Too Many Tomatillos?

Just a few of the many.

November may seem an odd month to be buried in tomatillos. Normally November is more likely to see us buried in snow than garden fresh produce. Nevertheless, we've got tomatillos. This state is a testament to the fabulous hoophouse. We in the north do appreciate season extension.

Our hoophouse is a little wonky, we bought it used and discovered (through some serious trial and error on our part) that it is not sturdy enough to withstand the winter wind and snow of Michigan's Upper Peninsula with the plastic on. Whoops. But we put it back together and, as our end of the season harvest proves, it still works just fine, wonky or not.

Here you see hoophouse wonk and happy tomato plants.

A few days ago my wonderful husband performed one of his many annual hoophouse related tasks. He converted it from a tropical oasis growing structure into a temporary chicken and duck housing structure.

Basically that means he picked the last of the fruits, put all the plants into the compost pile, and blocked off the doors so the birds could spend a month in there eating up tasty tidbits (aka cleaning up and fertilizing for us) before the plastic is removed and they are put in their winter home. We are going to try a straw bale house for them this winter.

We love giant compost piles!
That's the west end of the hoophouse off in the distance (in the upper left corner).

The result of all his labor, other than the replenished compost pile, is a kitchen full of solanaceous goodies. When I say full, I mean very full. I mean we are in serious danger of losing the toddler under an avalanche of vegetables full. How will I use everything up?

I have one grocery bag of eggplants. This is an awesome quantity of eggplants considering we live five miles from the shore of Lake Superior. No worries there, I love eggplant and can easily use them up.

Yum.

I also ended up with a box of red tomato stragglers (to be made into more sauce) and three bags of green tomatoes. I have finally perfected a fried green tomato recipe and will try valiantly to use them up through frying. When I am sick of fried green tomatoes, however unlikely that sounds, I will can the rest. I suppose I can consider it an opportunity to retry the blueberry green tomato relish, albeit without the blueberries. See my post on failed blueberry green tomato relish.

The pepper plants had four remaining banana peppers and one sweet pepper that we missed earlier in the season. Those were eaten and added to pickles almost as soon as they made it inside.

And now I must return to the topic of this post, tomatillos. So many tomatillos. I can't even tell you how many tomatillos because they are spilling out of every bag, box, and spare container that we could find in the kitchen. And we waited all season for these tomatillos. Seriously, we were out in the hoophouse every other day this summer pinching the papery husks, waiting to squeeze the plump yellowish green fruits within.

Tomatillo flowers are pretty,
but we wanted fruit!



A tomatillo husk, no fruit inside.

A few ripened in the hot months, but we had kind of given up on getting a sizable harvest. So it was a surprise when he pulled the plants and there they finally were. I don't know what took them so long, but after all of our anticipation I do not want them to go uneaten. These are good tomatillos. They taste like tomatoes, Parmesan cheese, and pineapples all wrapped up in one unassuming package. So I have been finding uses.

First I pickled five pounds. Then I made soup. Then I gave away five pounds. I've located a few salsa verde recipes that will be utilized this weekend - hopefully that uses up another ten pounds. My husband has discovered that our daughter can get about ten minutes of entertainment and eating pleasure from one nice big tomatillo. But that leaves us with more. Lots more. And it's fall, which isn't really the time of year I want to eat salsa verde anyway.

What fall is is chili time. Hmm...tomatillo chili.

Here it is, with lentils. My new favorite thing to do with too many tomatillos.

Tomatillo Chili with Lentils and Chicken

Don't be put off by the long ingredient list. The first eight things (over half the list!) are there to build a spicy and earthy base upon which to make your chili. The other seven ingredients are there to make your chili saucy and chunky, just as it should be. It's really a very simple recipe.



Chili spices.
You can grind them in a spice grinder
if you don't have a mortar and pestle.

