Carol

Sure, I love the beautiful, peaceful aftermath of a snowstorm, with the pure white fluffy stuff piled high like so much Marshmallow Fluff. But other than that, I can leave behind in a heartbeat the cold, the gray, and the icy.

On the other hand, one thing that we do get in winter that isn’t so great in summer is citrus fruit. I love a good orange and would travel the country to find a kumquat—even going so far as to buy a tree of my own (long story for another time, but it turned out it wasn’t a kumquat).

However. This week—in May!—I saw a bag of “raspberry oranges” in the grocery store and just had to try them. I learned that they are an inspired hybrid between the Pomelo and the Tangerine. Smallish oval fruits, their insides are a deep red.

Although they’re not overly sweet (and I like a sweet orange), they actually have a taste of raspberry in them. Wow.

But what makes the flesh so red? Well, raspberry oranges are simply the result of a natural mutation of the standard orange that led to the production of anthocyanins, the water-soluble flavonoids that make blueberries blue and blood oranges red.

So, then I wondered what was the difference between a raspberry orange and a blood orange? After all, both have deep red flesh.

It’s just marketing. Maybe producers, or their advertising managers, finally came around to understanding that the name “blood orange” sounds just plain creepy. (And this from somebody who writes mysteries.)

Any way you slice them—or call them— these fruits are delicious.

In a world where sustainable living and aesthetic appeal go hand in hand, creating an edible landscape has emerged as a harmonious blend of functionality and beauty. An edible landscape refers to a garden that features plants that are both ornamental and edible, producing both an appealing visual setting and a source of homegrown produce. In this article guest blogger Clara Beaufort https://gardenergigs.com/about/ guides you through the art of crafting an edible landscape that not only delights the eyes but also provides a bountiful harvest.

Select the Right Plants

Plant selection is a critical aspect of crafting an edible landscape. Choose plants that thrive in your area and that serve a dual purpose—edible and ornamental—to ensure your garden offers both a visual delight and a fruitful harvest. For example, lavender not only adds a pop of color, but its blossoms can be used in various recipes. Similarly, blueberry bushes offer succulent fruits and striking autumnal foliage.

Create a Relaxing Space

Enrich your edible landscape by incorporating an outdoor seating area. This personal oasis offers a venue for relaxation while allowing you to enjoy the fruits of your labor. Adding features like pergolas or water fountains can augment both the aesthetic appeal and the overall value of your property.

Introduce Edible Grasses

Gardenia notes that starting with edible ornamental grasses offers an elegant yet practical way to establish a natural border around your property. Grasses such as lemongrass or vetiver serve as defining features that outline your garden and contribute to the culinary palette. Their leaves and stems can be harvested for various dishes, making them multifunctional elements in your landscape.

Invite Everyone Over for a Party

Hosting family, friends, and neighbors to marvel at your garden’s bounty and to partake in a meal crafted from its produce is a splendid way to celebrate your hard work and share the fruits of your labor. If you’re looking to make this gathering even more special, you can design your invitation in minutes utilizing a free online tool to craft beautiful, custom invitations. By selecting a premade template, you can personalize it with unique fonts, your own images, and distinctive design elements, setting the perfect tone for your garden feast.

Group Plants Strategically

Efficiency is key when it comes to managing a thriving garden. Be.Green suggests grouping plants according to their sunlight and water requirements to optimize their growth conditions. For example, shade-loving plants like mint and water-loving ones like watercress can be planted together. This strategic approach makes garden maintenance easier and more efficient.

Make Money Out of Your Garden

Starting a YouTube channel focused on educating viewers on creating an edible garden or showcasing your gardening journey can be a fruitful way to monetize your passion. By forming an LLC, you benefit from limited liability, tax advantages, less paperwork, and more flexibility, making it an ideal choice for those running a business. To avoid hefty lawyer fees, consider filing the LLC yourself or through a formation service like Zenbusiness who can make the process fast and straightforward.

Diversify Design

Variety is the spice of life, and the same applies to your edible landscape. Achieve visual allure by incorporating diverse colors, textures, and shapes. A blend of leafy greens, vibrant fruits, and blooming flowers creates a mosaic of visual elements that elevate the aesthetics of your space. Swiss chard, for example, offers colorful stalks, while nasturtiums introduce lively hues and are also edible.

