It is cold outside today. Perfect time for a hot cup of tea, my seed box and a stash of seed catalogs. Time to plan the next gardening season.
The first step is to take stock of the previous season, which I kind of do as I go along. I take notes throughout the season and then make a summary in late fall. I reflect on what worked well in the garden and what did not, and take note of what vegetable varieties I would like to grow again this season and in what quantities (same/more/less). Are there any new vegetables or varieties I might want to try this year? Are there any that I will definitely not grow again (because they did not do well, I did not like the taste, they took up too much space, required too much labor, were decimated by pests etc.).
Second, I take inventory of my seeds. I store all my seeds in a single cardboard box and use simple card stock dividers to sort the seeds by vegetable. Every winter/early spring, I go through the box and discard the old seeds and make a list of vegetable seeds I need to buy for the next season.
I then plan the layout of my plot and draw up a planting diagram for the year. I like to rotate crops and this is this year’s plan:
Here is my general plan for the garden plot for 2019:
- tomatoes (6 to 8 plants total: 3-4 early, 3-4 mid/late)
- eggplant (2-3 plants)
- hot pepper (1-2)
- cucumber (1 cell of 3-4 plants)
- butternut squash (1)
- basil (5)
- carrots (2 rows spring, 2 rows summer/fall)
- radishes (2 rows)
- garlic (5 rows)
- golden beets (1 row)
- fingerling potatoes (1 large hill)
- Swiss chard (1 row)
- kale (4 plants)
- leaf lettuce (1 row)
- head lettuce (1 row)
- peas (2 rows)
- bush beans (2 rows)
- pole beans (1 tipi)
- leeks (2 rows)
- fall greens (1 row)
- bok choy (1 row)
- spinach (1 -2 rows in the fall)
- flowers: dahlias, cosmos, sunflower, zinnia, nasturtium, marigold
- parsley
- sage
For my back porch, I am planning: 1-2 tomato plants (I will select varieties that are suited for containers), 1 hot pepper, 1 mini eggplant, chard, head and/or leaf lettuce, herbs (sage, thyme, rosemary, parsley, basil, mint) and flowers.
Now comes the fun part — I browse the seed catalogs (paper copies and online) and make a preliminary list of interesting varieties to consider. I will then narrow down the varieties and prepare my final seed orders. I have yet to start saving my own seeds. Maybe this is the year?
Last night’s dinner was Moroccan meatballs with harrisa, cumin-roasted cauliflower with tahini, Greek salad and rice. The five tomatoes in the salad were the very last ones from my garden. They had been ripening on the kitchen window sill for the past five weeks. They were so very tasty.
We spent Thanksgiving at our friends’ house and I was on appetizer duty. My daughter and I made these 
Eating from the garden in November – potato leek soup. Leeks, garlic and parsley are home-grown.
Last two cloves of (volunteer) hardneck garlic. Now onto the softnecks.
Leeks and garlic sauteed in butter.
Add potatoes …
… and water , salt and pepper. Simmer for 20 minutes and puree. To be served with chopped parsley, bacon bits and homemade croutons. Yum!
Today I spent a couple of hours raking our back yard (I had great help by my son) and clearing out the front yard flower bed and then moved on to the community garden. It is supposed to dip down to the 20s tonight so I thought it would be a good time to get the garden ready for winter. I got a bale of field hay from 
Still growing are two stalks of Brussels sprouts …
…, two stalks of kale and about a dozen leeks. Ready for winter:
Yesterday was the Head of the Charles Regatta here in Boston and my 16 year old-daughter participated with her high school’s girls varsity Eight. They did great and qualified for next year’s event but the conditions were rough. It was very cold (40s), with a light drizzle at the beginning of their race and the wind was fierce. Our family spent most of the day outside and we all felt this weather called for soup for dinner. So, I made the first butternut squash soup of the season. I like to roast the squash at 425 for about 45 minutes depending on the size (I typically add fresh herbs at this step, this time it was sage and rosemary from my porch kitchen garden). In the meantime, I saute an onion in butter in the Dutch oven. I then add the roasted squash and saute for a couple of minutes, add water (or veggie broth) and simmer for 15 minutes. I then puree it and add a cup of milk and more water to make it the desired consistency and season with salt and pepper. I like to serve it with a spoonful of grated Parmesan on top and fried sage leaves (optional) and with fresh crusty bread on the side (yesterday’s sourdough bread was from 
Squash is roasted cut side down at 425 F. (The smaller squash on the side was the one from my garden. It was very tasty.)
Post-roasting, nicely caramelized. 
I planted my garlic today after putting in a few hours of community work in the garden. I planted two rows of hardneck (Red Russian) and 3 rows of softnecks (Transsylvania), 7 cloves per row. This is the earliest ever I planted garlic. Normally I wait until the first week of November. But we already had two nights of light frost and the weather the next two weeks looks good (50s and 60s), so the garlic should be able to set some nice roots before winter is here for good.
Today’s harvest: a couple of carrots, parsley, the last two hot peppers, a tiny butternut squash (the foliage was already damaged by frost), and the last dahlia. I pulled all the tomatoes, eggplants, cucumbers, nasturtiums and beans and semi-cleaned the plot to get it ready for planting garlic. I still need to do more weeding, pull the dahlia tubers and will need to get hay to mulch the plot.
Rainbow chard
Brussels sprouts