A blog of the past (and a link)

Since moving to a new house and garden two years ago, I didn´t find time to blog. I intend to reviwe the danish version, and guess there will be a convenient translation option. I also intend to let wild fermentation become a major subject in my blog.

Skrubtudsens Have

 

Ivan Chai, russian tea

Ready homemade Ivan chai

In Russia, rosebay willowherb (fireweed) leaves are fermented in to a lovely tea. It is an old tradition, and before chinese tea was readily available in Europe, Russia exported huge amounts of Ivan Chai to western Europe. In russian it is known as Koporskij chai (Копорский чай) or Ivan chai (иван-чай), but Ivan chai is also the russian name for rosebay willowherb, as found growing in the wood. Leaves are picked both before and during flowering.

 

Rosebay willowherb, Chamerion angustifolium

Rosebay willowherb often grow in large groups in clearings in the forest or wood. It is quite common in my area. You can start to harvest as soon as you recognize the plants, and you can continue during flowering until seeds are formed. Seed fluff in your tea is not pleasant. 

A harvest tip: Grab the stem below the inflorescence. With the other hand slide down the stem, collecting all the leaves while doing so. This way you can harvest what you need for a year in an instant.

 

The fermented leaves prior to drying

The leaves must undergo a fermentation process to bring out the good flavor. The flowers can be dried without fermentation and mixed in as decoration.

Russia is a huge country, and similarly there are many opinions on how best to ferment and dry Ivan chai.

I chose to squeeze the leaves until the got soggy from their own juice, tucked them firmly in a polythene bag and let them ferment for two days. I’m using longer fermentation than russian sources prescribe, as my summer temperatures are considerably lower, and I don’t want to use artificial heating during the fermentation process.
After fermentation I cut the leaves into narrow strips and dry them.

 

Ivan chai after drying

Preparing the tea for drinking, I use about double of black chinese tea. But then I can prepare a nice tea two to three times from the same Ivan chai leaves, before the taste deteriorates.
The taste is lovely, a bit like a cross between black and green Chinese tea. Contrary to Chinese tea, Ivan Chai is slightly sedative.

 

 

Time for Mongolian Tea

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Processed Mongolian tea ready to store

Mongolian tea is naturally, on plant, fermented leaves of Bergenia crassifolia (syn. Bergenia cordifolia). It is used in Mongolia and Siberia, where Bergenia crassifolia grows in the wild. The leaves are collected when the snow melts in the spring.

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Bergenia crassifolia, flowers in may

Bergenia crassifolia is quite a common perennial in older european gardens. It is green all winter. My Bergenia crassifolia comes from my grandparents’ cottage garden. They had a large bed with it, and my mother could remember the plants from before 1930. The bed is still there – the cottage replaced with a modern comfortable house.

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The withered brown leaves harvested in winter

In Siberia and Mongolia is not unusual to drink mongolian tea. I can remember the taste. I definitely got this tea served in Siberia, thinking it was ordinary chinese black tea. Nobody told me I was wrong. The taste is gentle and pleasant.

To make your own mongolian tea, collect leaves blackened over the winter. I have noticed that in cold winters it is good to wait until the beginning of March. In mild rainy winters, I find the taste best when collecting leaves earlier, sometime in January. The crucial for harvest time decision, is how far the natural fermentation has progressed. I look into the bed from time to time during winter.

When leaves are collected, I wash off dirt, chop and dried them. They easily dry on a tray indoors. Quality is not affected by a prolonged drying time, as are so many other products for drying.

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A nice cup of mongolian tea

The mongolian tea is infused like regular black tea. However, one might consider using more tea leaves than usual, to enrich taste and colour. You can infuse the same leaves two or three times, before the taste gets insipid.

Do you want to know more, please search on “Бадан толстолистный”, and translate with Google, babel fish, etc.
Eg. I found out:
When growing, expect to harvest 3-4.5 tonnes of dried leaves per. hectare. The leaves can be harvested from the third year after planting. The area can be harvested 8-10 years or longer.
The thick rhizomes are edible, after a thorough leaching – I found no recipe.

 

Oca harvest

Oca, Oxalis tuberosa, from neglected tubers surviving in the ground during last winter

Oca are late to develop underground tubers. This mild start of winter has been a gift for the ocas. Harvested between christmas and new year, it is my best oca harvest ever.

The two clones that yielded best, I’ve grown for years. The neglected tubers survived last winter in ground. But I guess the better yield is due to better soil and more space.

 

Oca, Oxalis tuberosa, from neglected tubers surviving in the ground during last winter
 
With a good harvest came the desire to use oca for food. They cured some days at room temperature, before being boiled in water until tender. The taste was pleasantly mild and slightly sour. I guess most people will like oca.
 