• One Tablespoon Butter
• One Tablespoon Olive Oil
• One Teaspoon Sea Salt
• One Teaspoon Coriander
• Two Teaspoons Cumin
• Three Cloves Garlic, minced
• One Medium Onion, roughly chopped
• Two Jalapeno Peppers, sliced in rounds
• One Cup Green Lentils
• Three Cups Chicken Stock
• Two Carrots, sliced to make about one cup
• Two Pounds Tomatillos, husked and quartered
• 1/2 Pound Tomatoes, chopped into one inch pieces
• Two Cups Roasted Chicken Meat, chopped in 1/2 inch pieces
• 1/2 Cup Whole Milk

The first eight ingredients well on their way to becoming chili.



1. Melt butter and oil over medium heat in a large heavy bottomed pot.
2. Grind the cumin, coriander, and salt together.
3. When the butter is foaming, add the ground spices and stir for about 30 seconds.
4. Add the garlic, onion, and jalapeno.
5. Stir frequently until the onion is just soft and translucent.
6. Stir in the lentils, making sure they are coated with fat and spices.
7. Add the carrots and chicken stock.
8. Cover, bring to a boil, then turn the heat down to simmer. Simmer for 30 minutes.
9. Stir in the tomatillos, tomatoes, and chicken meat. It may look like there isn't quite enough liquid. Don't worry, the tomatillos will release a lot.
10. Return the pot to a simmer and simmer for an additional 30 minutes, or until the lentils are as tender as you like.
11. Remove the pot from the heat, stir in the milk.
12. Serve immediately or store and reheat. It is even better after it has sat a day.




We were eating greens too so I used a few as garnish.
The traditional cheese and oyster crackers also work nicely.

How Does Your Garlic Grow?

Fall is the season to put garlic in the ground. This year we planted about 500 cloves of garlic, half hardneck and half softneck, plus a test bed of some new (to us) overwintering alliums called potato onions. These are, of course, for harvest during the 2011 season.


The hardneck garlic.
A hot and colorful variety called music.


 

The softneck garlic.
Mellower than the hardneck and braidable,
this variety is called New York white.

We've been growing out the softneck garlic for three years now, giving some heads to CSA members and replanting the rest. We hope to harvest enough in 2011 to make a few garlic braids because who doesn't love edible art? About 100 of the hardnecks are from heads we grew this season. We wanted to try the variety out before we made a big investment in it. After tasting it we're convinced it's worth some of our money, land, time, and muscle to grow more. It's hot and mega garlicky and we've decided to make it our main variety for the CSA.     


Those things in the bag are potato onions.
Each one will grow into a cluster of small to medium onions
that will keep for several months.

The potato onions are something altogether new to us. We love things that can be planted in the fall because fall planting means less spring insanity. Spring is crunch time for us. We are so busy with bed prep and seed planting and CSA payment collecting and tomato transplanting and chick rearing and lamb purchasing and (I could keep going here...) that we have been known to forget to breath. So, we're crossing our fingers that the potato onions do well and allow us to eliminate something from the spring to do list. There is one sure thing about farm life. We will never run out of new things to try.

Our favorite new things this year are our tractor and manure spreader. They don't look so new but they're new to us and truly life changing. My husband was able to create an acre of new growing space by plowing in his spare time and spreading manure without using a wheelbarrow is, to put it simply, revolutionary. The only thing missing is the callouses.
 

The Tractor. A 1948 Ford 8N.
Michigan girls love their Fords!



A current sampling of our soil inputs.
This is composted horse manure from
the local animal shelter.



The Spreader. Full of composted manure and ready to roll.

Compost is the lifeblood of a small farm. We are always on the lookout for organic materials to add to our fields. Our plan this year is to create a few windrows of hay and fish guts before the snow falls. We'll see how the skunks like that!



Look at that compost fly!

Once the compost is down the bed must be readied for planting. We rake to make sure that the manure is spread evenly and there are no large chunks in the growing area.


Smoothing the bed.

 

Keeping things straight.















After all of that prep, it is finally time to get down to some planting.


Planting.



Planting.



Planting

We lay the cloves out in a grid pattern, six inches apart in every direction, then poke them under the soil and compost so that the growing tip is about an inch below the surface.

...

Still Planting.

The final step is to tuck the garlic in for the long winter. It's not unlikely that this garlic will be covered in two or three feet of snow come January, but it needs the insulation of hay during the early winter. The hay will also help keep weeds down, hold in moisture, and give the worms a nice place to live next spring.