Cob Garden-Week 16

We finished our first batch of Red Marble Cippolini Tomato Sauce. We reduced several pounds of skinned tomatoes with 4 bulbs of garlic last night. Today we added diced up red marble cippolini onions with fresh parsley and flowering marjoram reheated and pureed. Nearly all of it was devoured through the "sampling while cooking" process and I'll have to make an additional batch for canning. Cippolini's are incredibly sweet so next season we'll try to stay dedicated to accurate spacing.

Excavating the Cob Oven

The sauce compliments this divine Raw Ricotta Cheese over a bed of rice penne noodle. This cashew cheese also makes a great stuffing for whole tomatoes.

What you'll need for the cheese

1 Raw Tokyo long onion(or any white finger size onion)

1.5 cups soaked cashews

a handful of cilantro

1/4 cup of volcanic lemon juice

a splash of sunflower oil and enough water to get things going in the blender

Add all ingredients to the blender and serve between the warm sauce and noodles

Applying the Discovery Coat

The Queen of Slip

We've been busy busy transferring the discovery coat of natural plaster to the straw bales. The outside wall has the first coat complete and we're a 1/3 of the way through on the inside. It looks like it takes a few days to fully dry down before the infill coat can be added. That's when the playing and building with clay gets really fun.

Making the Mix

First Coat of Earth Plaster

At some point during this process we worked out individual roles-things we like to do that essentially influenced our efficiency. Apparently, my role as foot mixer evolved from my lack of mud time as a child and my less tender feet than Salty's. So be it. Children have the most fun anyway so might as well join them.

Our first coat of plaster formula was made of 3 parts sand, 2 parts nearly pure clay from underground the streets of Whitefish (a fortunate stroke of luck), 1 bucket native dirt from the earth oven project and 1 gallon straw. This was tinkered with by adding about 1.5 gallons of coffee bean frass during the final stomp for added aroma and binding strength to the mix. I found this more pleasant and realistic than trying cow poop as an additive.

I started with the volcano of sand then slowly added the buckets of clay. Mixed with the feet till homogeneous then added the bucket of earth oven dirt. Resumed jumping. Rolled the plaster around in the tarp. Sprinkled with straw and coffee frass- returned to the rhythm of mixing with feet/rolling the tarp. Continuously repeating for 15 or so minutes until a nice form resulted.

I knew the brownie batter batch was sufficiently worked if it stuck together as above. 3 mixes of this filled the wheel barrow and covered the outside wall (120 square feet). We applied the mix by hand. You basically work a clump in your hand then apply it to a freshly misted wall emphasizing pressure up and with the palm. It went on about 1/2 inch thick. We were building up low points in the wall with a straw/clay/slip filler from any that fell to the ground.

It took about 4 days to dry down and during this interlude we dove into using a new batch of the same mix on the inside. The loose straw at the top proved quite challenging so we stapled burlap to the frame and tucked it under the stuffing before applying the plaster.

The plaster inside dried much quicker with more consistently warm air in the greenhouse. We gave our next round of starts a mist. We have pablo and slo bolt lettuce going again, cilantro, northern lights chard, peppers, calendula, basil and leftovers from summer-turkish eggplants and hungarian peppers which were attempting to raise as mother plants for next season. There's even a baseball size watermelon between the eggplants that I'm curious if it even has sweet fleshy insides yet.

Spraying Clay Slip

We used a plaster gun to spray the slip on. The actual making of the slip took much longer than the applying.

Here's the process:

the clay mix was screened on 1/2 inch wire mesh over one trash can

hydrated until entirely covered & stirred with a hoe

the mix settled out for a few days till the water on top ran clear

the water was then scooped off leaving just a little for the clay slurry and felt like the consistency of heavy cream

this was then poured in 1 gallon batches over a window screen secured with a bungee cord over another trash can

The Results

One trash can of finely screened slip covered about 240 square feet.

Applying the Slip

It took two people to use the plaster gun since the batch sits on top of the gun in a large funnel which is difficult to balance while trying not to drench the wall.

