Asian Caprese

Sometimes when using ingredients from your garden you have to improvise. I had a big variety of tomato (Celebrity) but it only produced one tomato and it still is not ripe yet. The Celebrity tomatoes skin is also split due to a slight drought and then excess watering. Given all that I have abandoned my one Celebrity tomato. Today I wanted to make a salad but didn't have any lettuce or spinach ready in the garden. I did have plenty of.....


Thai Basil,

Yellow Pear Tomatoes,
and a block of Mozzarella cheese, I would have rather used the fresh mozzarella....but this works.
I de-stemmed the basil, cut the mozzarella into cubes, and sliced the tomatoes down the long ways to keep there artistic shape.

After plating the salad I sprinkled some rock salt over it, and poured some olive oil and balsimic vinegar. YUM!

Yesterday I also bought a pressure canner so that I could can my tomatoes and peppers. At first I was just going to make salsa but I decided that I really don't eat that much salsa and there are so many recipes that I want to try with my peppers and tomatoes so I decided to just can them so that I could use them as I see fit throughout the winter.

My compost pile is starting to get pretty big and hopefully I will have enough compost for my garden next year. I also plan on buying some chicken manure at the local nursery.

In a couple of weeks I am going to dig up yet another part of my yard and create my pumpkin patch for next year. It is going to be in the front yard so I am a bit worried about dogs and kids but pumpkins are tough so I'm not that worried. I also think the neighborhood kids would love to watch the pumpkins grow because I think they are by far the most fascinating fruit to watch develop!