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Oca from a first year seedling
 
In the spring, I was presented some new oca clones, and a small bag of the rare oca seeds. The seeds made it in to a single healthy oca plant, that produced these nice tubers. Many thanks to Philip Heinemeyer!
 
Oca is producing tubers in short days. Quite unfortunate in scandinavia! For more ease of culture, shortday dependecy need to be bred out of oca, like it was done in potatoes. To breed oca, I need seeds. Before seed harvest, ocas must flower. Unfortunately, also flowering seems to be shortday dependant. (*correction: Oca, I learn, can flower in long days) Anyway, I still wait for the first oca flowers in my garden. While waiting for the flowers, I really appreciate the efforts of gardeners in milder parts of Europe!

 

Entire oca harvest
 

The above photo show the entire oca harvest. The six pots on the right contain named clones and the seedling, the six pots on the left contain the two old clones.
 

Ps. I’ve saved some tubers of all the clones for next garden season.

 

Apios Trial

Apios, Apios americana

A scientist asked if I could send him some old pea cultivars. He is interested in hardy crops that will adapt to climate change. I sent what I could get hold on to him. As thanks, he sent some clones of apios, and asked me to follow them some years and report back. When I reported back last year, he sent several more clones.

Now I’m learning to grow apios. First lessons included.

– If they dry too much on the surface, they go dormant. It can take a whole year for them to break the dormancy. Therefore, they must be kept slightly moist in plastic bags if they are to be sent by mail.

– They can withstand frost, far more than I expect in a harsh winter here.

– They develop edible tubers like huge pearls on a string, and the roots are very long. I have not yet dared to put them into the ground, but grow them in tubs. I was recommended 40ltr. (10,5 gallons, US) tubs as appropriate size, and it has worked fine. Had I carelessly put them in a row in the vegetable garden, I would now, two years later, not be able to keep track of the clones.

The set-up with 40 liter (10.5 US gallon) tubs

First year harvest didn’t impress.

I also learned that Apios are slow food. They must grow for several years before the harvest is reasonable. There’s something to improve, by selective breeding for more productive clones, and a few scientist work on this in USA.
I have yet to see them bloom. No flowers – no seeds – no chance to improve anything. Maybe if I sacrifice space in the greenhouse, I could harvest seeds and start breeding Apios.
For now I’m grateful being able to grow some.

Some of the clones increased surprisingly much in second season

Now I have taken interests in Apios, I have acquired a clone from a danish seed saver who have grown it for a decade I think. It derived from Chiltern Seeds originally. It is shown in the first image in this post. I feel I need it for comparison.

A few good qualities I just have to mention:

– Tubers of Apios contains as much protein as dry beans, and of same good quality.

– Apios can be harvested throughout the year, if frost doesn’t prevent digging in the ground.

There are several pictures of individual clones on my photo page on Flickr:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/10348212@N07/sets/72157651806087245/

PS. The scientist had my short report a few weeks ago. Quite banal, mainly a link to the photos I took (link above). In the text of the pictures I have inserted clone no. and weight, in case it is not clear enough on all photos. In response, he sent a new clone he thinks we can benefit from testing in Scandinvia.

 

Prinsesse NGB18186 and Blauhilde – the Grandchildren

Pods of the last harvest. Phaseolus vulgaris Prinsesse NGB18186 x Blauhilde F2

The best bean cross this year was no doubt the accidental cross between Prinsesse NGB18186 og Blauhilde. It is the F2 generation I have grown, and the seeds harvested is F3. It is confusing for most people. This years F3 seeds will grow the F3 plants next year, to produce the F4 generation of seeds. A little, but for understanding these photos, important detail is, that the seed surface consist of tissue from the mother plant, thus showing us F2 fænotypes. The inside of the seeds with the embryo is F3 tissue. Keep your mind clear, or just enjoy the photos 🙂

F2 generation with a wonderful diversity

Pod shape and colour show a great diversity in this F2 generation. In next generation even more diversity may show, as genes recombine. Some of the beans er quite long. Others are curved and charming, in a way usually selected against in breeding programs. Straight pods are preferred by consumers. As a gardener, I have to find out, if I really share this view on pod shape. I’ve read about german “posthörnchen”, strongly curved wax beans, reminding of old days posthorns.

F3 bean seeds, skin is F2 tissue

Each photo in the above mosaic show the seeds from a harvest event. In the first harvest are only seeds from the early maturing individuals. In following harvest events the same individuals probably also released pods. To me the first harvest is the most important, as cold climate is a limiting factor in beans in my garden.
A few seeds are very dark. One pod in the first harvest, and one in a later harvest. The same plant must have set more pods, with a different colour. This is all normal, as patterned beans tend to make an occasional “negative”.

