Going Organic - Part 5

In continuation from my last post on organic vegetable gardening, I thought of giving you a glimpse of the summer garden and its produce. The picture below is the view from my kitchen window; adding colour to the garden is the trumpet vine in the background.

Capsicums and Okra
As our Capsicums/Peppers and Okra/Ladyfingers have picked up pace, this is how the big patch looks. The tall plants in front are the ladyfingers and the bushy ones behind are the capsicums. And the produce is pretty satisfying.

Pumpkin Vine
One of the easiest to grow summer staples, the pumpkin vine can be started by planting seeds in late spring (March-early April). The aim here is not the fruit or flowers; the leaves and vine are also edible. They make delicious fritters too besides adding some much needed greens in the dry summer heat. Is container garden friendly.

Mint
Another summer staple, mint can be started by a mere sprig. It is hardy, grows lush quickly (especially in rains), and smells great.

Can be easily grown in containers. My little patch gives me enough leaves for fresh chutney every week.

Quarantine Baking

The Covid-induced lockdown pushed a lot of us to finally try our hands at things we had always wanted to make but weren't getting around to. For me that one item which I really wanted to try was bread making.

In the early days of lockdown, there was no yeast available so I started by substituting with curd. The hot weather aided fermentation, of course. Yummy garlic bread was the outcome.

Once the first attempt was successful, there was no looking back. Hubby ordered yeast online and baked a neat loaf himself.

Now focaccia, using veggie toppings from the kitchen garden, are my favourite.

Along with bread making, another recipe that everyone loved and chipped in with, was bread pudding. Made out of stale slices, the final result is quite an appetizing dessert.

Though I had been baking vegetable gratin for years, a simple recipe using eggs that was shared by a friend made me take my skills up another notch. While I use white sauce for the inner layers, the egg-cream-cheese mix on the top takes this gratin to the next level.

All in all, the quarantine has been a great foodie party for us as a family, and no one is complaining!

Then & Now: Backyard

I love to do these 'Then & Now' posts as they give a sense of how time changes things. And now that we have completed just over a year at the new abode, I thought this was a good time to indulge in this exercise.

So here is presenting a part of the backyard, just outside our bedroom and featuring the mango tree. 

Now

We all love sitting on the stone edging to attend to our calls. I am trying to green up the background, creating more greens on the walls. But the scorching summer set back my plans a bit.

Then

The 'Then' picture was taken when we first came to see the house. Though we got a large part of the soil covered with stone slabs but I do the prefer the neater look that the place has now.

Going Organic - Part 4

Back to share more about our organic adventures in the last few months.

Come March everything we knew as normal got challenged due to the outbreak of the Corona virus and the resultant countrywide lockdown. Sourcing and consumption of vegetables had to be handled carefully since the bi-weekly markets were off, and vendors were few and far between. In such difficult times our organic produce came in really handy.

Fenugreek and Spinach

The last crop of both these greens saw us through the early days of lockdown. If the veggie vendor gave our lane a miss, the backyard always had an alternative to offer. A relatively prolonged spring helped us enjoy these leafy goodies well into April.

Cherry Tomatoes

Umpteen salads and pasta bowls were lavished by their yummy presence. Again most of April we were blessed by their sweet, tasty goodness.

Garlic

The pods we had planted in early winter yielded tiny garlic. We had enjoyed their leaves through the winter so no regrets at the small size of the bounty.

Peppers and Ladyfingers

May onwards our summer crops took over. 

Peppers and ladyfingers (okra) got off to a slow start due to the steadily increasing heat but their yields were consistent.

A few spells of rain in early June have ensured that the May temperatures aren't coming back, and so we can hope to harvest both veggies till autumn.

May Days

As the lockdown keeps getting extended, we keep our spirits up with these small moments of joy.

Our May mornings be like this....

While May evenings turn out this way....

In between, the sweltering daytime heat melts and merges everything into a ball of sunshine fire!

And so goes our second summer...

Cat Tales Revisited

Remember the cat story I shared last year? Well, I have no clue what happened to those cats but this time there is a fresh feline family to tell about, so here goes....

As we discovered towards the beginning of the lockdown, living the cat life during quarantine isn't easy. Especially if you choose to produce kittens in Corona times!

So one fine morning, I spotted our neighbourhood fat cat jumping into our backyard with something in its mouth. Naturally, given her catty instincts, I assumed it to be a juicy pigeon or a large rat. With the maids already in absentia due to the lockdown, I was horrified at the prospect of cleaning up after the fat cat. Cleaning up our own lunch leftovers was already enough for me! In a bid to scare her away, I went running right out into the backyard, screaming like a banshee for added effect. Only to see the fat cat jump walls deftly and disappear into an upstairs balcony. So far, so good. But soon she was back, crossing through the backyard again.

Meanwhile, hearing the earlier commotion, hubby had parked himself near the glass door to oversee fat cat's antics. So when she returned this time, and paused near our vegetable patch to tighten her hold on whatever she was carrying, hubby promptly switched on his camera. And what did we discover - fat cat was ferrying her kittens across!

Tiny bundles of fur, two black and two brown, were taken by turns to a new location. Apparently, cats have a tendency to change their location several times when they give birth; that is a strategy to keep the mewing, helpless kittens safe from predators.

After the transposition was done, all was quiet again. Now, as luck would have it or maybe by sheer design, fat cat landed with her kittens in the milk hoarder's balcony. All was well till the babblers and mynahs descended on the mango tree in the evening. Sitting on the topmost branches gave them a field view of the balcony, and the occasional mewing of the kittens confirmed their presence. The birds put up a spirited cacophony but fat cat being a smart mommy chased them all away.

A couple of days went by peacefully till the milk hoarder's son discovered the feline family sheltering in their balcony. His screams, followed by his mom's screams, forced fat cat to again change her family location. They are now, in all probability, housed in the yard of an empty house next door. As fat cat is seen daily ambling across our backyard, in search of food in these lockdown days. And that is the story of a cat in quarantine!

  

A Birthday In Lockdown

Even as the world is in a state of collective lockdown, we had a birthday to celebrate. And despite being in the middle of these crazy times, I wasn’t going to give up on the celebrations so easily, so what if stocks were rationed and stuff not available.

Well, for starters, instead of the customary birthday bouquet, the garden displayed new blooms to commemorate the special month of April. Here’s a peek…

The good hubby ordered for a cheesecake couple of days in advance from a service provider that claimed to be addressing especially "birthdays during lockdown". But guess what? The order wasn’t delivered! Seeing the sad state of affairs, and unwilling to let go of the joy of birthday cake cutting, I baked my own cake. Of course, with the family chipping in. Reminded me of birthdays during my school/college days, when also I sometimes baked my own cake…. more out of passion than out of necessity.

We landed up with a gooey choco-banana cake that could give any professional cake a run for its money! The chocolate frosting only added to the flavours.

I had planned the food and meals beforehand, and made all preparations the day before so I didn’t have to slog on the birthday. A scrumptious veggie bake made from garden-fresh produce turned out superb. The daughter cooked us ramen so we could have a Chinese dinner. And finally, I made the effort to dress up for the occasion by wearing a new saree that had been lying in a corner of the cupboard for some years. 

Nah! No lockdown can lock me down nor can it take away the happiness from the small joys of life. We only have to alter our approach and work as a team, and things fall in place beautifully.