Part of having a community garden without fences separating the gardens, and a very low fence (easy even for me to jump over when I forget my key) is that garden goodies inevitably get 'sampled'. One of our neighbors told us she had seen people walking around with small backpacks and knives and then jumping over the gate to get out, and it doesn't take a lot of imagination to guess what they were doing. Of course berries growing along pathways get munched on, no big deal in my opinion. I once even saw a guy helping himself to some tulips! Our latest casualty was our first real bell pepper. After nursing the plant from seed (on March 15th!) and transplanting it out into the big bad world (May 21st) it had finally started ripening it's very first pepper into a wonderful shade of orange (around Aug 15). Of course we wanted to pick it at its full color and when we went to the garden, discovered that it was gone! I guess a large glaring orange bell pepper, babied to ripeness in a climate not fit to grow peppers has an invisible sign on it saying 'take me'. It was a very sad day indeed, 5 months of anticipation, only to be let down. Let's hope that the remaining 3 peppers on the plant make it to maturity, and this time I will not be waiting to pick them. And I hope those #@$&!@ that took it really needed food (which I doubt, because Switzerland is not a poverty ridden nation) or else they should know that karma is a bitch! In other news, next year I will be growing more exotic vegetables (aka asian veggies) because I doubt they will steal stuff they have no idea how to cook!
Friday, August 24, 2012
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
july update
July had nice warm weather but it did rain enough that we didn't have to hand water.
Plant progress:
The fava beans were removed and the bed was prepared for bush beans, swiss chard and beets (the chard and beets failed to germinate, perhaps I planted to deep? and half of the beans didn't germinate, I am guessing they needed more water because they were all on the sunny side of the bed). The carrots in the middle of the bed have FINALLY reached an edible size, but are still small. I mean they germinated in the middle of march and still aren't ready at the end of July?!? What am I doing wrong?
Not much progress on the celery and all the fall brassicas got planted out (under row cover this time!) hopefully with the kohlrabi gets harvested i can plant kale to overwinter there.
The nightshades are really struggling, first the hail knocked half the leaves and fruit off, and then late blight struck. I know it is inevitable here, but i probably could have slowed it down by training to one leader instead of allowing them to bush. But old habits die hard, and i have to remember i don't live in texas where plants dry quickly so air circulation is key! The eggplants are either also affected by the blight or just don't like the weather. they are still tiny and not really setting any fruit. Also the cape gosseberries in pots are doing much better than those in the ground, although they need such frequent watering. The tomatoes under the roof are blight free, but really need more sunlight and those on the balcony are blight free but a bit unwieldy. Next year, only the miniture bush tomato(really amazed with the variety balkonstar, not for taste but for how well it fruits in a small pot with only half a day of sun) get planted on the balcony along with chile peppers. The rest will get planted under a foil tunnel to keep dry and promote warmth. The space on the terrace will be used for potted flowers, cape gooseberries and peppers.
The curcubits started out strong, giving is plety of cukumbers for fresh eating, but really not any to pickle. Unfortunate i love pickles! The variety Picolino was a dud, just not really setting large fruit. Is it supoosed to be that tiny? I mean they were cornichon size....too much space and work tiny pickles! Our lone surviving zucchini plant put out 3 zucchini before succumbing to powdery mildew. so sad, i would have rather had a glut. An the pattison also set only 1 fruit. I am not sure if they just need more compost/fertilizer or more sun or more space. Thier rotation spot for next year is definitely sunnier and has been heavily composted for the brassicas that were there this year, so ill hope for better luck before blaming the variety.
Harvests:
some not blight affected tomatoes, enough for salads, but nothing else.
a few baby eggplants that got added to a sambar. these were picked to destress the tiny plants.
the rest of the onions. the later onions were less worm ridden, or only on the outer layer which dried anyways and was removed. The bolting seemed to affect the size, but they have still kept reasonably well. We haven't purchased onions since the end of April.
Cukes for fresh eating. zuchinni/squash
2 pickings of Favas yielded enough for a small treat. I love fresh favas for their taste and they are unavailable locally, but man do they have low yield/lots of problems (wind, aphids etc). Plus it doesn't help that i find the outer skin bitter and double peel which further reduces yield. I'll still grow them because half of having a garden is to plant things you can't get locally (i mean i really doubt we 'profit' on anything except berries)
some basil, which it would grow faster!
Rasperries finally coming in. we have both fall bearing and summer bearing varieties mixed together and it is VERY confusing to prune, so of course I just procrastinated it till i see what dies back in fall.
