HAPPY TO BE A WOMAN

Growing up with so many guys around, I'll be honest, I got a little spoiled... these days however, I'm not so fortunate but at least I'm learning to work smarter, rather than harder - like wetting the soil before I dig into it.

With the severe water restrictions in Gauteng right now, I'm obviously enormously grateful for the gentle rains we've been blessed with in the afternoons. I'm trying to make the most of the moist soil and cooler temperatures for my ever-growing list of cooking and gardening chores, so here's a quick summary of what I've been up to in and around the house lately.

The Tepache was a splendid success, and one sweltering evening I stacked a glass full of frozen fruit cubes and topped it with her refreshing brew - I will definitely be making this one again.

The yogurt was also a massive success... hard to think it started with a lemon and some milk. I was absolutely over the moon with the end result, and it's been going down well with my homemade muesli and frozen blueberries.

My cute pineapple crown from last Monday has already developed little nodes all around... I suspect what I'm observing is the start of roots.

And I finally planted some watermelon seeds in cups and scattered the rest amongst the leaf mulch in the garden beds... even if just one plant sprouts and grows to bear fruit, I'll consider it a win.

My ginger pre-soaked and showing lots of growth potential, I also popped those in a pot on Friday morning.

And placed it next to the potatoes I planted in September.

Then over the weekend I planted out the oak sapling I sprouted from an acorn a while back. There's this rich Mediterranean and Middle Eastern history of oak as a staple, and so I hope to one day harvest my own acorns and turn some into flour, to bake with, and others for iron gal ink, the same indelible ink used by Da Vinci, Bach, Rembrandt and Shakespeare. It usually takes oak gals, but it's commonly accepted that the acorns work as a perfect substitute due to its high tannin content.

Which coincidentally is the same reason its leaves, along with bay leaves, can be substituted in fermented goods that require grape leaves for crispness. Speaking of fermented goods, I've been craving fermented dill cucumbers for a while now and stumbled upon this easy to do recipe...

So I went in search of, and found a flowering dill at a nearby nursery.

Then I prepped the cucumbers as instructed.

And afterwards I transplanted the remainder of the dill into the garden.

This morning I awoke to a beautiful semi-overcast morning, the soil still moist from last night's rain, and feeling inspired, I cleared this overgrown bed, for the new batch of roma tomatoes that sprouted from kitchen scraps.

Just figured, the burglar guarding will work ideal as a trellis too later on, once they need upright support.

Oh, and my Ginger Beer is busy brewing... so yea, a lot of exciting things happening, all at once. I am blessed, truly blessed to be able to be a woman and right now I'm enjoying every moment of it, thoroughly.

WORDS: rhodenel©11NOV2024 

PHOTOGRAPHY: rhoderuth©NOV2024