Kangaroo Apple Flower

Kangaroo apple (Solanum laciniatum) is another in a line of marginally edible, strange solanums that I am growing this year. I say “marginally edible” because the fruit is edible when ripe and poisonous when green. Still, I’m not convinced it’s worth eating. Edible and worth eating are two different things entirely. Morelle de balbis fruit is edible, but is it worth growing if food is your priority? Not so much. Even still, I am growing that again this year, too.

The kangaroo apple is a subtropical plant that needs warm weather and a long season to produce fruit. I started my seeds very early — as early as January or February. Unfortunately, I can’t remember which and I lost my original tag.

TIP: I write the sow date on the tags when I sow seeds as a way to track each plant’s progress later on. This is especially helpful when growing long season plants like kangaroo apple. If they don’t set fruit in time then I can gauge how much earlier I need to start the following year in order to be successful.

If you’re interested in learning more about this plant, there’s some information on the Australian National Botanic Gardens website and through Tradewinds Fruit.

I purchased my seeds from Solana Seeds in Quebec.

I’ll update you on the progress of this plant as the season develops. I’m very curious about the fruit.

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Violets Galore

The new yard came with violets… lots and lots of violets. They’re blooming now and even though the yard continues to look like the excavation site of a dead body on a television police procedural…

I’m in heaven.

I have longed to have the space to grow enough violets to make cheerful springtime jellies. A few years ago I set about making this dream real by installing white and purple violet plants into a shady corner of my community garden plot. I began growing them in a large trough on the roof, too. Then we moved here and I inherited a yard of them.

Between all of these locations I should have more than enough to candy, make my jellies, and eat fresh in salads. I like the young leaves, too. Of course, we are currently in the process of digging up the yard, but I’ve been careful to dig around the violets and set each one (barring a few casualties) for replanting. I plan to carefully extract the plants from the grass that is growing around them, and replant them into their own swath along with the three other colour varieties I have collected over the last few years. You think I’m crazy for taking so much care with a plant that spreads like a weed, but I can’t wait for you to see it.

Man, do I ever love having a yard.

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Lampascioni Flowers

Remember months back when I wrote about lampascioni, the Italian wild onion bulbs that are really a muscari (Muscari comosum) that I purchased at my local greengrocer? Click here for a refresher and more details.

Well, here they are! Aren’t they fantastic? I love their feathery plumage (the tassel in their common name, Tassel Hyacinth) and the earthy-brown bells that flank the lower part of the stem.
Read more…

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Spotlight on ‘Trionfo Violetto’ Pole Beans

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

Back in June I wrote in my Globe & Mail column about growing beans. Within the piece I mentioned a favorite pole variety ‘Trionfo Violetto.’ It’s been years since I have grown this particular variety and now that the plants are in full swing and producing a little crop of beans daily, I can’t understand why I had set it aside and turned to other, inferior varieties for so long.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

First are the dark, pinky-purple flowers depicted in the photo, above. And the way they are set off against the green foliage with a hint of burgundy that almost seems to be applied with a water-color brush.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

All of this accented against slender, dark stems, and long, thin, purple beans that are delicious fresh off the vine. I can buy all manner of green beans at my local Farmers’ Market, but the French fillet-style beans are less popular and cost a small fortune.

Stunning, prolific, and delicious. Next year I will double my planting efforts and stop trying with other less interesting varieties.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

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Elderberries

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

My friend Barry has an elderberry tree in his yard. Last summer he offered up the harvest in exchange for a sampling of the end product. I collected a lot of berries and was a bit unsure about what to do with them. Raw elderberries have a somewhat unpleasant scent and are not edible so it was difficult to commit to a usage without a clear understanding of what I was getting into.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

[Please note that while there are elderberries leaves shown in this photo, you should not eat them. They are poisonous!]

In the end, I made cordial. It was pretty good. The berries have an earthy taste. That’s all I can come up with as a descriptor. Earthy. Perhaps a bit pungent. It does taste like berries, I just can’t place a finger on which berries exactly. We dripped it on pancakes, poured a little onto granola and yogurt, and added it to sparkling water on occasion. Elderberries are very high in vitamin C and potassium. Many people use the cordial as a cold and flu elixir, instead of store-bought pharmaceutical cough remedies.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

This year I wanted to try using the flowers so I harvested about two thirds of the tree back in June, when the flowers were in season, and left the remainder to develop berries. I had enough to make two batches, so I tried two different methods. Unfortunately, I no longer remember the second (preferred) method nor can I recall what it was that I did or didn’t do that made it better. However, if you’re interested, the first, less preferred method came from the River Cottage Handbook No.2: Preserves, by Pam Corbin.

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

Photo by Gayla Trail  All Rights Reserved

This year, with only 1/3 the harvest, I made a much smaller batch of cordial, which is fine by me because I think we prefer the elderflower flavor. I have no memory of how I made it last year, but this year I used this recipe from David Lebovitz’s website. Within the notes he makes a remark about straining the cordial a second time through a fine sieve. I’ve found that step to be essential and not overly attentive. Otherwise you end up with a very seedy, crunchy syrup. I didn’t have enough to can so I just sterilized two jars on a low heat in the oven before filling, gave one to Barry, and refrigerated the other.

I also made a quick, single jar batch of mixed berry jam last weekend (pictured). But that’s another story.

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p.s. The site will be down this weekend while we switch over to a new design and work out all of the inevitable kinks. It’s going to be a bit manic, but I’m so excited! A big change has been a long time coming.

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