Flowers:
The gladiolus are really wonderful cut flowers and make me smile every day at breakfast, definitely more colors next year!
The self sown sunflowes are also a delight and make great cut flowers.
The miniture dahlias, while good landscape plants, are pretty unimpressive as flowers, guess I will look for a better compact varity next year with more interesting shapes or colors.
the iris was very short lived ( a bulb type) so sad, i love iris. but it is so carefree it can stay.
The miniture asters were also quite unimpressive.
I guess the moral of the story is, just because you have a small garden, don't go with miniture everything. One large/beautiful plant is better than 10 tiny ones that aren't great.
Plant progress:
The fava beans were removed and the bed was prepared for bush beans, swiss chard and beets (the chard and beets failed to germinate, perhaps I planted to deep? and half of the beans didn't germinate, I am guessing they needed more water because they were all on the sunny side of the bed). The carrots in the middle of the bed have FINALLY reached an edible size, but are still small. I mean they germinated in the middle of march and still aren't ready at the end of July?!? What am I doing wrong?
Not much progress on the celery and all the fall brassicas got planted out (under row cover this time!) hopefully with the kohlrabi gets harvested i can plant kale to overwinter there.
The nightshades are really struggling, first the hail knocked half the leaves and fruit off, and then late blight struck. I know it is inevitable here, but i probably could have slowed it down by training to one leader instead of allowing them to bush. But old habits die hard, and i have to remember i don't live in texas where plants dry quickly so air circulation is key! The eggplants are either also affected by the blight or just don't like the weather. they are still tiny and not really setting any fruit. Also the cape gosseberries in pots are doing much better than those in the ground, although they need such frequent watering. The tomatoes under the roof are blight free, but really need more sunlight and those on the balcony are blight free but a bit unwieldy. Next year, only the miniture bush tomato(really amazed with the variety balkonstar, not for taste but for how well it fruits in a small pot with only half a day of sun) get planted on the balcony along with chile peppers. The rest will get planted under a foil tunnel to keep dry and promote warmth. The space on the terrace will be used for potted flowers, cape gooseberries and peppers.
The curcubits started out strong, giving is plety of cukumbers for fresh eating, but really not any to pickle. Unfortunate i love pickles! The variety Picolino was a dud, just not really setting large fruit. Is it supoosed to be that tiny? I mean they were cornichon size....too much space and work tiny pickles! Our lone surviving zucchini plant put out 3 zucchini before succumbing to powdery mildew. so sad, i would have rather had a glut. An the pattison also set only 1 fruit. I am not sure if they just need more compost/fertilizer or more sun or more space. Thier rotation spot for next year is definitely sunnier and has been heavily composted for the brassicas that were there this year, so ill hope for better luck before blaming the variety.
Harvests:
some not blight affected tomatoes, enough for salads, but nothing else.
a few baby eggplants that got added to a sambar. these were picked to destress the tiny plants.
the rest of the onions. the later onions were less worm ridden, or only on the outer layer which dried anyways and was removed. The bolting seemed to affect the size, but they have still kept reasonably well. We haven't purchased onions since the end of April.
Cukes for fresh eating. zuchinni/squash
2 pickings of Favas yielded enough for a small treat. I love fresh favas for their taste and they are unavailable locally, but man do they have low yield/lots of problems (wind, aphids etc). Plus it doesn't help that i find the outer skin bitter and double peel which further reduces yield. I'll still grow them because half of having a garden is to plant things you can't get locally (i mean i really doubt we 'profit' on anything except berries)
some basil, which it would grow faster!
Rasperries finally coming in. we have both fall bearing and summer bearing varieties mixed together and it is VERY confusing to prune, so of course I just procrastinated it till i see what dies back in fall.
Flowers:
The gladiolus are really wonderful cut flowers and make me smile every day at breakfast, definitely more colors next year!
The self sown sunflowes are also a delight and make great cut flowers.
The miniture dahlias, while good landscape plants, are pretty unimpressive as flowers, guess I will look for a better compact varity next year with more interesting shapes or colors.
the iris was very short lived ( a bulb type) so sad, i love iris. but it is so carefree it can stay.
The miniture asters were also quite unimpressive.
I guess the moral of the story is, just because you have a small garden, don't go with miniture everything. One large/beautiful plant is better than 10 tiny ones that aren't great.
