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It’s time for our last Grow Along check-in for 2024. Each year we at Good Growing decide to try growing some new (to us) vegetables. This year we invited you to grow along with us. This video is for those who signed up to receive seed for our Grow Along. In this video, we are trying the fruits of our labor. We share some of the different ways we have prepared the produce we grew as part of the Grow Along.
We want to hear back from you! You should have gotten an email with a survey link if you received Grow Along seed from us. How is your crop progressing? Have you been able to harvest anything? And more. Please use the survey link sent to you in the most recent email that included a link to this episode.
We are treating this as a quasi-trial of these crops. So, we are asking for some specific details on your growing conditions. If this year works out, we may make these "trials" more official.
Got questions? Contact us at
Chris Enroth cenroth@illinois.edu
Ken Johnson kjohnso@illinois.edu
Emily Swihart eswihart@illinois.edu
Chris Enroth cenroth@illinois.edu
Ken Johnson kjohnso@illinois.edu
Emily Swihart eswihart@illinois.edu
Check out the Good Growing Blog: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowing
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Any products or companies mentioned during the podcast are in no way a promotion or endorsement of these products or companies.
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Creators & Guests
Host
Host
ES
Guest
Emily Swihart
University of Illinois Extension Horticulture Educator serving Henry, Mercer, Rock Island, and Stark Counties
What is Good Growing?
Talking all things horticulture, ecology, and design.
00:00:05:16 - 00:00:38:22
Welcome to check in number three of the Good Growing Grow Along. And I am here with my co-host, my colleagues. Hello, Emily. Hello, Ken. We are all here together in the same room. We have harvested the vegetables, and now it is time to taste these vegetables. So we. Today, what we're going to do is we're going to go into how we prepared these vegetables and then, maybe discuss our thoughts or opinions on taste and flavor.
00:00:38:24 - 00:00:59:22
But I guess where do we start? Like, what's what's the order of what? What what is the appetizer? Well, so let's talk about first of all, we prepared and, we'll put up a picture here of what we harvested. We have all. We have six of the season, five of the six girl, foods that we, we, grew this year.
00:00:59:22 - 00:01:22:06
So we have the squash, the cucumber, okra, whole grain, black eyed peas and runner bean. You're missing the Mizuno. That all? Just, you know, the season went to too long, basically, for the Mizuno. So we don't have that, and we try that earlier. So reference back to our previous podcasts for our thoughts on that, but.
00:01:22:06 - 00:01:44:20
So The Runner Beans and the Black Eyed Peas, can you prepare? Do you want to talk about how you, like fix those other kind of science, for a meal today? Yeah. So the, runner means, just did, so, so you can soak those overnight? I did it in a, an instant Pot, but never soak them for,
00:01:44:22 - 00:02:06:19
That's something to be courses. Why not? Remember what they look like? So that's that's the runner. And so these are, this is Africa. So nice and big and big beans. So soak those or put them in in spot. So those, like you would have no typical driving for that. Just cook them with some garlic and some leaves.
00:02:06:21 - 00:02:28:07
And that's it. So if you plan on them, you know, they look like they the, the kind of the purple, the pink mottled, the pretty beans that fortunately, the color doesn't hold all that well when you cook them. But other dry, they're nice and pretty. So for those hopefully you can see this. But modeling is not working at all.
00:02:28:08 - 00:02:58:22
Maybe not. That's a really pretty though. Really pretty in person. Very. Yeah. Very ornamental. Come on. There a little bit. Oh, yeah. So it's really pretty. So that's what I did for that one. And then for the southern pea, which so we had a first larger, much smaller, much smaller events again, use those as a dry beans and soaking those either overnight or using a pressure cooker to do a quick, kind of soak on those.
00:02:58:22 - 00:03:19:00
So, and with this one, we just kind of a salad, cooked, with, cooked those down. Refrigerate them. Onions, celery, pepper, with Italian seasoning on that. And we can put the recipe in the show notes after that. So as someone who has only ever grown green beans, how do you know when these are?
