Wednesday, October 29, 2008

October is My Favorite

I've always loved October. Something about the arrival of cooler weather energizes me. I get a lot done in October.

This October I worked on a few projects. Project #1 at the beginning of the month was to bake the yummiest birthday cake for my husband Chip. I chose Macrina's Tuxedo Cake, and it was fabulous. This cake is huge. It goes something like this: chocolate cake topped with chocolate ganache, another layer of chocolate cake topped with raspberries and whipped cream, another layer of chocolate cake and ganache, then the top layer of chocolate cake. All frosted with the most delicious white chocolate cream cheese frosting. Wow. It took me about six hours to bake it and put it together. It was really good but RICH (obviously).


Project #2 was the fall/winter garden. My grandpa grows spinach, mustard greens, turnip greens, and broccoli in his fall/winter garden. Chip and I don't love greens, but we do like spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, and Swiss chard. I bought transplants (the ones I listed plus fennel and leeks) from Mountain Valley Growers. I love this website! I've purchased healthy herbs and perennials from them in the past: thyme, spice islands rosemary, all-purple mexican bush sage. All have performed excellently in my garden. My live transplants were sent via 2-day shipping. I ordered on a Sunday night and the plants arrived that Wednesday afternoon. The packaging is awesome.

I need to buy some fabric row covers. It doesn't get too terribly cold here in central Mississippi. We rarely see low temps drop below 20F, and we're still months away from weather that cold (think February). I am thinking about getting this GardenQuilt cover from Gardeners Supply Company. Anyone out there have experience with this fabric, or can recommend a different one?

4 comments:

Susie S said...

Wow, that cake is amazing! I'm going to have to give it a try for the holidays! Looks fabulous!

dig this chick said...

I am so jealous of what you can grow in the winter!

And, my man would swoon over that cake.

Anonymous said...

My tomato and pepper plants still have babies on them so I have been reluctant to pull them up and start winter veggies, but it's time! I'm going to put the green tomatoes in a brown bag with a ripe apple so they'll turn red.
I'm going to plant carrots, scallions, lettuce, shallots and maybe leeks this fall. I may order some leeks from Mountain Valley -- thanks for the link! I'll probably just throw an old sheet over the raised beds when it's supposed to get really cold, for my "row cover"

Lisa Blair said...

We are lucky to be able to grow veggies well into the winter.

We still haven't had a "hard" freeze, though we've had lows that just reached the freezing mark. Even over the next week or so the lowest low is about 35F.

Ginger, I may try using an old sheet instead of buying something new. Lord knows I've got plenty that could be of service.