Category Archives: Adventures

DC State Fair – Even You Can Enter the Fermented Vegetable Contest

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Our fridge: filled with delicious things in glass jars

 

Our own DC State Fair celebrates the growers, the makers, the brewers, the bakers and the fermenters.

Fermenting vegetables?

It’s not just for the Germans, Koreans and bachelors who never clean their fridge.

You can do it – do it this weekend.

You don’t have to grow your own veggies to ferment, just bebop yourself down to your farmers market, buy some stuff to ferment and get to it.

It does take a little planning. Get details below, but you will need non-iodized salt (such as sea or Kosher), an acceptable vessel (a clean glass jar with a lid or a crock) and some recipes call for non-chlorinated water.  You don’t need full-blown canning supplies. See how easy it really is:

  • Dr. Ben Kim: He wants you to buy stuff from him, so block those pop-ups, but his How to Make Kim Chi gives step-by-step pictures and cheer leading.

Once you’ve filled a few jars of fermented, locally grown, organic, hand-picked, biked-it-home epicurean treasure, you’re ready to register for the DC State Fair Fermented Vegetable Contest!  (Note: Your veggies do not need to be organic, local or transported by bike to be eligible to compete.  DC State Fair suggests reading over these researched recipes for fermenting success.  Only 50 entries can be accepted so get busy and register, $5 per entry.)

If your drunk roommate tosses your kimchi at 4:00 a.m. thinking it’s an appropriate time to clean the fridge, you should still join the 2012 DC State Fair fun Saturday, September 22nd, 2012.  As part of the Barracks Row Fall Festival along 8th Street SE on Capitol Hill, there will be a little something for everyone.

Even your hungover roommate.

County and State Fairs – Scratch that Competitive Itch

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Runner-up beans at the 2012 Montgomery County Fair

Do you love the county fair?  Did your parents ever take you to the state fair because there was more fair there?

Remember wrist-band day?  It was caution-to-the-wind as your parents said, “Meet me back here at the grandstand at 6:00.  Sharp.”

You – two bags of cotton candy.  Your best friend – dares you to ride the Gravatron for the fifth time.

We were just at the Montgomery County Fair in  Gaithersburg, MD yesterday.  I’ve been to many fairs and this one blows me away.  Aside from the delightful animal barns with their wooden stalls and open-air construction that encourage you to admire the livestock, the farm, garden and flower contest entries will make any gardener flush with envy.  Tomatoes beckon like seed catalog illustrations and impossibly plump pole beans lay alongside sun flowers that cast shadows.

The Montgomery County Fair just happened to fall on the week following the 2012 Summer Olympics.  I can’t help but wonder if the non-ribbon-winning contestants for Corn – Feed Grade feel it’s an honor just to compete, or, if like McKayla Maroney, they are not impressed with the category’s blue ribbon winner.

What about us in the city?  Can we podium with the spoils of our summer labor on our balconies, tiny front yards and sidewalk tree boxes?  County fairs have strict rules that competition entrants be raised or grown within the county, likewise for state fairs.

Our own DC State Fair answers that call to celebrate – and compete – in agriculture and craft of the urbanite.

If 80 percent of success is showing up, then the 2012 DC State Fair’s broad spectrum of twenty+ contests has a little something for everyone – pick one and show up.

From homebrewing to photography, kid’s art & poetry to beekeeper honey, pie baking to cupcake-ing, knit & crochet & sewing contests to bike accessory making, home pickling & fermenting to vegetable growing – pick your favorite hobby (or learn a new one!) and see how easy it is to register to compete.

Some contests have limited registration capacity, others will accept entries the day of, but plan ahead and envision what you’ll do with that blue ribbon.  (Can you say Instagram gold?)

If your main hobby is socializing, join the fun and cheer on the ag-athletes!  The 2012 DC State Fair will be held Saturday, September 22nd, as part of the Barracks Row Fall Festival along 8th Street SE on Capitol Hill.

Do you live nowhere near DC but want to get in on the grow-your-own and make-it-yourself competitive spirit?  Find your state agricultural fair here or simply Google your county fair for dates and location.

Get the kids involved, or cultivate your own blue ribbon wishes, the fair is for everyone.

Blue ribbons for days at the Montgomery County Fair

Travels – Tennessee Stole My Heart

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No phone picture taken from the backseat while heading to go boating on Norris Lake north of Knoxville can really convey the beauty.

However, winding through those woods and hills, seeing old barns with fresh hay stacked for the cows grazing along the road, following fences around the bend, driving through the dense shadows and into warm golden sunshine – conveyed to me the quietly incredible Tennessee that breaks the bustle of the East Coast and uplifts the sturdy endurance of the Midwest.

Oh, Knoxville, you might be my new favorite thing.

Travels – In Athens Thinking About Sassafras

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Our trip has become a gardener meet-up and I love it. Yesterday Mia and I had a whirlwind and excellent coffee break in Atlanta, today Toni Senory hosted us at The 5&10 in Athens, GA.