00:03:19:02 - 00:03:42:18
When these dried beans are ready? So, so the ones I did the, the outer skin or the whatever that's called the husk or whatever, that gets really dry and kind of crinkly. I had picked some that were still this. The beans were unraveling inside of the the outer skin was still a little damp. And when I opened those, the beans weren't quite hard yet.
00:03:42:20 - 00:04:07:22
We could still pick them like that. You just wanted to dry out a little bit, but they'll get papery. The very first thing is cracking open and the beans will be hard on the inside. Like you like a dry, I mean you to get in the grocery store. Yeah, I can't really comment on the Black Night Runner because mine didn't work, but my hog brain, I think I went through like a month and a half of nothing going on with the plant that was vining, no flowers.
00:04:07:22 - 00:04:28:24
And then finally, towards the end of the growing season, it just exploded in these, like, split long pods. So now I probably have enough for I. I would guess I might have like at least a pound worth of dried beans that I'm going to harvest this year, so not sure many if I had it, probably with almost two cups, being there.
00:04:28:24 - 00:04:58:23
So that's probably half of what I had on there of the we have five seeds. So I think it for seed to grow. So it's pretty repurposing like our, Master Gardeners grow some and there's are still green. And so it'll be curious to see how quickly they ripen here at the end of the season. And so yeah, so traditionally, I guess for black eyed peas, at least here in the South, that's with ham hock and collard green.
00:04:59:00 - 00:05:17:06
But I was told you only eat that up on New Year's. So that's I think that's the rule. So I didn't make that like this equation anyway. So yeah, she's from the south too. So she knows sometimes. Yeah. So. All right. Do we wanna try it or do we want to keep discussing still. Let's. I'm ready to try.
00:05:17:06 - 00:05:40:06
All right. Let's go for some beans to that. I'm going to eat a bunch of beans with people in a small room. Let's see what happens. I like it. Black night runner. Good. Yeah. Tastes like it absorbed some of that. The flavor that you put in there and garlic. Yeah, that garlic is nice. The inside is kind of this whitish color.
00:05:40:08 - 00:06:10:11
Of course you have the purple skin. It's, the once you soak them, they're pretty living beans. Some. It's almost like a potato. Like a little potato. Very little potato. That's a great description. Little starchy. Yeah. Very starchy. All right. Not bad, I like it. Yeah. Good job Ken. Thank you. So now you used your in this recipe.
00:06:10:13 - 00:06:20:15
Yeah. Pepper and onion in the pink celery and make so that we keep talking about. Yeah. Let's see.
00:06:20:17 - 00:06:45:00
And the recipe call for green bell peppers. But did it's a Christmas pepper sauce. The peppers will go from kind of a whitish to purple and bright red I think is as they get more ripe, more red they get sweeter. So that's what we used, what I used with this one. And red onions look another bite because I got the pull of that celery.
00:06:45:02 - 00:06:56:01
That's all I could taste. But.
00:06:56:03 - 00:07:03:00
Yeah, because it's the bean. I like the different vegetables in there.
00:07:03:02 - 00:07:29:09
And the celery is intense. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is another bean, I think. At least with a recipe like this, having the crunch of pepper, celery and the onion is, I think it's necessary because, like, once they're cooked or they're pretty soft. Yes. Yeah, it would be a really big bite with the Black Knight to have that with other things too.
00:07:29:09 - 00:07:56:11
Yeah. So the you know, the hybrid is a little more reasonably sized to put other, other vegetables with it. This might be good with like a cheese in it too. Like with the. Yeah. The feta or something. Anything's better with cheese. I know. Or ranch and ranch to their ranch. Boom. Okay. So then you want to go to the to your fixin crisp?
00:07:56:13 - 00:08:14:09
Yes. So I think, was I the only one that could success that that got the okra to grill? Okay. It might never germinate. No. And of the three okra seeds that I planted, I only had got one that wound up ever establishing and growing. But it is a beautiful plant now this late in the season. So this is candle fire.
00:08:14:09 - 00:08:33:03
Okra. It is distinct from some of the other different types of ochers, and that it has a rounded pod. It doesn't have the, you know, the ridges there. There's kind of a ridge there, but there's not not as strong as, traditional type okra. And then even when you cut into it, it, it has kind of a reddish color to it.