 

The New Toad

Toad (Bufo bufo) and Leopard slug (Limax maximus)

A new toad has claimed the garden territory. It is still shy when I meet it, particularly in the greenhouse. However, it is calmer than at our first meeting.

It appears to be a friendly little creature. I have seen it cradle with one of the leopard slugs. I hope they join their forces to keep the killer slugs out of the garden.
The hedgehog has also started to patrol the garden, especially in the part of the garden where I find killer slugs. The old toad had no problems with hedgehogs, and I hope the new toad will befriend the hedgehogs in the same spirit.

 

Killer slugs arrived

The killer slug, Arion lusitanicus, have invaded the garden

It’s been many years since the killer slugs was found in a garden nearby. Since then I have every summer expected the invasion. Now it happened, with many years of delay. I have found two adults and four youths in all, on three occasions, within the last three weeks. I have often searched in the garden morning or evening without finding any killer slugs. But now I probably should get the habit of these late walks to round up the slugs, and I hope it will become a dear habit.
They are nicknamed killer slugs, but we are killing more of them, than visa-versa.

A lot of snails and slugs live in the garden already. Since the news of killer slugs approaching, I’ve been more gentle towards my old snails and slugs. It visible in the number of burgundy snails, which has increased from rare to ordinary. They eat tits and bits of my plants, but less than would be annoying. I want them to stay, so I will not use poison or nematodes against the killer slugs. Change my mind later? Maybe! But first I will try to find a balanced way to live with them, and only kill them individually, when I find them, not to suppress my friends, the “old” snails and slugs.

Does anybody know for certain, if the are edible – maybe even delicious?
I could build a cage to collect them, until enough for an hors d’oeuvre. This way I might even be thankful for the day they finally arrived 🙂

From my “old snails and slugs” I have learned, that some things, like germinating melons must be protected, or they will feast on the tender sprouts. But when the plants get just a little larger, they are out of danger. Coffee, ground, fresh or from used filters, keep my “old” snails and slugs off the germinating plants, and no harm done (I hope). I will continue and intensify the use of coffee (it’s also good for the soil).

 

Calamint and Ground-ivy infused Kombucha

Larged-flowered calamint and ground-ivy infused kombucha

Time has started with a lot of seasonal products from the garden. Right now the garden offers lots of calamint and ground-ivy. I’ve only occasionally used the ground-ivy to steep in white wine in May, and the calamint for mixed herbal tea. Now I wanted to mix and cold infuse them in kombucha, and it resulted in a nice refreshing drink.

Kombucha (Чайный гриб)

I have my kombucha from Siberia, where it is called “Чайный гриб”. I feed the kombucha organism with strong tea with 10% sugar, after it has cooled. There should also be a rest of the kombucha tea left in the bottom of the jar. I cover with a cloth and ferment for a week, and then the nice refreshing drink is ready.
At times I make a fresh batch every week. It keeps well in a bottle in the fridge. When tired of the drink for a period, the culture keeps alive on the kitchen desk for months. Over the years I’ve had it survive several periods of inactivity. I was about to take another break, but then got the idea to infuse fresh herbs.

Larged-flowered calamint calamintha grandiflora

Larged-flowered calamint has a nice pleasant aroma, but lack some more rustic elements. It is one of the herbs that are both a herb and a perennial. It lives for several years and self-seeds moderate (easily removed)
Later in the summer there are some lovely flowers.

Ground-ivy Glechoma hederacea

Ground-ivy has a somewhat bitter flavour that is easy to recognize once you’ve tried it. This is both a weed, a herb and a medical plant. In Germany, loved by the name Gundermann. Before hops became universal in beer, ground-ivy was one of the herbs added to spice beer. In my garden it grows overwhelming, spreading by runners into the kitchen garden and establishing it selves even in the lawn. Really a herb for the low care garden.

My previous experience with ground-ivy is adding it to white wine. It should only steep for one hour. If steeping until the next day, the result is very different and in my opinion poor. For that reason I only steep my kombucha for one hour.

 

Digging the Oca

Oca, Oxalis tuberosa

Now I couldn’t wait any longer. I just had to dig into the ground under my oca plants.
This year, several of the tubers have a reasonable size.
Other years they have been too small. There are still many small tubers, so I dug up one plant and let the other two remain in the soil. Since frost and snow can come any day (or maybe only in a month), I chose to cover them with several layers of bubble wrap hold down by wood. The leaves have died from frost long ago, but many of the thick succulent stems are still fresh, and they can quietly nourish the tubers to grow significantly. I want to see how long I can wait to harvest the last two plants. Now that I have dug up enough to put oca again next year, I dare let the time go before I harvest the rest. There seems to be a chance to taste them this year.

Had to use a flash, as it is dark now after work. These dark-dark afternoons are typical of advent and Christmas.