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Seeds from Italy News
Vol 4, # 2 September 2004
We publish four times a year (usually) and include information on all aspects of Italian vegetables, herbs and flowers: selecting, growing, harvesting and storing and cooking. We would be happy to receive and if space permits, publish your experiences in these areas.
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1. Privacy Policy
2. What's New
3. Catalogs
4. Seeds for 2005
5. Summer Trials
6. Recipe- Bruschetta
7. Growing tip.
8. Reader Comments & tips.
9. Fall Trial Results
10. Win an Italian Garden
1. Privacy Policy. A number of people on their order forms asked me not to sell or divulge their personal information: address, telephone numbers, email addresses, etc. I want everyone to understand that I take privacy very seriously. I never disclose any customer information to anyone under any circumstances.(except of course the inadvertant screw up in the July 2003 newsletter. ) I have been bothered by too many telemarketers, received too much junk email to do that to anyone else. I don't even keep credit card numbers: a number of customers who reordered and told me to use their credit card number on file were surprised when I told them I do not keep them on my computer, nor do I have access to them from the credit card authorizing service.
2. What's New. Garlic should arrive by the 20th of September. This year I have a pink Italian Hardneck and a white Italian Softneck. The hardneck has large cloves, is early and keeps well. It was brought over from Italy about 20 years ago. It has a sweet pungent flavor. The softneck is pungent tasting, has a white shiny skin and is an excellent keeper. It braids well.
Cheese Graters. I long ago decided to sell only seeds; no books, fertilizers, tools, etc. I made an exception for some of the kitchen products from Rigamonti Pietro in Italy. I have added a cheese grater to the Tomato sauce maker and the herb chopper. It is a really neat tool. Does the job well & no more skinned finger tips from my old metal grater. It is on the web site with the other two.
3. I am out of catalogs for this year. New ones will be ready in mid December and mailed out just before Christmas. Anyone who has ordered seeds will receive a catalog. Also, anyone who has requested a catalog since mid-April will also receive the new one. If you are not in these categories and would like a catalog, drop me a note. Even better, just request one using the catalog request form on the web site. If you have moved since you last received a catalog, please send along a current address. Send the change to seeds@growitalian.com Do not try and reply to this newsletter. It will not work.
4. Seeds for 2005. I am still working on new varieties for 2005. For sure there will be another fava (an early one), a couple of new beans, a cucumber from Fratelli Ingengoli which is strongly recommended by a customer, a leek or two, a sicilian basil [maybe] and maybe the red poppy you find wild all over Italy. I have found a source for friarello peppers so they will be here. I am pretty sure I will do some leeks and also some spring onions. If there is something which you know has great merit, let me know and I will hunt around for it.
5. Summer Trials. It was a difficult year in many ways. The weather was a challenge. Spring was very cool and it stayed cool well into the summer. We had almost constant rain and temperatures no higher than the low 80's throughout the summer. They claim this has been the coolest summer in 30 years. To make things worse, I fell from a ladder and broke my arm in several places. Weeds got ahead of me. To add insult to injury, we had an incredible number of chipmonks survive over the winter; I had at least 40-50 of them in my yard and seven or eight moved into the garden. They really liked the tomatoes. The final stroke was early blight showed up in late July and most tomatoes are gone by now (6 September). All and all, a fairly normal year. Nevertheless, there are some results to report.
a. New tomatoes trialed included Palla di Fuoco (Fireball) and San Marzano Redorta.
Palla di Fuoco is new this year; I brought it in based on the recommendations of some customers. It is reasonably early, sets a huge number of fruit which are round, red, and mostly weigh 10-14 ounces. Nice taste & texture. I was impressed with this and it is definitely a keeper. One customer wrote and said that his were hard & tasteless, but made a terrific sauce. This was definitely not my experience, but I would be interested in hearing from those of you who grow this particular variety.
San Marzano Redorta. This is described as a very large San Marzano type. It was. Big fruit (as in 10 ounces or so) many of which had a bit of a nipple at the end. They made an outstanding sauce. They are extremely juicy and the inside is full-no hollow spaces. They were very good tasting; I think this is the only plum tomato I have ever eaten that I would condsider tasty enough to eat fresh. They were extremely productive. Definitely another keeper.
Sorrento. This was something I picked up from another Italian Seed company. It was described as large, pink and good tasting. I only tried one of them and I must have mismarked the transplant; what I got was a large cherry tomato which was definitely not a Sorento. If you grew a Sorento, I would be very interested in hearing how it did for you. Please let me know size of fruit, color, shape, taste, productivity & any other observations. Thank you.
