Make a Hypertufa Trough - Fine Gardening Article

Make a Hypertufa Trough - Fine Gardening Article

Lavender Martini Recipe------- Think spring!

So you made the lavender syrup recipe below, now what to do with it.

Lavender Martini
Ingredients
1 ounce lavender simple syrup
2 ounces vodka
splash of soda
Directions
1Combine vodka, syrup, and soda into a martini shaker with plenty of ice. Shake for 20 second or until well mixed.
Pour into martini glass, add a sprig of lavender.

A fun recipe to do with the kids this summer when the fields are in full bloom with unsprayed wild clover. Over a hundred years old from an old New Hampshire native.

HOMEMADE HONEY

2 1/2 cups white clover flowers (No green parts)

1 cup red clover flowers (No green parts)

Petals of four wild roses

10 cups sugar

1 teas. alum

3 cup water






Directions:

1.

Wash blossoms and drain well.

2. Bring all ingredients except alum to a boil and stir slowly.

3. Add alum and stir 60 times (no more, no less). Turn heat off

Allow to streep for 3 hours.

4. Strain mixture through cheesecloth, reheat to boil and pour into clean sterilized 6 oz containers.


Note: If you use green parts your recipe will taste grassy.

Debra Lee Baldwin - How to Plant a Succulent Container Garden

Gardening Rhythms: Vertical Garden /Succulents Part 2

Lavender Syrup

Lavender simple syrup
Ingredients
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup lavender flower buds
Heat 1 cup of water and 1 cup of sugar until sugar is disolved.
2Add 1/4 cup of lilac flowers and allow to simmer on low heat for 10 minutes.
If desired, add a few blueberries for color or use food coloring.
3Drain syrup into a sealable glass jar - through a filter in order to remove the flowers. Let it cool, and then put in the fridge.
4Add syrup to tea, cocktails, or use as a syrup.

HOREHOUND COUGH SYRUP
Make an old-time cough remedy by mixing horehound tea with honey.  Make an infusion by steeping 1 ounce of fresh or dried horehound leaves in a pint of boiling water. Allow it to steep only 10 minutes.
Strain off the leaves, then measure the quantity of liquid remaining. Add twice as much honey as liquid, mix well, and bottle.
To soothe a cough, take 1 teaspoon at a time, about 4 times a day!! Taken from: Rodale's Illustrated Encyclopedia Of Herbs
HOREHOUND DROPS
1 cup fresh horehound leaves
I cup water
2 cups sugar
2 tablespoons corn syrup or honey
Put the horehound in a small non reactive sauce pan and add the water.  Bring to a boil and simmer, covered,
for 20 minutes. Allow to cool, then remove the horehound and squeeze out all of the liquid. Add the sugar and
corn syrup or honey to the pan, stir with a wooden spoon while bringing to a boil, then turn the heat down to a
gentle simmer. If bubbles threaten to overflow the pan, reduce the heat slightly and stir.  Boil to the hard-crack stage. If you have a candy thermometer, this is in the range of 330°F.  Keep
a shallow cup of cold water nearby. Stir the liquid occasionally, and watch how it falls from the spoon. When it forms a thread, begin testing for hardness by allowing a drop of the mixmixture to fall into the cup of cold water. Don't trust your fingers to examine the now hardened drop in the cup: bite it. If it's at all gooey or sticks to your teeth, keep cooking. When it's hard enough to crack when you bite it, remove the pan from the heat immediately.
If the mixture crystallizes, just add a cup of water and an extra tablespoon of corn syrup or honey to the pan, scrape all of the crystalline chunks into it, and begin again.
Lightly butter a candy mold, cookie sheet, or other heatproof baking pan, and pour in the hot mixture. If
you're using a flat-bottomed pan, score the surface of the candy after it has cooled enough to become firm. This
will help in breaking it apart, which should be done as soon as the candy can be handled.  After individual "drops" are
formed, sift granulated or powdered sugar over them to keep them from sticking together Store in a moisture-
proof container.
From the Herb Companion Magazine

Some home gardeners already use vinegar as a herbicide, and some garden stores sell vinegar pesticides. But no one has tested it scientifically until now.

Agricultural Research Service scientists offer the first scientific evidence that it may be a potent weedkiller that is inexpensive and environmentally safe--perfect for organic farmers.

ARS researchers Jay Radhakrishnan, John R. Teasdale and Ben Coffman in Beltsville, Md., tested vinegar on major weeds--common lamb’s-quarters, giant foxtail, velvetleaf, smooth pigweed and Canada thistle--in greenhouse and field studies.

They hand-sprayed the weeds with various solutions of vinegar, uniformly coating the leaves. The researchers found that 5- and 10-percent concentrations killed the weeds during their first two weeks of life. Older plants required higher concentrations of vinegar to kill them. At the higher concentrations, vinegar had an 85- to 100-percent kill rate at all growth stages. A bottle of household vinegar is about a 5-percent concentration.

Canada thistle, one of the most tenacious weeds in the world, proved the most susceptible; the 5-percent concentration had a 100-percent kill rate of the perennial’s top growth. The 20-percent concentration can do this in about 2 hours.

Spot spraying of cornfields with 20 percent vinegar killed 80 to 100 percent of weeds without harming the corn, but the scientists stress the need for more research. If the vinegar were sprayed over an entire field, it would cost about $65 per acre. If applied to local weed infestations only, such as may occur in the crop row after cultivation, it may only cost about $20 to $30.

The researchers use only vinegar made from fruits or grains, to conform to organic farming standards.

By Don Comis USDA
May 15, 2002

Veggie Tacos

Veggie Tacos

Apple Butter Coffee Cake

Apple Butter Coffee Cake

Smashed Garlic Fried Potatoes

Smashed Garlic Fried Potatoes

Spanish Garlic Soup

Spanish Garlic Soup

Blueberry Stuffed French Toast

Blueberry Stuffed French Toast