October 18, 2020- closing down

Reality has arrived. We dodged the frost Thursday night. But it is on the menu for the next few nights in Iowa City. I am seriously preparing for the season to be about over.

There were still a few gems this week.

This is another picture from that group of fall crocuses.

This is the yellow toad lily I had mentioned at one point. It bloomed particularly late.

I hired the local muscle yesterday who brought in the really heavy plants. One was Sue Davis' enormous jade plant. Sue was a friend from forever, who died in the fall of 2018. 

We rescued her jade plant/tree

that had grown on her sun porch for 30+ years. The plant arrived at our house about a year ago in a pickup truck. That was after we trimmed it way back to get it out the front door. It spend the summer in the front yard. Now it is in Julia's study. 

The hoyas and orchids and air plants came inside last weekend.

Yesterday was the time for the crotons to migrate. It was 60 degrees which was a good temperature for travel. You would prefer to avoid a big temperature change upon arrival.

The plants that are left outside before it freezes tomorrow night would be about 5 clivias, 12 smaller orchid cactus plants, and 3 bougainvilleas. I am sure I have forgotten someone.

But mostly the migration is over.

I do have to think about over wintering annuals. Sometimes I just take cuttings, Remember cuttings?

Here are some of the impatiens grown from cuttings by the front sidewalk. Julia counted them yesterday. It is not so easy. She counted 193.

The zinnias are lovely. Today they will become cut flowers. Maybe some can go to the office.

Then there are the lantana plants.

I do not know how easily lantana will grow from cuttings. I am about to find out.

I love the color combinations in the clusters.

Julia's recipe          

Pork, bok choy and rice noodle soup

Katie sent me this recipe, for a quick soup for supper. It os adapted from a recipe in Fine Cooking Magazine. The soup is quick and tastes good, both fresh to the table or as leftovers. The pandemic has left some folks with time on their hands, for making sourdough bread and kim chee, but others are still busy. Or have non-cooking hobbies. Decoupage or quilt-making or running in place. This is a good recipe for the busy,   

The ingredients: 1 lb. ground pork (not shown as it was already cooking); 1 tablespoon sesame oil (mine was toasted sesame oil. Non-toasted would be fine too); 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger; 1teaspoon smushed garlic (or a bit more); 6 cups of stock of some kind or part stock and part water; 1/4 cup soy sauce; 1 teaspoon sriracha; about 4 cups sliced up bok choy; 4 oz. or so thin rice noodles (about 1/2 of a package) plus a little salt. 

I had made an impulse purchase of a turnip, which I peeled and quartered and then cut into thin slices - about 1/2 cup of little turnip slices. 

I used bok choy. You could use deveined and thinly sliced kale. Or sliced chard or shredded green cabbage. I think spinach would be too wimpy. Red cabbage would dye everything reddish which would be weird.   

I used ground pork. I think you could use ground chicken or turkey if so inclined. I think ground beef might taste too beefy, not neutral enough for this soup. 

I think you could add modest amounts of other mild vegetables - some zucchini rounds for example. 

First I cooked the ground pork. Mine came from Ms. Pavelka, and it was quite lean. If your ground pork is fatty, drain off most of the fat. 

Next I added the ginger, garlic and sesame oil, and I stirred everything around until it smelled good (maybe a minute or two).

Next I added the stock and some water. I had about 4 cups of pork stock (from cooking bone-in pork in my slow cooker). I used it plus 2 cups of water. Chicken stock would be fine. Chicken stock made from bouillon would be fine. 

I also added the soy sauce and the sriracha and the turnip bits. 

When the contents of the pot came to a boil, I added the bok choy and cooked for about 5 minutes.  

After 5 minutes, I added the noodles - 1/2 of a 7.5 ounce package broken in half. This turned out to be harder than I thought. Rice noodles, even very thin rice noodles, do not want to break in half. I ended up using kitchen shears. 

I simmered the soup until the noodles were soft - not long at all. 

Here it is in the bowl. Flavorful, fast and kind of pretty. We had it with a Greek-ish salad (tomato, cucumber, red onion, feta and kalamata olives) and raspberries with yogurt for a sort of international meal. 

Later in the week, we had the leftovers for lunch. I had about a cup of corn left over in the fridge, which went in and tasted fine. Corn is not an Asian vegetable, but that's okay. Come one, come all I say.

Odds and Ends

I thought I would share pictures of grandchildren from Maine. We are not visiting them this year. That will be an enduring memory of this very trying year.

Christopher is going to be a penguin for Halloween. But along the way he is prepared for 76 trombones. Buttons were actually added after this picture was taken. Julia found him the hat.

Maisie, who is now two months old, appears to have some definite thoughts about this new existence.

One sign of transition is that we got out the flannel sheets yesterday.

Have a safe week, and vote in the real world. We have.

Philip