00:08:33:05 - 00:08:56:22
So I have eaten okra raw. I like eating okra raw. And we saved one again. You've eaten the raw too I prefer. Yeah. And we have saved one for Emily to try raw. So, I've heard good things and I've heard good things about that. There are. It is very good. And it goes down nice and smooth. So, I would say bottoms up water.
00:08:56:24 - 00:09:14:16
Question. When you eat this raw, just like, like bite into it. And yeah, I want the full experience. So you can I mean if you don't want then you can snap that off and try to get more closer to the the bigger the bigger piece. Yeah.
00:09:14:18 - 00:09:23:10
Isn't it good. So good. But then wait. Process for them.
00:09:23:12 - 00:09:53:02
You know there's a. Sensation there. Honestly, not as bad as I was expecting, though. The mucus, after effect. Really not that bad. I mean, like some other plants do that to the, like the believe, A film you're writing in your mouth. It's not as bad as I was expecting, but it's. Yeah, I really, really like.
00:09:53:04 - 00:10:15:24
In this crunchy. I guess I didn't think of any thought. I like the crunch. I like planted the vegetables with the crunch, too. So. Check it off the bucket list. All right, so with that and I, I've never had okra prepared this way, so I'm not sure if we're going to get that. Yeah. Mukul again. And is that the right word.
00:10:16:01 - 00:10:47:04
Yeah. Is that the that this is not that's not Mukasey texture. With this but but when you bite into okra it initially is very crisp being crunchy but it activates that that snotty mucus in within those cells as they break down and you chew them up and then they just get all slimy. So I don't know, with this preparation that we've done if that is going to be the case, but what we've done is we've taken okra, we slice it up into bite sized pieces.
00:10:47:06 - 00:11:11:18
We've then dusted them with a kind of a corn meal, seasoning. And in that cornmeal we have smoked paprika, we have some minced garlic. I think I dried minced garlic and salt and, then we bake them in the oven 400 degrees for about 20 minutes. And so that and that, then you get this. I don't know.
00:11:11:20 - 00:11:22:04
And it looks nice. Let's see if it's slimy.
00:11:22:06 - 00:11:42:06
It's more chewy and. The outside skin toughened up a lot. There comes the slime. Oh there's a sign.
00:11:42:08 - 00:12:09:18
I think I prefer it raw. Yeah I agree I wonder if I wasn't a an older man to exactly. Outer skin. Okay. Yeah. More fibrous when you get older to. Yeah. Go for a smaller piece. That would be the younger one and that one size hard. Yeah. The smaller pieces are harder. Yeah. I've always heard that if you let the pods on too long, they get more fibrous or chewy.
00:12:09:20 - 00:12:34:16
The younger, smaller ones about an inch, inch and a half long, of that ideal texture. So this color though, does that come on later as it matures this pinkish red color. Because that's desirable. But if you have to wait longer to harvest from what I remember. So we have this really pretty white flower that blooms. And it has a kind of this very nice, what is it is related to the mallows.
00:12:34:16 - 00:12:58:20
Right. So I guess type flower. And then as that flower then dies immediately at the base of that flower, we start getting this elongation of those, those ovaries of that, that flower. And it's already red. Oh. So, sometimes, though, I had to pull the flower off the top to make sure the flower didn't kind of. Yeah.
00:12:58:22 - 00:13:22:13
Interfere with the fruit development. Yeah. So that's great. That's a that's a good answer. Is, this color is really. It's a pretty plant active. Yeah. I would plant it again even just to, to look at it. So yeah, as Ken said, we'll put these recipes below in the show notes. Again, I probably wouldn't make the okra like this again, but I could have done it incorrectly.
00:13:22:13 - 00:13:49:08
So I did like the smaller, more immature pod. It tasted better. So yeah. Okay, so last but not least, hopefully, is the acorn squash the honey bun? So I made this, we made this more as kind of a meal, showcase, fixings. So it's, roasted acorn squash. Then I also have, prepared a, pot roast in the crock pot.