Sunday, July 1, 2012
june update
Plant growth/progress:
June was very fickle, extremely hot (30 C is hot for us!), followed by storms (including one with golfball sized hail, that did considerable damage) and then clouds. Aside from the hail damage, which mostly affected the curcubits, the weather caused the fennel to prematurely bolt. I harvested it as soon as I noticed and salvaged some small still edible bulbs. The lettuce also had enough of the heat and sadly bolted before i could save it, so it all got composted. The new seedlings are still small, but will get planted soon. The peas that got pulled (they were mostly on the ground after the storm) will be replaced by bush beans.
The carrots don't seem to have grown at all in the last month, i don't think the shade from the peas helped.
The celery hasn't put on much growth either and i wonder if it will be ready by fall at all. I can always make stock with the greens, and next year i think i need to fertilize more.
The kohlrabi was planted too close and is taking forever to size up.
Harvests:
Broccoli- main heads and side shoots, although i was really disappointed in one variety (calabrese- small heads and shoots, tendency to flower very soon). It will get one more shot in the fall before i pass final judgement on it's performance. Premium crop put out good main heads but the side shoots were small. Still on the lookout for the perfect broccoli, or perhaps they just need more space/fertilizer. The plants had worms at the end of the month, as i never covered them, so they got pulled and will be replaced by a fall crop in 2-3 weeks.
Cauliflower- one of the more exciting harvests! all 6 plants headed up, and would have been perfect had we not gone on vacation. The first 2 I managed to harvest at the perfect stage. the next 2 were on their way to bolting but still edible and the last 2 were sadly worm infested and had to be composted (wormy cauliflower smells awful!) note to self, skipping row cover on brasicas is not an option! i saw no noticeable difference in the 2 varieties planted, and i'll do another test with the fall crop.
savoy cabbage- had started to head up nicely with the worms hit. I quickly harvested and removed the outer damage portions, which left very very small heads. Also the plant was huge, compared to the size of the head. Many of our neighbors seem to have a variety with large heads and small surrounding foilage (which is better suited to a small garden) I wonder if they are removing outer leaves or it has something to do with nutrients. I'll have to ask
Beets- had only planted 12 and they were delicious. Such a satisfying crop to grow and i will definitely have to grow more next year. the direct seeded varieties were a bust, so transplanting it is next year
Fennel- bolted, but still was eaten. I will only plant after the summer solstice next year (or really early under cover)
Peas- both snap and shelling. The amount of shelling peas was perfect, and planting 3 varieties really extended the harvest for us. we had enough for a serving for 2 each week for about 5 weeks. The snap peas were also great, but i think we should plant fewer next year or pickle the excess because were pretty sick of them at the end of the month. Won't be growing the purple flowering Gigante again, becasue like the name says it grows tall and unwieldy and makes finding the pods difficult.
Lettuce- salads galore, can't complain at all. would love to have more varities to spice up our salad bowl next year and have to keep in mind to plant replacements sooner, because even the cut and come again varities bolted sooner than anticipated.
Currants- We harvest over 4 kilos of currants and the were eaten fresh, in cake and mousse and the rest were processed into syrup to add to drinks. The processing was a pain, but I am sure we will enjoy the bounty in the winter months.
Flowers:
I don't think I will ever buy mixed bulbs again. I previously stated that all the daffodils ended up being standard yellow and the Asiatic lilies turned out to be all yellow too. The gladiolus ended up being pink and yellow. I mean I like yellow, but i was hoping for more of a cheerful colorful mix and not a monotone view.
there were also all kinds of beetles eating away and procreating on the flowers. I let them be.
marigolds are lovely and carefree....need many more next year.
Plenty of self seeded weeds/flowers. (love the sunflowers and poppy, the others not so much)
Diseases/pests:
tiny strange beetles on brassicas. Bit annoying to wash off but not particularly damaging. spider web like residue on kohlrabi. black aphids on fava beans. Cabbage worms
Thankfully not too much slug or vole damage (knock on wood) Although the wild foxes seem to like using and freshly dug beds as toilets...
June was very fickle, extremely hot (30 C is hot for us!), followed by storms (including one with golfball sized hail, that did considerable damage) and then clouds. Aside from the hail damage, which mostly affected the curcubits, the weather caused the fennel to prematurely bolt. I harvested it as soon as I noticed and salvaged some small still edible bulbs. The lettuce also had enough of the heat and sadly bolted before i could save it, so it all got composted. The new seedlings are still small, but will get planted soon. The peas that got pulled (they were mostly on the ground after the storm) will be replaced by bush beans.
 |
| bolting fennel |
 |
| bolting onions |
The celery hasn't put on much growth either and i wonder if it will be ready by fall at all. I can always make stock with the greens, and next year i think i need to fertilize more.