Considering Toni’s twitter name, I realized I wouldn’t recognize a sassafras tree if it walked up and bought me a drink. Turns out, they grow all over the US east of the Mississippi and have quite the story to tell.

To bad we aren’t passing through Owensboro, KY.

Travels – Going Wild for Wildflowers As We Drive through NC

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It’s late June and the thick beds of tall flowers blooming along I-85 jump up and hold my caffeinated attention as North Carolina says, “Welcome back.”

They must be wildflowers.

Indeed, for 26 years, North Carolina has been planting beds of wildflowers along highways so motorists can enjoy the show.

What a treat – show times listed here.

Travels – Touring the South

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We are on our way to Atlanta for a long weekend with family for the husband’s birthday. We’ll take about a week to return to DC via Athens (GA), Chattanooga (TN), Knoxville (TN), Asheville (SC) and Richmond (VA).

Posts here will be sporadic but you can follow @TheSoilToil on twitter, Facebook and tumblr.

Do you have any favorite garden spots to share along our route?

Traveling – Photosafari in Brooklyn

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These days I give things I grow.  Friday afternoon we moved the luggage aside and placed a potted tomato alongside to give our weekend hostess.

Memorial Day weekend took us to New York visiting friends and family.  Specifically, to Brooklyn, since we are of a certain demographic whose friends have all left the Lower East Side and are either engaged, married and/or with children and/or dogs in Park Slope and its neighboring neighborhoods.

The weekend sweltered with humid 90s and a few soaking rains.  Park Slope parents pushed past with spendy strollers and Williamsburg baristas took pitty that we could possibly live more than a bike ride away.  Heatwave and glances aside, we love our treks to the belly of all things awesome.

Container gardens abound and I noticed more edibles than visits past.  Brooklyn spills with tiny gardens as lush and tough as its people.  Street fashion gets all the buzz but street gardening makes the bigger statement.

Hopefully growing edibles sticks around longer than neon flats.

Travels – Englishtown Flea Market, NJ

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We plan our trip routes and stops based on flea market locations and hours.

We’re those people.

I grew up going to flea markets with my mom, Neal has gone to flea markets most his adult life to dig for records. When his mother first met me and I stood in her kitchen explaining that Keller’s Flea Market in Georgia reminded me of home, she smiled as Neal joined us, “Neal, you’ve met your match.”

Englishtown Auction makes our short list of incredible flea markets.20120526-235950.jpg. This flea is huge, has indoor and outdoor vendors and has tons of shoppers (a busy vendor is a happy vendor – more likely to have good prices and more likely to haggle).

We only had about an hour to shop but could have easily spent five. The Garden State did not disappoint – I saw more vendors with plants and gardening-related items than at any other flea I can remember. The wares spanned from cheap import dollar-store junk to antique tools to home-started seedlings to a mini garden center.

We had to shop light since we were on our way to New York and not homeward bound. We’ll have to plan our next trip to Brooklyn around returning to the flea on a Sunday from the southbound lanes of the turnpike.

Traveling Again

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We’re staying a night in the Garden State on our way to New York for the long weekend.

I should have taken a pic, but one of the salvaged pantry onions is about to bloom.

I’m bummed to miss its opening day but I suspect Brooklyn will be blooming plenty to make up for it.

Travels – Photosafari in Florida Garden

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My birthday: The toddler and I boarded a plane for a long weekend down to Neal’s parents’ house in Atlantic Beach, Florida.  We stayed over Mother’s Day weekend while Neal worked in DC.

Her gardens awe visitors.  Neal says his mother’s garden at his childhood Atlanta home inspired the same lush and peaceful embrace, everything existed together as though it always was.  I better understood patina my first visit to their Florida home a few years ago, everything outside settled into place and welcomed its fate, wearing with time and showing the elements.

The plants and fixtures grow into one another creating a continuous scene with nothing stopping the show.  Blooms call you over, scented flowers lead you further, the Loquat canopy draws you around the corner and, wherever you are, you love it.

People pay money to go to places like this.

I grew up in Florida, about two hours southwest of Neal’s folks’ address.  The smells, sounds, humidity, birds, lizards, bugs, thunderstorms, sandspurs and landscape are all familiar.  The most welcoming sight is seeing how these two non-natives have adapted to it all.

Indoors – Bug Eaters

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What an impulse buy.

At the Washington Cathedral Flower Mart 2012 I spotted the Carnivorous Plant Nursery tent and joined the other very excited shoppers to see such an exciting array of plants we know little about.  Ten minutes and about $9 later, I walked away with a Cape sundew, small Northern Purple pitcher plant and a pamphlet on carnivorous plant care.

The pair have have been busy, tiny winged flying things stuck in their traps.

