The Accidental Olympian

ALASKA -- ON A MISSION TO MAKE VEGGIES PRETTY AGAIN

There are many things about Alaska that are spectacular and wonderful. There are also quite a few things about living here that go against my beliefs. Like the size of my carbon footprint. 

Nearly everything in the world I want, need, and consume is being shipped via barge from somewhere else. Mostly Washington. Berries, rugs, popcorn, fixtures, nuts, bolts, puppy food, you name it. 

Or at least this was the case until I started opening my eyes and trying to make a difference.

It is taking a little more work, but it turns out I can get the things I want and need from retailers, producers, and craftsmen here in Alaska. There is dog food make exclusively in Alaska, even a local pet store that I love which enables me to ditch Petco and give all the cash I spend on my pets back into the Alaskan economy. Local bookstores, Alaskan breweries, and more recently my commitment to attempt to buy as much produce as I can with the "Alaska Grown" sticker proudly on the front.  

Because of my new pledge, this weekend I ate the first tomato since May that actually tasted LIKE A TOMATO. It was glorious. I nearly cried.

As well, on Saturday I headed to the Farmers Market, and walked away with lettuce, broccoli, a cucumber, zucchini, fresh white onions, Alaskan caught shrimp (F-you Fred Meyer, I REFUSE to eat Indonesia farmed shrimp when there is fresh shrimp right there in the water!), Alaskan grass fed beef and prosciutto, Alaskan basil and parsley. All raised right here in Alaska thereby making the carbon footprint of my salad once again in the normal and respectable range. 

I also talked with the ladies of Matanuska Creamery about their dairy farm, tasted some of their delicious cheese (getting some next week when our gross block of tasteless crap is gone), and spied their beautiful ice cream. Our conversation led me to notice their yellow milk jugs at the local grocery store, helping me to finally support a local organic dairy, instead of being forced to buy crap milk shipped in from who the hell knows where. 

And if all that wasn't enough, I also saw some of the most beautiful cauliflowers I've ever seen in my life. 

Yes, that last one is an edible cauliflower! I don't know that I could eat something so beautiful though. 

This weekend I didn't reinvent the wheel, I didn't become a homesteader, and I'm not in a place where I can grow all my own produce to decrease both my grocery bill and my "environmental guilt" but, I can support the farmers of Alaska in my own garden's absence and that little step makes me feel just a smidge better about my footprint, and I think it's a step in the right direction. 

Some day I'll have my dream house with my super garden, my chickens and turkeys. I'll grow as many veggies as I possibly can, make my own tomato sauces and have a freezer full of my own frozen produce to get me through winters. 

But until then I'll just keep collecting ideas on my Pinterest account for this dream home/farm of mine, and in the meantime I'll make the commitment that in January I wont buy lettuce at the grocery store because I know that lettuce had to be shipped in from who knows where, and potatoes will do just fine to get me through the winter. 

And that salad in the early spring will taste so much better when I know it came from my very own window box. 

 

 

Sorry if things got a little preachy around here. It's just I've had a lot of time this summer to think about growing food, my current inability to grow much food compaired to living in Olympia, and how much work it takes to get everything I buy to me in Alaska. The days of living in the abundance of Washington are very, very over and I'm finding I need to adapt. 

 

THERE WAS A TIME WHEN I THOUGHT I WAS GOOD AT GROWING THINGS

Sadly, those times have past my friends. 

As much as I wish it wasn't, gardening is a science. Soil, light, water, wind, rain, heat. They have to be right for these little seeds to turn into tasty plants. The reality is that before you have a good garden, the summer before you have a trial by fire, why the hell is nothing working, garden. 

Currently I have a, WHY IS NOTHING WORKING? Garden. 

I wanted to keep it a secret you see, my garden failure, but then Grumbles went and shared her tomato monsters with the world and suddenly I had flashbacks to my masterpiece that was my garden last summer, and OH THE JEALOUSY. 

Want to see my mess? My things I have nothing to brag about seeing as it is already nearly August and I've tasted only a handful of spinach leaves? 

(sigh)

Fine, I show you my shameful excuse for a "garden." Please don't laugh. 

 

 

These tiny tiny seeds were started in early MAY. It is now nearly August and I am no closer to adding basil, oregano, parsley or cilantro to my meals than I was in the dead of winter. Why herbs, why do you forsake me? 

In Olympia I started seeds, they took off in about 17 seconds, two weeks later they were in the garden, in minutes I was picking tasty leaves. In Alaska I apparently bought snail speed herbs that hate me. And guess what? I hate you too. 

 

Next on my list of ways I suck at gardening we have my two types of lettuce and some green onions. All of which were seeded in MAY and are still pathetic, weirdly shrived little messes in late JULY. Lettuce for those who are unaware are supposed to be ready to eat in about 30-45 days. Hmmmm.

I believe I have a few things working against me. I think first of all they are actually getting too much sun, and the fact that they sit on the balcony edge means they're being abused by wind. 

SO, in a last ditch attempt to eat something before the snow comes I've removed the pot from the ledge and placed it on the floor of our deck so that the lettuce might receive direct sun only half of the day. We'll see if I have even one leaf of lettuce before October. Fingers crossed. 

