Soul Food: Crust-less Bacon and Leek Quiche. Sielskos: Korslose Prei en Spek Souttert

Food is one of my biggest passions... as I think was made clear in my previous post on soul food. Now, with the country being obsessed with the Banting-based Tim Noakes diet, it seems that everyone feels guilty about eating. Yes, I have also tried to cut back on carbs, but I think food is to be celebrated, not regretted. Heck, if you celebrate food by overloading on fat and protein, that's great too.

Bacon & Leek Quiche/Prei & Spek Souttert*

Who ever thought something with as fancy a name as "quiche" could be so simple to make? I follow the principle of throwing ingredients together until it kind of resembles what I'm trying to make, with a recipe as a starting off point. Do you also find it easier to remember made-up recipes than book recipes? I certainly do!

I'm taking liberties in posting this recipe on my blog, as pretty much everything was store-bought. Since I don't live on a farm it's pretty much impossible to make my own cheese and such, but one main ingredient came straight from my backyard vegetable patch. You guessed it; leeks!

Leeks being sautéed in butter/Preie word gesautée in botter

Quiche Recipe (serves 6):

500g chopped leeks/gekapte preie
500g sliced bacon/repies spek
200g cheddar cheese/kaas
8 eggs/eiers
150ml slightly whipped cream/liggeklopte room
2 tbsp butter/botter
1 tsp thyme/tiemie
salt and ground pepper to taste/sout en peper na smaak

Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius
Sauté leeks in the butter
Add bacon to leeks and lightly fry
Mix the cheese, eggs and cream together and whip lightly
Add all the ingredients to a large glass pan
Bake for approximately 35mins

The recipe is easily adaptable. Simply add more bacon for a meatier taste or more cheese and leeks (instead of the bacon) for a vegetarian twist. 

Have you ever tried to make a quiche?

*As this quiche is crust-less, it is Tim Noakes friendly

Backyard Farmer Contemplations. Agterplaas Boer Denke

As the autumn season draws nearer and nearer to a close, I thought it appropriate to reflect on my autumn garden. There isn't too much to show harvest wise, except the abundance of sweet potatoes, but let me share with you the goings on in my corner of the Garden Route:

Black Hungarian peppers and Bishop's Crown peppers/Swart Hongaarse en Klokvormige soetrissies

Bishop's Crown peppers in the backyard veg patch

Black Hungarian peppers in the backyard veg patch

Now that the weather is cooler but still warm, the peppers have come into their own. I think I got the green peppers too late in the season to produce, but the Bishop's Crown peppers have stolen the show. Such pretty vegetables, aren't they? Another pepper that has done really well (despite attempts at annihilation haha), is the Black Hungarian pepper. I got these critters from the kind folks at Organic Seed SA. The peppers turn a deep, glossy purple and is really quite mild. Even people who dislike hot food will love this one.

Tree Tomato/Tamarillo/Boomtamatie vruggies

What were only dainty little flowers on my Tree Tomato two short months ago, developed into plump fruits in the meantime. I can't wait to sample some of these fruits. Not only are they delicously strange and exotic, but they are also packed with vitamin A and C. I think they are a valuable and easy-to-grow addition to any South African garden.

Despite hectic berg winds, hail and the occasional downpour my autumn garden is coming along nicely. I hope to share the progress with you next time :-) 

Cold Season Garden Planning. Koue Weer Tuin Beplanning

I started avidly growing veggies in my backyard about 9 months ago, in the depths of 2013's winter. I was so eager to start, that I totally ignored the time of year and therefore got miserable results. Results which should have been expected, but nevertheless disappointing beyond belief. Yes, most new gardens are over-eager and make the fatal mistake of focusing on the vegetables/fruit trees/plants, instead of the soil. All the research I did beforehand warned me of this fact, so I had no excuse.

I won't make the same mistakes again, or I will at least try to improve on what I did wrong last year. Planning is one thing I'm very good at; sometimes so good that I plan and plan and plan, but never really implement. A character flaw I know. This is how the planning for my autumn and winter garden is coming along so far:

Calculating how much space you have

This was the logical first step for me, since the available space (and the type of space) will tell you the type and quantity of vegetables to plant. No simple task for me, as most of my space isn't square or rectangular beds, but have weirdly winding or circular edges. Blame my parents for their creative garden planning! For any other person this wouldn't be such a hassle, but I'm a sucker for precise calculations and mathematical formulae. Yes, I'm not only a garden geek, but a geek geek as well haha. After countless tries with a broken tape measure, pen and paper, and even calling in the help of a genial best friend (those damn formulae!) I had calculated my veg garden size to near precise dimensions. And so the real fun began...
 

Backyard Veg Patch - cold season crops to follow/Lappie vir herfs en winter groente

Deciding on which veggies or varieties to grow

The four factors which influence me on what to grow and where to plant it, are;

• What do I like to eat? More specifically, what does my family like to eat?
• What worked in my (or the granny's) garden before?
• Which plants or vegetables benefit most from each other? (Companion Planting)
• Which plants or vegetables are most suited to my soil type and amount of shade?

