Carbon Nation

What’s Cookin’?

It doesn’t matter how many emails I read, I can never find the one that says its okay to eat what makes you feel good. They all stress balanced diets, fruits, vegetables and limiting carbs. It seems the only way I can limit my carbs is to chew slower, hoping my jaw tires ahead of what my stomach is calling for.

And I have found that everything turns into carbs. Even things with carbonation turn into carbs. Maybe that’s where the word came from. Sugar is bad for you AND it turns into carbs. That’s double jeopardy! “What is the worst thing you can eat, Alex?”

So, this weekend was really cold and rainy! The high temperature Sunday, Fathers’ Day, was 52 degrees and it dribbled rain all day. Saturday wasn’t much better! So it was a perfect day to bundle up, pull some weeds in the garden, straighten out the basement and harvest some broccoli. Yup, it was about as ready as ready can be. Anyone who knows me well knows I use a scale of 1 to 10 on a rather consistent basis. So where does broccoli stand on a “cooking it smell” scale?

Now, whether you line shrimp or not, cooking shrimp inside hits a strong 10 on that 1 to 10 scale, for sure. Lobster about a 9. Onions and garlic perhaps an 8. Now all this is good food but when you are cooking shrimp indoors, if you had a major gas leak, no one would know. It is STRONG! To me, broccoli is at a 5 but Judy, even though she likes broccoli, thinks it is a 10. I guess it is like the herb cilantro. Some people love it, others think it tastes like soap. “Don’t say that word again or I am going to put cilantro in the food tonight!”

But I was able to quickly steam a few batches and we had some last night and froze the rest for later this year when it is like yucky quality in the supermarket. But, back to that balanced diet thing, what is I could create chocolate broccoli? Not just a dish, but broccoli that tasted like chocolate. I have time on my hands, so I wonder how I could fashion a broccoli plant and a cocoa bean plant to work together? Maybe I could call it cocoalli. Broccoala? I’ll have to work on that!

But back to the garden, the raspberries are really starting to GROW!

Based on how wide that row is to the left, I may have misjudged the distance I needed between my rows because next year those next two rows will look like the one on the left! I saw this advertisement the other day for pants that cannot be ripped…I may be in the market for a pair. If I go out picking and I don’t come back, call 911.

Until this year, I never put much effort into supporting our tomatoes. No, not the kind of support where I go out and cheer them on. “You can do it!” No, I’m talking about like when you support Uncle Fred as you walk him from the car back up the ramp and into the house. Since they were in raised beds, I would just let them grow down over and toward the ground, but in a wet year like last year, I found I lost some tomatoes because of blight or because they never got enough sunlight.

So, this is what I am trying this year. At both ends of each bed with tomato plants, I pounded in a metal T-post, five feet long, leaving about three feet above the ground. Then I took 1 ½ PVC pipe with 90-degree elbows on the end and pushed those down onto the T-posts. Next step was to tie some heavy-duty twine to the PVC and straight down to the base of each tomato plant where I loosely tied it off. Now, as the plants grow taller, I am taking these reusable plastic clasps that loosely fasten the plant to the twine. I will keep you posted on our progress, but so far so good! I think next year, I either have to paint the T-posts white or the PVC green. Maybe I won't care by next year!

Sooooo…..the broccoli was yummy, the beans have sprouted and are about a foot tall. The carrots have sprung, onions are growing like weeds and the garlic should be ready in three to four weeks, depending on how hot it gets after the 4th of July. I’ll keep you posted on progress.

If you plant a garden, I wish you well as everything seems to taste better from your own back yard. If you don’t garden and enjoyed my blog on stress, gardening can be just like watching fish….refreshing! And no matter where you are, you can grow something!

Cheers and happy picking!

Joe Alpaca - Did some checking on that whole cilantro bunk, where some people think it tastes like soap?! Come to find out, there is a scientific reason for it! It appears the people who taste soap rather than an herb share a common smell-receptor gene cluster called OR6A2. This gene cluster picks up the scent of aldehyde chemicals that are found in cilantro leaves. Seems those chemicals are also used to make soap! Now, these same scientists say that anyone who thinks cilantro tastes like soap can get over that by eating more cilantro. I also think that would qualify you for a job as a test dummy for the next generation of fighter jet ejection seat. If you are interested, go to Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico and they can strap you in!

Cheers!