Use Space Wisely

Space constraints shouldn’t deter you from building your edible landscape. Raised beds and container gardening can prove invaluable in making the most of limited areas. These methods maximize your gardening space and make it easier to control soil quality, resulting in a more abundant yield.

Crafting an edible landscape seamlessly integrating functionality and aesthetics is an art form. It rewards the senses, fosters community engagement, and contributes positively to the environment. By embracing these key principles, you’re not just cultivating a garden but creating a flourishing, sustainable haven that enriches your life and those who gather within it.

 

In honor of my congregation’s 100th anniversary, I was asked to do a cooking workshop. (As if I would say “no”!) But why limit ourselves to one dish and one workshop? So, I thought, let’s do one recipe from each of the main streams of Diaspora life: Ashkenazi (Eastern European), Sephardi (originating in Spain and spreading eastward due to the Inquisition), and Mizrahi (Middle Eastern).

First up was Ashkenazi, but I didn’t want to do the same-old, same-old with which we are all familiar. You know, rugelach, matzah brei, stuffed cabbage. Could there be something I’d never had? Yes there was! Hungarian shlishkes, a gnocchi-like potato dumpling. Now, Eastern European Jews depended heavily on potatoes in the shtetl because they were easy to grow and within their budgets. And nutritious. Remember Mark Watney of Martian fame? But they were ubiquitous to the point that there’s even a Yiddish folksong satirizing the daily menu of potatoes:

Sunday potatoes. Monday potatoes. Tuesday and Wednesday potatoes. Thursday and Friday potatoes. But shabbos, for a change… potato kugel!”

Anyway, here’s the link to the recipe: https://carolgoodmankaufman.com/wp-content/uploads/Hungarian-Jewish-Shlishkes.pdf

This recipe makes a lot. Share prep duties with a friend!

In the Book of Exodus, God promises to rescue the Hebrews “…from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey …”

Now, for many if not most Jews, the honey into which we dip apples at Rosh Hashanah, the new year, is the variety we can purchase at the local grocery store. Whether clover, orange blossom, or any of the other varieties of the stuff that we see on the shelf, all are made by honeybees.

However, some archaeologists believe that the honey referred to in the Bible is not actually the amber liquid to which we’ve become accustomed to see on our holiday tables and incorporated into all manner of honey cakes, taiglach, and other goodies. Rather, they believe it is silan, or date honey, made by boiling and mashing the fruit and concentrating it into a sweet syrup.

But because bees and/or honeycombs are mentioned at least ten times between the Five Books of Moses, the Prophets, and the Writings, I’m not so sure about that rationale.

Regardless, at Rosh Hashanah I’ve started serving both regular old clover/orange blossom/whatever honey and silan with my apples and challah. It is delicious!

 

By now, we all know the 3Rs: reduce, reuse, recycle. In addition to complying with those goals, many of us also compost. But as virtuous as composting makes me feel (and maybe even a little self-righteous), there is downside to the last of the list: drosophila, the mighty fruit fly. These little critters swarm in and around the compost bin, making me want to don a hazmat suit every time I need to go near it.

We’ve tried the vinegar in a jar trick courtesy of a Google search. It didn’t work, so I went online and ordered a plug-in fly zapper. It still hasn’t arrived.

Desperate, I went back to Google, where I learned that fruit flies like banana peels. That news could explain the infestation both in our outdoor compost bin and in my kitchen counter bin. (We forgot to empty the latter before heading out on vacation and returned two weeks later to find a truly disgusting mess).

Back to business: J put a banana peel into an empty applesauce jar, covered it with plastic wrap (yes, I still have some of that stuff around), put a rubber band around the neck of the jar to seal it, and then poked a few holes in the top with a pin.*

By the next morning, dozens of fruit flies were inside the jar. The day after that, hundreds.

It’s not attractive, but if you have fruit flies in your home, the banana peel is the way to go.

* Use only a pin. Anything larger, like a toothpick, and those little flies can come right back out of the jar. In retrospect, that could have been the problem with the vinegar set-up.