Early October, and we were still getting nice harvests of beets, eggplant, Shishito peppers, and a few odds and ends.
A few of the Shishitos were starting to turn red– perhaps out of embarrassment from their enormous numbers. We got about 750 peppers in 2014 from about nine or ten plants! That totaled about 7.5 pounds of peppers alone, representing almost 10% of our total yield from the garden. That’s a lot of peppers. We grilled ’em, pan-fried ’em, pickled ’em, and gave ’em away as well. These red ones weren’t spicy– only about 1 in 10 green ones is spicy, although I found it to be even fewer than that. We ate a few of the red ones and also used some for seed saving at the end of the season.
The Tuscan kale was enjoying the cooler temperatures. You just have to be careful about the tips and sides of the leaves where they curl… little spiders like to hang out in those crannies. So don’t skip the cranny-check. Very cold-hardy, these ones.
The Rainbow Chard was starting to suffer from some kind of disease. In the end it wasn’t as hardy a plant as I’d expected. Still great eating in general, but at some point we had to call it and pull them out.
The larger Japanese Eggplants were still cranking out fruit in October and even later. Pretty happy, healthy plants, they seem to be. Not many issues with disease.
In early November, the larger eggplants were still happy.
Here’s a little harvest from early November. Beets and Shishitos. I love beets. Late in the season like these, they might not be as flavorful or sweet, but we still find a use for them in the kitchen.
