Sunday, July 18, 2010

Harvest Monday - berry good

I'm back from vacation and did what any gardener does the minute the engine stops, rushed out to check the plants. Before even the children were out of the car, the tent stowed, or mail checked, I needed to see if there were any ripe tomatoes.

Yes, there were, with many more to come. I would have taken a picture but today my kids went foraging and came back with red seedy goodness dripping down their chins so I'll have to wait a little while before portraiting those iconic backyard garden goodies.

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Montreal plums, raspberries, pixwell gooseberry - not bad despite its reputation for being average in taste, and some alpine strawberrires which are gearing up for round two of fruit making.

In the meantime, plums are starting to ripen, gooseberries are positively dripping from the bushes, and each ripe raspberry is a drop of magic making up for their slow start. In the wings, my grape vine has gone from only being good for leaves to setting what seems to be a million fruit this year, the apples are wormy but sizing up, and the perennial ground cherry and volunteer sunberry are promising late season treats.

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Pixwell Gooseberry so named because it is partially thornless. It is not known as the best tasting variety but I find it quite good raw. Not complex maybe but more than merely edible.

Summer is good.

11 comments:

Sheryl at Providence North said...

Yum! I love berries too! Looks like you will have lots for pie this year.

Marcia said...

So at first glance I thought those were huge blueberries and then I read your caption again. Plums! Almost as good as blueberries. Lovely.

thyme2garden said...

Your berries look delicious! I can't wait to get some more vegetable growing experience under my belt and venture out to berries in the future. Welcome back from your vacation!

kitsapFG said...

I am glad to hear someone else races to the garden to see what the state of it is when returning from time away from the homestead!

Lovely fruits and berries.

Anonymous said...

I love plums! They are the only fruit I’m freezing for winter.
Never tasted a gooseberry. Even thought you say that they are average in taste, I would like to try them some day.

miss m said...

I want gooseberries ! I want plums ! I need more fruit in the garden. Berry beautiful harvest !

michelle said...

Mmmm, summer is good, look at that beautiful fruit!

Robin said...

That's the same thing I did last night when we got home from vacation!! Your berries look yummy :)

Shawn Ann said...

Too funny! Its like leaving one of your children behind when you go on vacation.

mac said...

Yummm, fruits, fruits, fruits.

Angela said...

Nice fruit! Those berries look delicious, even the gooseberries. I use to love them when living back East. We have native gooseberries around here with insignificant fruit, I wonder how the cultivated varieties would do, I don't see them in the farmers' markets.