What do you Grow?? The Garden Thread

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Thanks Blazingstar and Misslizard. Seeing the Bottlebrush plant in Florida when I was visiting for a month or so, reminded me of the bottlebrush tree just outside my bedroom window, growing up in Australia. Wonderful memories of a homemade treehouse, tropical climate and imaginative play as a child, a 16th fancy dress birthday party beneath that same tree with a Flim Flam singing telegram man! Once returning from Florida back to England, I bought a bottlebrush plant and it’s thriving here now, much smaller scale though. Loved having ladyfinger banana trees in Aus, lemon and orange trees, mulberry tree in the back yard that I used to climb as a child and feast on throughout the Summer... good memories!

Aussie burger = homemade breadrolls, secret patty recipe = 5% ground beef, grated onion, grated carrot, grated cheese, 1 x egg, parsley(larger pinch), sage(smaller pinch), rosemary(average pinch) and thyme(smaller pinch), salt, pepper, tablespoon of tomato puree, breadcrumbs or crushed cornflakes both in mix and used for coating. Toppings include fried onions, smoked bacon, egg, freshly sliced tomato, beetroot, lettuce and BBQ sauce. For an Aussie sunshine burger, add a slice of bbq pineapple. Americans I’ve found have the BEST ‘slaw recipe and that’s now my go-to as a par of side salads. It’s the sprinkling of lime juice and ratio of mayo and sugar that makes the difference. Home grown lettuce and tomatoes can make a wonderful difference taste-wise! A can of alcoholic ginger beer placed in the cavity of a whole chicken, while BBQing with a brown sugar, paprika and onion/garlic powder glaze can be nice too.

Things are definitely chilling down here. Lots of pretty autumn leaves sprinkling down like snowflakes right now here in Surrey. Lovely walking in the neighbouring forest, tonnes of apples falling from the trees in the forest for the wild animals. I captured a deer the other night on film, dashing across the road ... a small Bambi . Last time I saw deer was in Pawling, New York in my yard there. A whole family of deer would visit daily.

Wonderful cornfield harvest took place early Autumn here just beyond the railtracks. That’s another thing ... nothing beats American corn! Key is soaking them in water while covered in their outer leaves for an hour or so, then wrapping them in foil with a sprinkling of Maldon Salt and butter, slow BBQing along with one of those ginger beer chickens ... Mmmm!

Bottlebrush in Florida ...
https://hosting.photobucket.com/images/ ... fit=bounds

Till next Spring wildflower fields ...



... and Forget-Me-Nots (rose underplantings) ...


The Wedding Day Rambling Rose and Danse du Feu Red Climbing rose are growing nicely together over the arbour freshly painted white this past Summer ...


The electric blue Lithodora remains a favourite(underplanted beneath the roses by the hedge)...


Japanese garden in the making ...


Happy Gardening and cooking after harvest!

Juliette - what is "5% ground beef"? Here, we do it by ratio of lean to fat. Something like "80% lean and 20% fat." Thanks for the recipe and the great photos.

We bbq whole chicken on a can of beer too. Here it is called "beer butt chicken."

And I love forget-me-nots. That color blue is precious. I don't see them often in FL. I recently saw where I can order some plants and I may do that.

I spent the morning dividing my walking iris. I have enough now for a whole new garden of flowers. I think I will put them along the drive in front of my office.

MissLizard - I can't grow roses here either. The rose bush I bought last spring in the great excitement over Karmazov's roses went to my head. (And where is he anyway?) It's good you still have blooms and a few veggies. Do you try to grow anything under cold frames? And did you see the Buffalo was over 16 feet last week? Would have swept us away for sure!

blazingstar, over here, it would be, as an example, "Extra Special Aberdeen Angus Beef Mince (Typically Less Than 5% Fat)", or any ground beef with the least amount of fat. Been awhile since I've been to a Stop N Shop or a Walmart. Miss being in the US. Would be living in Connecticut if I could . "Beer butt chicken"! Love it! And yes, forget-me-nots are something special! They love to spread out, that's for sure, and come the spring, they look so pretty! Dividing those Iris' and putting them along your drive sounds like a very productive morning! Harvesting key limes and pepperdew peppers ... love the sound of that! Pepperdew peppers are popular over here as an entree at my local Gomshall Mill ... special place! X

It did rain here a lot over several days, close to nine inches.I had a friend that liked to hit the Buffalo after high water to salvage what fell out of the tourists canoes.He found all sorts of goodies, coolers , camping supplies,beer, etc...
We finally got a frost that melted all the summer flowers.
I have used cold frames before with success but need to build some new ones.This year I will just use metal hoops and a frost blanket for the kale and collards.
The roses that survived here are
Queen of Denmark,Marie Louise,
Vichenblu, Miracle on the Hudson,
Shaliers Provence, Red cascade,Seven sisters,and Sunny knockout rose.

In anticipation of growing my own pomegranates (the tree is only 3 ft tall), I bought a few from misfits market. The struggle is getting the arils out, of course. The best instructions I’ve found so far are at stephangourmet.com .

How do you do it? These are big huge red fruit the size of a large apple.

Also, if you know, why is the caloric value so much higher than other fruits? At 234 a pomegranate - that’s more than twice an apple, pear, banana, etc.

I have never tried juicing them, I think there are presses.We just eat them and either spit out seeds or chew them up.If I find a good deal on them I might try it.
I did find this article.
https://www.bhg.com/recipes/how-to/cook ... egranates/
Not sure why they are high in calories.Maybe a high sugar content?

Thank you, Misslizard, for the information on pomegranates. It has been and continues to be a fun journey for me.

Here is a picture of my banana flowers, from about six weeks ago. Bananas are forming well right now.

[url=[url=https://imgur.com/ygic5Ky][/url]]Banana Flowers[/url]

Pepperdew peppers are doing much, much better now that we have "cooler" weather. They are producing bright red glossy fruits.

[url=[url=https://imgur.com/HhYRZLn][/url]]Pepperdew Peppers[/url]

I was surprised this morning by the new stalk of butterfly orchids. Most of the blooms come in the spring. This is a plant growing on an oak limb brought down by that triplet of hurricanes that came through central Florida a few years after we moved here. It would have died if left on the forest floor. It has been thriving, still on the same limb, placed up on a table or railing.

[url=[url=https://imgur.com/Vda8Lrv][/url]]Butterfly Orchid[/url]

Forecast for 37F tonight.

Might touch a few sensitive tropical. Will have to wait and see.

Ouch.Hopefully it won’t get that low.Its so lush in your garden, hard to imagine it being cold there.
All my tender plants are inside now.I mulched and wrapped plants outdoors.The fig tree looks like a Halloween ghost now.Row cover is up on the kale and young collards.
Thanksgiving cacti have finished blooming ,now there is a cyclamen blooming and a begonia.Paper whites and Amaryllis will be next.
I ordered some baby trees to plant, several magnolia varieties.
Right now I enjoying the first gardening catalogs arriving.