Drawing up a Garden Plan

This is one step that small-scale backyard gardeners don't have to spend too much time on. Being the kind of person that I am, I've spent hours and hours planning, calculating, drawing and re-drawing my very first Garden Plan(s).

I only have three spaces suitable to vegetables and the occasional fruit tree; they measure:

• 6.1 sq meter (of which 4.8 sq meter can be used due to perennials)
• 7.8 sq meter (of which 1.4 sq meter can be used due to shade and trees), and
• 1.52 sq meter (all suitable for planting)

This leaves me with only about 15.5 sq meter. Not much by any stretch of the imagination, so therefore pre-planning is vital to optimise my space.

The most wonderful tool I've discovered online is the GrowVeg Garden Planner. Not only is it free for a 30-day period, but all features are available to users of the free trial programme! The first step in the design is to tell the programme the length and width of your bed. Then you simply choose a veg/fruit/flower type and plan out the rows or blocks desired. The nifty little programme will tell you automatically how many of said plant you can chuck into said space. Marvelous!

Here is an example of my backyard vegetable patch:

Backyard Veg Patch Plan/Agterplaas Tuinplan [copyright www.growveg.com]

See the full plan, all suggestions, and how wonderful this site really is at GrowVeg.com

Preparing the soil

As soon as the summer veggies and flowers start looking a bit straggly and production comes to a grinding halt, it is time to pull them out and either compost or destroy them, depending on whether they are still healthy specimens. This normally happens the last month of summer or in early autumn. In areas where chilly weather comes sooner (like the Free State or Gauteng) it would most probably be end Feb, and the Garden Route area where I live it's more likely to be March. There is no hard and fast rule to the month of the year though. 

From Pumpkin Patch to Onion Bed/Toekomstige wit-ui tuiste?

Now comes THE MOST IMPORTANT TASK IN GARDEN PLANNING... Soil preparation. It is very important to spend most of your available finances on preparing the soil well and the smallest amount on buying plants or seed. The type of soil you have is also very important. This is because you will need to add coarse sand to hard, clay soil or huge amounts of compost to loose, sandy soil. I have a mix of good garden soil and heavy, clay soil in my own garden.  

A rule of thumb is to add two bags of good, organic compost to a square meter of your garden. That is roughly equivalent to 2'' of compost (5cm) on top of your bed. It is also a good idea to add a complete fertiliser to your garden. 10-10-10 fertiliser is the best one to go with (equal amounts of nitrogen, phosphate and potassium). Manure is an alternative to compost, but must be well-rotted. A good indication on whether it is suitable for your veg patch is to smell it. If it doesn't reek to high heaven, it apparently is black gold!

A scattering of red onions to follow/'n Paar rooi uie midde-in die vrugte bedding?

All the preparation stuff must be done at least two weeks before any planting. I've just realised it's already March, and I haven't done even a square foot of soil preparation. I will definitely have to order a bakkie-load of compost from Norgarivier Nursery, some fertiliser... and get in my garden, sweating away!

Favourite Corner - Spring 2013. Gunsteling Hoekie - Lente 2013

Although I'm more of a winter person, Spring is probably the most beautiful season in any garden. The abundance of flowers, new growth in the backyard veg patch, new shoots on trees and iridescent green leaves on deciduous ones. What's not to love?

I want to take this chance to share my favourite garden corner of the season with you:

My favourite corner/My gunsteling hoekie

It's actually a wild mix of grasses, ground cover, indigenous plants, self-seeded volunteers, a huge trunk and an unidentified bush. Oh, and some stones added for effect. I think the result is quite striking. The mother can take most of the credit for this creation though. Can anyone identify the big shrub behind the trunk?

Originally, only pink impatiens was planted, but the bush somehow multiplied into normal pink, dark pink, white and variegated impatiens. Wonderful!

Impatiens galore

The ground cover plant in this spot is Mexican Daisies, or Erigeron karvinskianus. Quite a mouthful for such a petite plant. It might have petite pink and white flowers, but it's an aggressive grower. It survives even the worst neglect and water shortages. A great bonus in an often-neglected garden *blush. 

Dis nie soseer uit pure nalatigheid nie, maar aangesien ons area al deurgeloop het onder erge droogtes is dit slim om waterwys te plant. The neglect is not always voluntary, but sometimes due to serious droughts in our Garden Route area. Therefore I would recommend the Mexican Daisy to all gardeners in this region of South Africa:

Mexican Daisies

The latest addition to this spot, as I wrote about previously, was a Clivia. How happy am I that it turned out to be a red one! Weereens dankie aan 'n dierbare Tannie vir die geskenk!

Red Clivia and pink Impatiens

Do you have a corner in your garden that just makes you happy instantly?