so it’s a good thing we caught them when we did.

Charmaine built a custom drip system for the garden this week. She started in the back to see if it would work. It totally works. No more spraying water on the leaves (and potentially causing problems for the plants). After such a success she moved to the front yard and built an even more complex system. Both of the systems start from a regular hose bib with a timer that runs on batteries. It’s awesome. We may even be able to spend some time away from home without killing all the plants. It would be a shame to lose some of these plants now that they’re starting to produce.

We picked our first three perfect zucchinis this week (no pictures). We just cut the first one up and ate it. It was really good, but very interesting. It hint of a sour kick like a radish, but much milder. I enjoyed that a lot. The plant itself is growing like crazy. I inspect it for squash bugs every few days, but haven’t seen any signs at all so far (knock on wood).

The rest of the garden is doing really well too. The peppers are blooming and growing like crazy. The one exception has been the Poblanos. We’ve had a few blossoms, but so far no peppers. One of my favorites right now is the Thyme. I haven’t actually cut any of it yet, but I grab it and pull on it from time to time and then my hands smell good for hours.

October 1st is the beginning of the new water year each year. Last year was a record year for snow. They were still skiing at Snowbird on July 4th. This year may turn out to be another record year. It’s already snowing… and not just in the mountains. It snowed at our house Wednesday night and much of the day on Thursday (October 5th and 6th). Supposedly, the “average” date for our first fall frost is October 14th. I guess we’re a little early this year. It’s not all that early for frost, but it seems really early for snow.

We thought it was the end, so we picked just about everything that was left… hundreds of tomatoes, hundreds of peppers, etc. That was several days ago and we haven’t been able to use it all or give it all away. The counter is still covered.

Surprisingly, most of the garden managed to survive and it has warmed up a little since the snow. Who knows? Maybe we’ll have another round to harvest next week.

Earlier this week, Charmaine made some of the best Tikka Masala we have had the privilege to eat. It was near perfect. The two things that made the difference between this and previous attempts were: 1- She blended the ingredients in the blender and 2- She used some fresh Serrano and Cayenne peppers from the garden. It really was amazing.

Knowing that we can’t pick fresh Serrano peppers all year, she came up with a plan: freeze them and put them in ziplock freezer bags. She has been buying frozen Thai peppers to use in her Thai cooking for years, so it stands to reason that our Serrano peppers would work just as well. We picked a little over 500 of them from the garden, washed them, dried them, put them on cookie sheets, and stuck them in the freezer for a few hours. After they were frozen, we packed them into little ziplock bags and stuck them back in the freezer. So far it seems to be working perfectly.

I just need to convince Charmaine to make some more Indian curry!

The big news this week is that we have no choice but to find ways to preserve things. We can’t give stuff away fast enough any more. The first time you heat up that water bath and start preparing jars for canning, it’s pretty exciting. Every time after that, it’s just a lot of work.

We sliced and stewed about a hundred tomatoes, put them in bags, and stuck them in the freezer. We’ll make something with them later.

Next we blanched hundreds of tomatoes, peeled them, and made more than 2 gallons of salsa. The salsa was necessary, because the peppers have been coming in like crazy. We used something like 6 cups of chopped Anaheim peppers, 2 cups of chopped Jalapeño peppers, and several large bell peppers in the salsa. We cooked it, poured it into jars, and canned it. Fresh salsa is so much better than canned salsa, but we’ll be able to use this salsa all winter, when fresh salsa just isn’t an option.

Making salsa didn’t use all the tomatoes, and it didn’t come anywhere close to using all the peppers I had picked that day. I was still staring at a gallon of peeled tomatoes, 70 or 80 Jalapeño peppers, and 15 or 20 extremely large Anaheim peppers.

I looked up a recipe for Jalapeno Jelly. I picked one and doubled it. Then I doubled the number of Jalapenos in it. I wanted my jelly to have some kick. I also swapped the vinegar for half lemon and half lime juice. I threw all the peppers and lemon juice into the blender and pushed the smoothie button. It turned into a foamy green smoothie. I tasted a bit of it. It was really good. It tasted like a very tart citrus drink, but then moments later your mouth and throat burned. I was a little worried I had over done it with the peppers, but it was too late to change. All in all, I think we used about 40 Jalapeños in that recipe that made twelve 4 ounce jars and one 12 ounce jar of jelly. After it cooled, it wasn’t hot. It barely has any kick at all. And it doesn’t taste all that great. I’m pretty disappointed. The Habanero jelly we made last year was much much better. Oh well.

We still had 30 or 40 Jalapeño peppers sitting there and I was out of ideas. Luckily, those are the easiest pieces of produce to give away. Everyone loves them. Charmaine took them to work (along with a whole load of other stuff) and got rid of them all.

As for the rest of the tomatoes, we had Charmaine’s parents over for dinner, so we used some of the peppers and the remaining tomatoes in a pasta sauce with some fancy noodles we picked up at Tony Caputo’s Market in Salt Lake. It turned out really well.

Today I noticed some bright yellow Ají Limóns in the garden. Just last week they were completely green, but now they are a beautiful bright yellow. They’re fairly hot. I can eat a fresh Cayenne pepper without too much crying, but I can’t get through one of these Ají Limóns… and yet, I am somehow compelled to keep trying.