00:13:49:08 - 00:14:09:17
I beat my Patterson crock pot. You can do it now then, shredded it up. Did, caramelized onions with some cranberries? I had to use the dried cranberries or, you know, it's not cranberry season. Yeah, I was I was optimistic that we were getting close to it, but we, I think we're still a couple weeks out from it, so I could find frozen or fresh, cranberries.
00:14:09:17 - 00:14:31:17
So we had to use, dried ones, but, and then there's a dollop of a yogurt concoction. So that's yogurt. Lemon juice. Garlic. And they're supposed to be time in there. And I didn't have any. So all of it. It's just gonna get, like, a little of everything she did all together. Then maybe do some honey bun.
00:14:46:10 - 00:15:11:11
What do you guys think? I'll let you get your reaction first. Good. I, I really like acorn squash. Yeah. So we have. We've been growing this at home as well, and we have been using this, in a lot of different dishes. Just sort of as, like a side, you know, maybe we'll have, like, some type of pasta dish, but as a side, we'll, you know, cut up a roasted acorn squash, put it on everyone's plate.
00:15:11:13 - 00:15:33:12
You know, even my kids, they're they're enjoying this. So, I really like acorn squash. If I had to pick only one of these plants to grow again next year, it would probably be this one big one. Squash. Yeah, yeah. The the the combination of not only the sweetness of the squash savoriness of pot roast and I love the the Greek yogurt.
00:15:33:12 - 00:16:00:00
Yeah. And cranberry. Great combinations. Yeah. The, squash really has a sweet squash flavor to it. It's really a good, good flavor of standing on zone. But, yeah, I like this. I don't honestly, I've never put. I usually eat it the same way you do. I never put, like, meat. I don't usually make my acorn squash as a as the meal, you know, the, the vessel for your meal.
00:16:00:02 - 00:16:27:07
But I would do I would do this again. I probably would. I don't know, man. Ken. Yeah. I wasn't sure about the, the yogurt on top but. I think that really ties it all together. Yeah. I might need to be alone with this little acorn squash meal. And the presentation is, is lovely too. So it looks really nice on the plate.
00:16:27:09 - 00:16:51:22
Looks really good. Yeah. Yeah, I really like it. All right. I'm going to make this myself. Well good. Oh okay. So this is fun. This I do remember. Oh the cucumber. So we didn't do anything to the cucumber. We are going to try this. We're all sick and tired of eating it just like the the cucumber. Hello everyone.
00:16:51:22 - 00:17:08:00
But it'll be final regardless. So we're going to just kind of eat it raw. No ranch, no nothing. Just, cucumber. Try not to cut ourselves on recording.
00:17:08:02 - 00:17:25:18
And I'm going to. There are pickles, you know, on it. Yeah. I don't like eating them. I don't eat the prickles. So any the prickles, they won't hurt you. It just is a texture thing. Right.
00:17:25:20 - 00:17:47:16
And Chris, you hear this one is, Yeah. This came from my yard. So. And growing these as I said, we're kind of sick of eating them, at least in my house. The lemon cuc is so prolific, it put on so much fruit. This year. We ran out of of effort, to try to come up with anything else we could do with this particular vegetable.
00:17:47:16 - 00:18:09:07
So, the other part of it is I started trying to pick it when it was a little bit underwrite, because the more ripe it gets, the larger that seed is. And because this is more of an heirloom type cucumber, the seed can get fairly large. So but yeah.
00:18:09:09 - 00:18:31:17
It is a very good cucumber. Yeah. Some are mild flavor and then some other cucumbers. Yeah. So for our the two plants we have, we think 30 pounds of cucumbers a couple weeks ago. If you want to. So, I've done well. Yeah. I think I have 15 pounds on my counter right now, so I don't. And I'm out of I'm out of ideas.
00:18:31:17 - 00:18:52:11
I made so much cucumber sandwiches. I'm sick of them. You can donate. Okay. Yeah, I can't, I can't. Yes, that is a good idea. That's a refrigerator. Pickles. Yes. Freeze them. We talked about doing a freezer recipe. I didn't have success in the. They started to, they flowered and they turned that fruit. And then the the vine died.
00:18:52:13 - 00:18:57:22
So. And if there's a.