OK ok, I'm being slightly dramatic. There are two areas where I have not totally fallen on my ass. Beans and spinach. I didn't get around to planting anything until mid to late May seeing as we'd just moved and my brain was having a hard time thinking of anything other than, "Where the hell did the cheese grater go?" Planting and gardening was hard to jump on board with so I got a really late start. 

Considering I also had a SPECTACULAR failure right out the gate when all my herb and bean seedlings died on me (really this has been a whopping failure in garden land) I don't think these particular beans were even planted until nearly June. JUNE PEOPLE. 

But, they're alive. They're growing! And if they keep it up I might have a bean by late September. Maybe. 

And finally we have spinach. This is my second pot of spinach, which you can see I have to get to work plucking leaves asap since it's starting to flower. 

My first batch of spinach was a tremendous FAILURE. It got all brown and burnt around the leaves and I think I only tasted ONE little leaf from my first pot. But I was smart enough to plant this second batch when I saw how sad my first yield was going to be, and this might be enough for one salad. 

I'm starting to realize that if I wanted to grow enough spinach to feed my obsession I'd need to devote my entire balcony, backyard and front yard to the crop. Crazy town. 

As it stands I feel like I have so very little to show for my "garden." I've restarted another batch of spinach in the original container, I'm hoping the new location for my lettuce and onion pushes them to actually GROW, my herbs just make me mad, and I'm really hoping the beans come through as the winners of this miserable gardening summer. 

My only real saving grace is that I know I had to fail this summer to do it right next summer. That's the horrible thing about gardening, 95% of the time your first summer will suck. But, you'll figure out what works and doesn't, you'll spend the winter dreaming of a new arrangement, buy amazing wonderful books that fill you with inspiration and happiness, and hopefully next summer I can put to work some of the new ideas swimming in my head and actually, oh I don't know, EAT some of the things I grow. 

Either that or I'll get really depressed and spend next summer looking at pictures of the Olympia garden or standing longingly outside my neighbor's greenhouse until they become so creeped out by me they file a restraining order. 

You never know. 

BLOOM BABY BLOOM

 

 

The flowers, both wild and domesting taking up residence in my life these days.

I CAN'T BELIEVE I FORGOT TO SHARE THIS PICTURE WITH YOU LAST YEAR

Sticking with the theme this week of me holding large food items I realized I totally forgot to share this picture with you last year! 

Yeah. I grew that last year. 

Completely on accident I might add. 

Not only did I have about three zucchini plants too many last year, I also did BLASPHEMOUS things like go on vacations in the middle of harvesting time. Zucchini plants do not like it when you vacation. 

No matter how diligent I was about picking any and all zukes that looked ready before we left for a trip, low and behold I'd come home TWO DAYS LATER to find shit like this growing in my yard. TWO DAYS. 

I have a serious knack for growing fucked up looking veggies. 

And it makes me fairly proud. 

WITH ALL THIS EXCESS LIGHT UP HERE, I BETTER BE ABLE TO GROW SOME EXCEPTIONALLY FREAKISH VEGGIES

As I've lamented before, leaving my garden at the Olympia house was tough. Probably harder than leaving the city itself. 

For a while after we moved into our new place in Alaska I refused to do much of anything related to gardening. REFUSED. But once the sadness of leaving the old garden wore off, and the itch to plant things got stronger I found myself once again wandering the isles at the local nursery and walking out with flowers, seeds, dirt and a whole lot of dorky excitement. 

My main arena for veggies is the front of our house since it gets the best light, and I wasn't about to plant corn in my front yard, so all veggies need to be cultivated from our little second story balcony. It's a step down from the square footage I had only a few months ago, but seeing as last summer I planted FOUR ZUCCHINI PLANTS, maybe less actually is more. 

Already I have beans, two types of lettuce, onions and baby spinach. Soon I'll also have oregano, parsley and basil, and I'm thinking of tossing another pot or two up there to increase my yield. My lack of tomatoes makes me feel like I'm cheating, but unless I find a way to turn my balcony into a tiny greenhouse, I don't think tomatoes and I shall be very good friends up here.

WHICH I MIGHT ADD IS A CRIME. Have you tried Alaskan shipped in from God knows where tomatoes? They are terrible. TERRIBLE I TELL YOU. They ship them in from South America somewhere, and if you buy the organic ones they are pretty much all sitting there rotten before you even buy them. If you find one that isn't bruised you have about 20 minutes to eat it at home before it turns to mush on you.

THIS IS NOT OK.

And that will be the conclusion of my Alaskan tomato rant.

Look! Pictures of things I grew!  

Who knows, maybe next summer after a long and very cold winter I'll tear up the whole front yard and just grow zucchini and corn right where the grass used to be. 

Bet my landlord would LOVE that. 

Wait, on second thought, that sounds delightfully evil. 

Stay tuned for next summer when I try to piss my landlord off by turning my entire front yard into a veggie garden. To make up for the fact that I can't get a decent tomato to save my life up here and the fact that my landlord STILL hasn't finished the painting they started 7 weeks ago.

It's only fair.