BEANS. It was a very good year for beans. Bush beans were all grown in 3 foot wide beds, with seeds spaced 2" in the row and rows spaced 12" apart. They seem less succeptible to rotting in cool soil, so they were planted in the 3rd week of May and germinated exceptionally well. The pole beans were planted on tripods made out of 8 foot saplings. Six or seven beans around each pole. All of our beans are untreated, so make sure you plant them only after the soil has warmed up well. These went out the end of May and all germinated extremely well this year.
BUSH BEANS. First trial was a couple of bush beans that I had not grown previously. Slenderette is the organic seed and Vanguard is a variety I brought in based on a customer recommendation. Both are green, fairly early. Slenderette produces a slightly flat six inch pod. Nice taste and texture and good production. Definitely a keeper, especially since it is the only eating bean I know of available in organic seed. Vanguard was one of the best bush beans I have ever eaten [the customer was definitely correct when he told me that] It produces a very heavy crop of 5-6" round green beans. Crisp and great taste; they taste almost as good as a pole bean. They are also pretty easy to pick which was a real bonus.
UN METRO. These are the yard long beans, sometimes called asparagus or snake beans. They are similar to the chinese ones, but are a slightly different variety. They are pole beans and need heat to do well (production was down here due to the very cold summer we had). They begin to produce in 65-70 or so days. Beans grow in pairs and seem best when picked between 12-16 inches; at that point they can be eaten raw or if you cook them, it only takes four or five minutes. You can let them keep growing and you get a very nice shell bean (actually it looks like a black eyed pea). Very productive and excellent taste [though a bit different from a regular pole bean]. They were very nice cooked with a bit of tomato, garlic, onion & basil.
LAMON & Lingua Di Fuoco. Lamon is a shell (borlotto) bean from Venice. They are ready in 70-75 days. You get a very heavy crop of beans which have a red/white pod. Inside are 4-5 very large white beans with red mottling. The trick to picking them for fresh shell beans is to let them completely color up; pick before the pod begins to fade. They are pretty easy to shell. The Venetians claim it is the best tasting shell bean in Italy, and they may be right. I cooked them (15-25 minutes depending on the stage at which you picked them) with some sage in water about one inch above the beans. You want just a little bit of water left. You can serve them lots of ways, but my favorite is just to add some salt & a good drizzle of olive oil and eat them at room temperature. The lingua di fuoco is a larger bean (it has 5-7 beans) which are a bit smaller than the Lamon. Good taste and texture. Pretty good production. I thought the Lamon tasted a bit 'meatier', but that may just be personal preference. Lingua di fuoco a pretty good bean; it is also available in a bush type, though the pods are a bit smaller.
NEKARGOLD. This is a yellow pole bean. It was somewhat early for a pole bean and produced a very nice crop of slightly flattened 6-8" long yellow beans. Very nice taste and texture. No strings. Held pretty well.
SANTA ANA. This is a green pole bean, round & a bit small (6" or so). Very good producer and great taste. I really liked these, almost as much as the supermarconi. They were a bit on the late side as far as pole beans go.
AGRETTI. This was new this year and it is very difficult to find here in the US. It is a fairly popular spring green in Italy. Taste is a bit like beet greens, though with a sour/bitterish undertone. I really like it.(but then I think all vegetables should be a bit bitter) The traditional way to cook it in Italy is just to boil it until tender, drain, dress with lemon juice and olive oil and serve at room temperature. It also goes well with pasta. Agretti seed has a very short shelf life (7-8 months) so if you bought some and did not use it all, it probably will not work next spring[maybe it will since it was in hermetically sealed packs]. It is definitely a spring crop. Get it out shortly after you sow peas. [It will not germinate when it is hot out as in the middle of the summer] One seed every three inches or so in a row, spacing rows 12 inches or so apart. It is up in a week. Transplants will work; I did a bunch in 72 cell trays that took well to transplanting. It is a slow grower at first. It needs a constant supply of water. I grew mine in a loose sandy soil, though I suspect it would do better in a mucky soil (like onions). It was ready to pick in 60 or so days. You can either pick the entire plant and cook it or you can pick some of the many branches and it will regrow. It will last pretty much all summer, though it gets a bit tougher toward the end of the summer.
