Cool Frog

So I was out planting onion sets about a week ago, and the neighbor from across the street came over saying he had something he wanted to show me.  He brought over a patio stool/table, or whatever you want to call it,  with this cute little guy on it.  He said he had just been sitting there for most of the day.  I think it may be some kind of tree frog, but to be honest with you I am not really sure if it is a frog or toad.  I did a little searching online and have not really found anything exactly like it just yet.  Anyhow I just thought he was really cool, and figured I would post the picture.  Unfortunately it is not exactly the best picture and does not really do the little guy justice, but it is still pretty cool.

Plant Pictures

I have been meaning to take some pictures, and finally did.  The picture below is of my plants that I have started under lights in my basement.  Some eggplant, celery, peppers hot and sweet, and lots of tomatoes.

This is a picture from in my hoop house outside of broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and brussels sprout plants.

Hopefully I will get a chance to get them in the ground soon, since they should have already been planted.

Some kale plants in the hoop house, waiting to go into the ground.

 

Some mustard green plants.

Some cute little Mexican Sour Gherkin Cucumber plants.  These guys have the cutest little cucumbers that are not even dime sized.  I need to transplant them into larger pots and start to train them up a trellis in my hoop house, hopefully I will be able to add them to some of my salad mixes.

Hoop House Complete At Last!

 

I have finally completed my hoop house!  It took me almost all day yesterday to finish it.  Being that it is so small I thought I could have it covered fairly quickly, so I did not think it was going to take me as long as it did, in fact after it was all done I was kind of exhausted.  At least it is done, now all I have to do is get the shelving and tables (old pallets on buckets:) together, and I am all ready to start some seeds in there.

Homemade Vanilla Extract

 

 Here is my homemade vanilla extract.  This is the first time I have made any, but I can't wait to use it in a recipe.  It is very simple to make, all you have to do is add some vanilla beans into vodka, let it sit for a month, and the strain it through cheese cloth.  It is as simple as that.  This is the real thing, not some imitation.  I will for sure be using this in my zucchini bread this year that I make for market.  I just strained it today and it looks, smells and tastes great!

Homemade Vanilla Extract

4 split vanilla beans, cut into 1 inch pieces

1 pint cognac or vodka

Place vanilla beans and cognac or vodka in a sterilized pint jar. Cap and seal.

Let stand in a cool dark place 1 month.  Shake bottle gently from time to time.

Pour liquid through a cheesecloth into a sterilized pint jar.  Seal tightly, and store in a cool dark place.

Just thought I would post a picture of what my hoophouse looks like so far.  Unfortunately I have not been able to work on it for a few days since it has been raining and now snowing.  It has been kind of slow going, since the days I have gotten a chance to work on it, by the time I get home from work and get everything together, I only have around 2 hours to get anything done.  So sadly at the pace I am going, I still probably have another 3 days of work before I get to cover it with plastic, which would not be too bad if I could get some nice days where it does not rain or snow.  Oh well it will eventually get done in time for spring, so I will be able to start some stuff in there.

The Start Of My New Hoophouse

 

Ok, so it isn't exactly finished, but here is the start of my new hoophouse.  It is going to be small, not for actually planting things in the ground in.  The main purpose of this hoophouse is going to be for protecting my transplants when it is still colder outside and before they get 100% use to outside conditions.  I will also be able to start some of my more hardy plants directly out here and skip the inside under lights step.  The actual size is 7'x8'.  I think if I get one nice day I should be able to almost finish it, so hopefully we will get a reasonably nice day here sometime soon.  I will post a picture when I have it finished.

Hot Peppers for 2012

Last year was one of the first years that I really grew a larger variety of hot pepper, and since they seemed to sell reasonably well I figured I would grow even more this year. I know most people seemed to interested in the hotter peppers so this year I kept that in mind while deciding which peppers I was going to grow. Here is a list of a bunch of the hot peppers that I plane to grow for this year.

*Jamaican Red Pepper
The package reads "If you have a passion for heat, this is the pepper to grow!" This pepper is said to be 50 times hotter than the Jalapeno. The Jamaican Red is a close relative to the Habanero. 100,000- 350,000 scovilles.

*Habanero Mix Hot Peppers

*Chocolate Habanero Pepper
Chocolate brown habaneros, that are about 2" long. Measure in at over 300,000 scoville units.

*Lightning Mix Peppers
A habanero type of pepper, which is very hot. Come in a variety of different colors, including red, yellow, green, peach, brown, orange, mustard, and coffee tones.

*Tabasco Pepper
Yellow hot pepper usually under 2 inches long which ripens to red. Very hot pepper used to make, can you guess it? Tabasco Sauce! 30,000 to 50,000 scovilles.

*Bhut Jolkia Pepper
Also known as Ghost Pepper. May possibly be the worlds hottest pepper, measuring over 1,000,000 scoville units.

*Lemon Drop Pepper
A yellow when ripe chilli pepper, with a unusual citrus flavor. 5,000- 15,000 scoville units.

*Cayenne Peppers

*Jalapeno Peppers

I may plant a couple other varieties, but it all just depends on how much planting room I end up having in the end. Any other varieties that I plant will probably not be any super hot types. I may plant a hot pepper that can be used as a stuffing pepper. But we will see.



I thought this was interesting it is a link to the wikipedia's explanation of scoville scale, just in case anyone is interested in what exactly it means. It is kind of interesting.
Wikipedia- Scoville Scale