I have thirteen tomato plants growing in our garden, which means that a portion of my daily rounds entails admiring all the green tomatoes as they grow huge on the vine and anticipating what an avalanche of ripe red tomatoes we will soon have. But then I think of some of our favorite tomato preparations [...]
Tags: garden·green tomatoes·preserving·summer
All winter I’ve been digging periodically in our potato bed and coming away with spuds wonderfully preserved underground. There was still one small area untouched and I wondered if it could still yield edible potatoes. Was this possible? Finally, the rains stopped long enough for a look-see. I plunged my forked spade into the soil [...]
Tags: preserving
A stillness overtakes the garden as the plants pass their prime. Or maybe it’s just lack of expectation that removes all tension from the air. The fall crops–lettuce, radishes, arugula, greens–are ready for occasional harvesting. But all the jubilant growth of summer–the real fireworks in the vegetable patch–are missing. The tomatoes, for instance, are mere [...]
Tags: preserving·tomatoes
We are engaging the concerns of a hungry planet--slowly--right here in our kitchen garden in the District of Columbia, about a mile from the White House.
What's in your turkey? We killed and butchered more than 80 birds on the farm of Mike and Michelle Klein in Prince George's County. Thankfully, Michelle did the gutting. Unfortunately, Mike bought his turkey chicks earlier than usual and they did not stop growing. Our prize for helping was a carcass that weighed nearly 40 pounds. It barely fit in the oven. Here, Mike is subjecting a slaughtered bird to the "magic fingers," a machine with a nubby, rotating barrel that removes most of the feathers. 
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