It took a half hour to apply and the slip dried in 24 hours

Our Slip Soloist painted flour paste glue onto the straw bale brace boards prior to spraying the slip. Wood needs this adhesion coat of flour paste and sand for the first coat of plaster to bind to. More like binding to like.

So on to the first plaster batch known as the "Discovery Coat"

Strawbale Braces

I notched the bales with the prying end of a hammer so our 1x3 braces would lay flush to the wall. You'll notice we stacked the bales nearly vertical since the straw is not load bearing and would require less loose straw stuffed areas. Once again the hammer is a handy tool far surpassing the utility and noise if I had used the "literature suggested" chainsaw or roto-zip method.

Salty then anchored the braces into the frame so we skipped the part on threading string to the bales. The top of the wall was stuffed with sections of bales turned sideways and later covered with burlap for the plastering. The top needed no notching just a little side to side movement with hand to separate the pieces of straw.

We stuffed the cracks and seams with dry straw to the middle of the wall and filled the outer 4-6 inches with a straw/slip mix as we plastered to bring the wall semi flush. The consistency of the infill would make a ball when worked with the hands. We applied it by smushing the sphere to it's furthest structural limits and joining the edge where it met the slip-sprayed-straw with a little extra slip. Like joins like.

Also worth mentioning skipping the weed eating part turned out to be a poor choice as compensating for valleys in mountains in the straw was even more time consuming while plastering. Five minutes of prep to trim the wall flush after stacking the bales and before any other step would of saved us at least an hour or two infilling those elevations. So be advised TRIMMING is worth it.

Week 15-Wall Raising and Dancing

We have clay and sand!

The wall and cob oven projects are going for the fall and the weather is staying temperate. Our 2nd round of peas may actually make it outside too.

This weeks share is more heirloom tomatoes, herbs for salsa, onions, chard, kale and apples. Try the kale de-stemmed and fry with garlic and butter. Grate the apples, add to the kale with a little lemon juice and a 1/4tsp of garam masala. Cook down till apples are soft then serve.

Apple pies really good too

Week 13/14 Summer in September

This share seems like a lot of food as we combined 2 weeks in one as many crops were ripening up. Daytime to nighttime temps have been swinging 50 degrees with the nights in the 30's. The plants are giving it their last hoorah. We survived the last freeze with just some basil lost. Next year all pesto for the freezer must be made by Sept 1st. And yes, we have another freeze in a couple days so we'll be watering and hoping for the best. So, with all this variability in temps we started to increase the harvest for the share, the freezer, the dehydrator and mason jars.

By now you've probably discovered a couple bags of heirloom tomatoes the Polish Soldaki's being my favorite (pink and funky shaped), a bag of arugula-mizuna green mix, purple cipolini onions, some yellow squash and grey zucchini, a bundle of bok choy greens, parsley and cilantro, hardneck garlic and nasturtium flowers.

In preparation of growing as long as possible. We've been working on laying the floor in the greenhouse and prepping all the potting supplies for fall/winter greenhouse growing and spring planting. We're exploring what type of heat source will be most efficient-woodstove, rocket bench or perhaps a lorena oven to keep the greens, cruciferous plants, herbs, chard and overwintering peppers warm.

We lost 2 crops of peppers so far this season (too cold spring-coconut planting mix-who knows) but the 3rd is looking the best out of all of them. The sun is dropping lower in the sky and shinning more directly into the greenhouse where heat loving watermelons and peppers in pots call home. We've had luck in other parts of the country overwintering peppers and putting them out the following summer. Then they are strong mother plants and produce beautiful fruit. This may be bordering on impossible with negative temperature winters in Montana but we'll see.

We're thrilled with the idea of fresh greens all winter and started the pablo and slo bolt lettuce, cilantro and basil over the last 2 days. This weeks planting menu includes beets, onions, arugula and sweet peas. We all need a little extra sweet smelling, vibrancy during the winter months and sweet peas might be the right potion.

Keep it up Summer in September.