Turns out I chose well for a novice.  Sundews are tolerant of poorly informed gardeners and, although sun-lovers, can withstand living on a windowsill better than other carnivorous plants.  The pitcher plant wants a dormant season over winter but the sundew doesn’t need one.  Not sure how that will work out but maybe I’ll gain the courage to separate them by then.

I love them.  Every time Bunny see their bowl she says, “Hey mom, those plants eat bugs!”

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Social – Go to Flower Mart 2012

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Flower Mart, presented by the Washington National Cathedral All Hallows Guild for the 73rd year, finished its first day Friday with a bright setting sun shining against stormy clouds that passed over without pitch.

If you live in DC and didn’t attend the first day, then you should attend the second day, Saturday (May 5th 10 am – 5 pm).

Ten Reasons to Attend Flower Mart 2012

1.  It’s at the awesome Washington National Cathedral.

2.  Free admission.

3.  Many local vendors for snacks, gifts, plants and wares.

4.  It a benefit for the Cathedral’s gardens and grounds.

5.  See the 7th Annual International Floral Exhibit inside the 102′ tall nave of the Cathedral.

6.  Self-guided tours materials available for the gorgeous Bishop’s Garden, Olmstead Woods and Amphitheater.

7.  ONE STOP SHOPPING FOR MOTHER’S DAY GIFT.

8.  Very cool 1890′s traveling wooden carousel.  It’s a big deal.  (Costs 2 tickets per person, $1 per ticket, sold in the children’s area on opposite side of the Cathedral.  Plenty of adults ride the carousel.)

9.  PLANTS FOR SALE.  Herbs, annuals, perennials, roses, hanging baskets, carnivorous plants and bonsai.

10.  It’s fun.  And see #7.

Go.  What better way to build up a thirst for the Supermoon Cinco de Mayo?

Day Trip – Photo Safari at the Howard County Conservancy

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April’s final day brought a cloudy chill perfect for visiting the Howard County Conservancy.

Their native plants honors garden got me thinking about plans for future gardens but “finding animals and flowers” with our two-year-old was the real highlight of our casual visit.

What makes the conservancy in Woodstock, MD,  special, aside from the work they do educating the community and preserving homestead outbuildings and easements?  It’s beautiful.

Its perch looks gracefully over rolling grasslands, streams and native woodlands.  No gimmicky cow cutouts greet the kids.  An orchard, gardens in various states of care, a pair of pygmy goats, a few chickens, stone walls, birds – all inviting you to take it in.  I want to return and hike the woods and meadows.  I want to sit along a stream.

A school trip of art students dispersed across the acreage.  On our way out, Bunny laid on her stomach in the grass and looked down the knoll at the trees along a stream.  “I’m painting, mom, you go.  I’ll stay here.”

I felt the same.

Gardenspotting – Native Plants at the Howard County Conservancy

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Native plants are your allies.  Invasives are the enemy.

My Twitter feed lit up recently with native and invasive plant posts.  The morning of our little trip up to the Howard County Conservancy with Neal (the husband), the fantastic Mid-Atlantic Invasive and their Native Look-alikes guide came my way.  It’s 68 pages of pdf joy with snappy graphics and stunning resolution – it looks great on my iPhone.  (It does not load well on my glitchy computer, but check it out for yourself).

I proclaim no expert knowledge of our local (DC, Maryland and Virginia) native plants.  But, I grew up in Florida watching all manor of natural setting get razed and replanted with subdivisions, strip malls, sod, exotic plants and colored mulch.  The hammock I grew up in and knew like the back of my hand with its passion fruit and wild berries is slowly disappearing, one 12-acre plot at a time.

Never tired of native plant gardens, whether around DC or afar, the Honors Garden native plants and native plant cultivars pulled me in for some gardenspotting.  The short photoset reveals my shallow Maryland native plant knowledge.  Once home, I compared my photos with online resources and only included plants who matched their markers.  I snapped many more but I lined up the wrong name for the frame.

So, instead of this post being wildly informative, let it inspire you to explore the Howard County Conservancy farmstead, woodland hikes, meadowland hikes and native plant Honors Garden.  For those living beyond DC and Baltimore, seek native species gardens and conservancies near you.  Nothing beats seeing plants in person.

Even if you have no interest in growing native species in your garden, familiar knowledge helps you decide perhaps to leave a patch of natives growing as you find them around your house.  Knowing invasives makes impulse buys at the garden center smarter for your garden and surrounding habitats.

A Few Maryland and Virginia Native Plant Resources:

- The University of Maryland Extension Native Plants brochure is wonderfully detailed and provides written descriptions but does not include specific plant images.

- Maryland Native Plant Society maintains a Native Plant Sources page, including upcoming plant sales.

- Virginia Native Plant Society lists upcoming native plant sales and swaps, more detailed plant information resides within the regional chapter pages (pull down menu under the “Chapters” tab).

A National Resource:

- Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center at the University of Texas at Austin, you can view recommended species by state or province and search by light requirements, soil moisture, bloom time, bloom color, height and more.