1st Okra of the year

[John K Jordan]

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In the skillet now.

[Matthew Curtis]

Fresh veggies. I love it
We had our first tomato last week.
I picked it, rubbed the dirt off on my shirt and took a bite.
I can't wait for more. The family planted 17 tomato plants, 8 pepper, some cucumber and herbs.
We usually can a lot of sauce, salsa and stewed tomatoes.

[Jim Becker]

Looks nice, but I'll pass...not one of my favorite veggies. I'd make a terrible southerner because of that, for sure. LOL

[Mel Fulks]

When I was a kid okra was served cooked down to mush. Gotta be prepared right. If it’s not cooked right you can always grease the farm
tractor with it. Fried is my favorite.

[Wade Lippman]

I was with you on the berries, but okra?!?!

[John K Jordan]

Hey, I'm just reporting, sharing the joy of the family!

I don't understand why okra exists (hey, I'm a transplanted yankee) but My Lovely Bride, youngest son, and some other relatives LOVE it. So I plant, water, fertilize, weed, cultivate, and pick. She makes fried okra, gumbo, stews with a variety of other veggies and meat, and always cans a favorite (of others, not me): lots of jars of pickled okra. We usually grow one hot pepper plant just to put some in the pickled okra for the relatives. In the last few years I have started eating some of the dishes that have a small amount of okra and to my surprise it didn't kill me!

Matthew, my brother in Marysville said the growing season here is probably two months longer then his, one month in the spring and one in the fall. So far from our garden and "yard" we've been picking large quantities of green beans, cucumber, yellow squash, zucchini, several types of peppers, tomatoes, lettuce and spinach, etc., onions, basil and other herbs, cherries, figs, a couple of early apples, wild and domesticated raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries. The ears are developing on the corn and the second planting is about a foot high. Before long we'll plant another round of cucumbers, squash, and beans, and after that the fall greens and such.

I put in a fair-sized garden plot years ago (about 50x150) and fertilize every hear with 15-20 tractor bucket loads of composted llama manure - great stuff! We usually mix it up and grow some things one year and some different things the next.

With fresh eggs, honey, meat from several farmer friends, and desserts from various fruit we are wallowing in embarrassing riches. Over the last few days I picked 5 cups of blueberries and the pie should be coming out of the oven about now. Yikes, gotta go! :)

JKJ

[Mike Henderson]

When I was a kid okra was served cooked down to mush. Gotta be prepared right. If it’s not cooked right you can always grease the farm
tractor with it. Fried is my favorite.

Yeah, breaded and fried. In New Orleans, where I'm from, everything was breaded and fried, including okra.

Mike

[Jim Becker]

Everything gets fried in the south...

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[Jim Koepke]

Everything gets fried in the south...



If it ain't fried it hain't died!

My favorite soup growing up was Chicken Gumbo. My mother told me the taste was from the okra. Tried growing it in the SF Bay Area. Got just one to ripen.

My mother never made anything with okra. She also talked about making watermelon rind pickles but never did.

Other than that, she did cause me to learn to cook meals for myself and others.

jtk

[Bert Kemp]

Well I must admit I don't know what Okra is, but if its a veggi I'd probably like it. :)

[John K Jordan]

...
My mother never made anything with okra. She also talked about making watermelon rind pickles but never did.
...

Me wifey also makes pickled beets, a staple at our house. We've made plain ol' cucumber bread and butter pickles but that was more effort.

JKJ

[Mike Henderson]

Well I must admit I don't know what Okra is, but if its a veggi I'd probably like it. :)

It is an acquired taste. When it's (over) cooked (not fried) it can appear slimly.

Mike

[Mark Rainey]

"No love today" song by bluesman Chris Smither mentions okra. Worth a listen.