The Zucchini Houdini

Well, the class is winding down to the end now. My beans are drooping, and my cucumber plans is all shriveled. I'm choosing to blame the time of year and not my skills as a gardener, even though other plots look as fertile as ever. Regardless, I've had a good run. This week's harvest was still pretty sizable considering the majority of my plot looks like death. I got 2 zucchinis (one as a gift), a bunch of radishes, 3 monster carrots (only 2 made it home...), 2 eggplants, 1 measly cucumber, 3 not-hot Anaheim Joe peppers, 2 GIANT sunflowers, 3 lovely zinnias, and one Ladybug pepper that I somehow lost along the journey home. The sunflowers were by far my favorite thing to take home this week.

My sunflowers! I gifted one to my roommate, and the other is still on the counter.

We did the usual weeding and harvesting this week. Libby told us that we're no longer being graded based on weeding, but I still did a little bit of maintenance out of habit. We got our final assignment, and it doesn't look too bad.

In terms of cooking my vegetables, I admit that I've been eating a lot of them raw. I did, however, make some zucchini bread. Warning, this is NOT healthy zucchini bread, but it sure is tasty. Here is the recipe I used:

http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/zucchini_bread/

And here is the final product!

Until next week!

Lettuce get to cookin'!

This week we didn't have regular class. Instead, we were asked to visit the garden on our own time to harvest some of our wonderful vegetables. I was surprised by how much was waiting for me. I harvested 1 GIANT zucchini (oops...), 4 cucumbers, 1 GIANT squash (double oops), 4 radishes, 1 head of lettuce, and 3 eggplants. I picked those (and more than a few weeds) before retreating back to my warm car.

So far, I've gone saute-crazy with one of my friends. We sauteed zucchini, tomatoes (not mine), beans, and squash. After that, we threw it on top of a bed of pasta and, with the help of my ravenous roomies, devoured the whole pan-full. We even roasted the squash seeds in the oven (accompanied by some oil, salt, and craisins!

Last night, I made the world's best friendship salad (we were having a roomie love kind of night). I used my head of lettuce, radishes, beans, and cucumbers. The rest I bought from the store (but if you ask anyone, my veggies were surely superior).

I have a plan for my giant zucchini. Currently I have a few tabs open with various zucchini bread recipes. Does anyone have a recommendations? I've never attempted such an undertaking before. Wish me luck!

College Collage