00:18:57:24 - 00:19:21:07
As a in general, the, both the squash and the cucumber, both bean types of cucumber, it's, it has not rained here in McComb for maybe a month now. And powdery mildew has been really awful lately. So all of my vines have really started to decline very rapidly. So I'm, I'm, I think my gardening season is done.
00:19:21:09 - 00:19:47:14
Yeah. So and Serranos has taken out our cucumbers. The very tips are still green, but everything else is brown. And. And then the squash bugs took out our acorn squash. Probably 2 or 3 weeks ago. Yeah, yeah, it happened. So that's the end of our good growing girl on for the first season. We thank you all for joining us.
00:19:47:15 - 00:20:12:01
Thank you guys for doing this with me. I had a blast, even though I did not have a lot of success. That's how it goes. We want to do it next year. You've been teasing the idea. Let's do it. Let's do it again. Okay. I knew they would say that. They had to ask anyways. So make it seem like whatever they make, you make it seem like you guys have got some say in this.
00:20:12:03 - 00:20:34:12
So we will send out another survey. So please keep sending, in your responses to our survey. We genuinely do appreciate the feedback and use that to inform what, we're doing with the program going forward. We grew food this year. We would like to know if you all would be interested in growing food again next year as a part of the good grow and grow along.
00:20:34:14 - 00:20:54:06
If you choose to join us again, and we hope you do, or I want to propose an idea about flowers, maybe tease this a little bit, but I would like to, give we'll do one or the other. And so we'll ask them in the survey to tell us which one you would prefer. But for flowers.
00:20:54:06 - 00:21:14:11
So this year, our, with our master Gardeners, I asked them to, provide some garden space for flowers to grow and then to harvest the flowers, similar to how we harvest our, produce and donate it. But we were making bouquets and taking them to people who may not have access to, you know, different garden spaces or outdoor spaces.
00:21:14:11 - 00:21:41:02
There's a lot of research that indicates exposure to nature is, beneficial. And so, if people cannot go to nature, a bouquet is a great way to bring nature to, to them. And so we grew a variety of different flowers. We attached to them this, custom made, tag that just, you know, identify who it was coming from and then, you know, or well wish them well and know as we hope these blooms brighten your day.
00:21:41:04 - 00:22:04:10
So I would like to, see if people are interested in doing that as a part of the good grow and grow along. We would grow bouquets. We would, you know, ask people to share them with those, like their neighbors, people who grow, nursing homes. We had one master gardener give it to, people at an oncology unit who are receiving treatment for cancer.
00:22:04:12 - 00:22:34:05
A lot of different ways to share the flowers. And, I in my unit, my master Gardeners were were really excited about doing it. So I wondered if anybody else would want to do it with us after the, after the hog ring which took over half the garden, the lemon cukes which took over the other half, and then the hog brain was just over, took those to I'm down for trying something that maybe isn't so viney.
00:22:34:07 - 00:22:56:01
Oh, there's some viney flowers. That's true. Yeah, we could go some that. We could go that route, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I would love to grow some cut flowers. That would be great. So we'll tell us what you think. Keep in touch. We will. I'd say if any of you have recipes that you've tried with some of your grow along vegetables, please share those with us.
00:22:56:03 - 00:23:14:19
You can do that if you're watching the video. You can do that down below in the comment section. Email us. Or I guess we'll probably even have one of them good old surveys coming out later at what we do. We gotta know what you think. So yeah, that was fun. We got a meal out of it, too, I know that.
00:23:14:19 - 00:23:32:22
Yeah, yeah, we got to get together. So thank you guys for. Thank you for hosting us. Chris. Thanks for coming to McCullen, Illinois. All right. Well, until next time, keep on growing. Keep on growing and growing. You gotta keep it on.
00:23:42:20 - 00:23:54:03
than I can see here. We are good. I baby.
00:23:54:05 - 00:23:58:24
I know.
00:23:58:24 - 00:24:16:20
I want to wait and say, what did you guys say when she said welcome to the good girl? Girl? I'm thinking number three. Okay, I will check in. Okay. So final. Recording.
00:24:16:20 - 00:24:24:01
We're professionals. You could do a different ending if you want. No, I like that we're cutting right now.