6. Recipe. Bruschetta. I know in a previous newsletter I did something on bruschetta and the topping we tend to use at home; however, this is a variation which is really good. Get some really good bread. You need something like a bakery tuscan bread or perhaps a country french style. It needs to be good and dense. Find some fresh mozzerella cheese (Italian deli, a good supermarket maybe, cheese shop, etc). You also need a really good fresh eating tomato (pantano, red pear, palla di fuoco, oxheart), some really good basil with big leaves (napoleatano, genovese or lettuce leaf), olive oil & garlic. Spray the bread with olive oil or drizzle some olive oil on it. Toast it on a grill or even in a toaster. When done, rub some garlic over it. Put on some thin slices of the fresh mozzerella. Add a few slices of tomato; add salt & pepper to taste; drizzle some more olive oil on it if you want (or just leave it off); put on a couple of fresh basil leaves. It doesn't get much better than this. Enjoy.
7. Growing arugula & salad mixes (misticanza). These should be eaten young & tender. Consequently, you need a lot of plants. The easiest way to do this is to broadcast seed in beds. Prepare a bed (I grow in three foot rows, so I just take a section of the row) by digging & raking smooth the surface. The size depends on how much salad you eat. For me and my wife, I have a 1x3 section of arugula[she does not eat arugula or endive], a 1 x 3 section of endive mix & a 2 x 3 section of lettuce mix. Add some fertilizer. Hold the seeds between your thumb & forefinger & drop them, trying to get each seed about an inch apart. Don't fixate on spacing however; anything will work. Run your rake lightly over the area so as to cover the seeds lightly and also space them a bit more regularly. Tamp down the area; water well. I usually water once or twice a day for the 3-5 days it takes for the seed to germinate. The plants will grow quickly and choke out most weeds. Begin cutting when they are 3-4 inches high. You should be able to cut for 2-3 weeks before the plants get too big (or you have cut them all). To have salad mix all summer, succession plant every 2-3 weeks.
8. Reader Comments & Tips.
Comments from Tucson. Rio Grande tomato has a reputation for doing well when it is extremely hot. A customer from Tucson confirms this: "I wanted to let you know how the Rio Grande tomato is doing out here in Tucson, Arizona. I am very impressed, it is a strong plant, and the fruit is large and producing very, very well. It is slower than other tomatoes, but I have not had any problem with sun scald or blossom end rot, which is affecting all but the Rio Grande's. The vines are still setting fruit so it looks like I will have tomatoes for quite awhile. With the heat in Tucson often going over 100 degrees I do go out and "tickle" the plants to coax them to drop their pollen early in the morning. It seems to be working. They definitely do like the heat. I am waiting for the first ones to ripen but they are starting to blush pink, so pretty soon!"
Comments from West Los Angeles. "Hi, Bill -
I'm checking in with a brief report from Ocean View Farms, a community
garden in coastal zone 10, West Los Angeles.
Attached are a few shots of my harvest thus far. It's been a great tomato
year. We've had an unusually warm spring and summer, free of the coastal fog
and dew that brings on verticillium and fusarium virus which usually dooms
our tomato harvests at OVF.
Winners in fecundity and size were Marmande VF tomatoes (36 anos). Although
for some reason they are not smooth, but grew in rounded bulges like babies'
bottoms, which doesn't affect the flavor but is somewhat unaesthetic and
makes slicing hard.
Winners in taste were Red Pear - very silky and non acidic, late ripening
and surprisingly heavy and low on the vines, so the wire cages crashed over
sideways, where I simply left them. (pear tomatoes) The jury's still out on Palla di Fuoco, which are still green on the vine.
Parisian Market carrots were disappointing. Few and small and tough and not
worth the bother. (cukes)
Cucumbers Beth Alpha were prolific, but slightly bitter and way too many
seeds. I preferred the old standby pickling ones and the Armenian. [MY NOTE-WE CONVERSED REGARDING THESE SINCE THEY ARE ONE OF MY FAVORITES. SEEMS SHE WAS PICKING THEM TOO LARGE. THESE NEED TO BE PICKED WHEN FIVE INCHES OR SO]
Pole beans were massively prolific and tasty while young. I gave them away
in buckets just to keep up."
9. Fall Trial Results. This year 12 or 13 folks did various trials. I am still trying to get all the results in and sorted, but the information should be in the December newsletter.
10. Win an Italian Garden. I also do sales at Garden Centers and Italian Markets. While I do the Northeast, there is also a Franchi distributor in the midwest, one in the southeast, one in Texas and another in California. All of us have agreed that if a customer provides a tip on a possible retail outlet that takes on our seeds, you will win an Italian Garden - 10 packs of Franchi Seeds. The ideal outlet is a large or very large garden center. If they sell in an area with lots of people of Italian origin, that is a bonus. Big Agways (or other farm stores) are also good. Finally the other really good outlet is a large Italian market or a large fruit & vegetable store in an Italian neighborhood.
Good Growing.
Bill McKay
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