The kohlrabi was planted too close and is taking forever to size up.
 | |||
| currants ripening |
 |
| view from walkway: brassica and pea beds |
 |
| view from top of curcubits and nightshades |
Harvests:
Broccoli- main heads and side shoots, although i was really disappointed in one variety (calabrese- small heads and shoots, tendency to flower very soon). It will get one more shot in the fall before i pass final judgement on it's performance. Premium crop put out good main heads but the side shoots were small. Still on the lookout for the perfect broccoli, or perhaps they just need more space/fertilizer. The plants had worms at the end of the month, as i never covered them, so they got pulled and will be replaced by a fall crop in 2-3 weeks.
Cauliflower- one of the more exciting harvests! all 6 plants headed up, and would have been perfect had we not gone on vacation. The first 2 I managed to harvest at the perfect stage. the next 2 were on their way to bolting but still edible and the last 2 were sadly worm infested and had to be composted (wormy cauliflower smells awful!) note to self, skipping row cover on brasicas is not an option! i saw no noticeable difference in the 2 varieties planted, and i'll do another test with the fall crop.
savoy cabbage- had started to head up nicely with the worms hit. I quickly harvested and removed the outer damage portions, which left very very small heads. Also the plant was huge, compared to the size of the head. Many of our neighbors seem to have a variety with large heads and small surrounding foilage (which is better suited to a small garden) I wonder if they are removing outer leaves or it has something to do with nutrients. I'll have to ask
Beets- had only planted 12 and they were delicious. Such a satisfying crop to grow and i will definitely have to grow more next year. the direct seeded varieties were a bust, so transplanting it is next year
Fennel- bolted, but still was eaten. I will only plant after the summer solstice next year (or really early under cover)
Peas- both snap and shelling. The amount of shelling peas was perfect, and planting 3 varieties really extended the harvest for us. we had enough for a serving for 2 each week for about 5 weeks. The snap peas were also great, but i think we should plant fewer next year or pickle the excess because were pretty sick of them at the end of the month. Won't be growing the purple flowering Gigante again, becasue like the name says it grows tall and unwieldy and makes finding the pods difficult.
Lettuce- salads galore, can't complain at all. would love to have more varities to spice up our salad bowl next year and have to keep in mind to plant replacements sooner, because even the cut and come again varities bolted sooner than anticipated.
Currants- We harvest over 4 kilos of currants and the were eaten fresh, in cake and mousse and the rest were processed into syrup to add to drinks. The processing was a pain, but I am sure we will enjoy the bounty in the winter months.
I don't think I will ever buy mixed bulbs again. I previously stated that all the daffodils ended up being standard yellow and the Asiatic lilies turned out to be all yellow too. The gladiolus ended up being pink and yellow. I mean I like yellow, but i was hoping for more of a cheerful colorful mix and not a monotone view.
there were also all kinds of beetles eating away and procreating on the flowers. I let them be.
marigolds are lovely and carefree....need many more next year.
Plenty of self seeded weeds/flowers. (love the sunflowers and poppy, the others not so much)
Diseases/pests:
tiny strange beetles on brassicas. Bit annoying to wash off but not particularly damaging. spider web like residue on kohlrabi. black aphids on fava beans. Cabbage worms
Thankfully not too much slug or vole damage (knock on wood) Although the wild foxes seem to like using and freshly dug beds as toilets...
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Green Harvests
It is salad, broccoli and pea sesaon! We have been eating these 3 things at almost every meal, with some of the bolting onions thrown in. I just started a second round of salad seedlings and also got a second sowing of beets, fennel and kholrabi in. Hope the harvests continue!
It is amazing how fast the plants are growing!
It is amazing how fast the plants are growing!
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| peas at the beginning of june |
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| peas in mid/late june |
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| premium crop broccoli is the first to head up |
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| lettuce at beginning of june |
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| lettuce at end of june (after multiple pickings) |
Friday, June 1, 2012
may update
Wow, I am a bad blogger. It seems I have time for any 3 of the following things and not more: work, garden, cook/bake, bike/hike or blog. Needless to say, blogging got put on the back burner, especially because I forget to lug my camera around. We had really good weather in May! Warm, sunny and a every so often rain, so I didn't have to hand water too much.
Planting:
Our last official frost date is May 15th, but the tomatoes were getting enormous and leggy, and the weather forecast on May 10th showed warm days for the next two weeks, so I went ahead and planted them. Of course a week later on May 18-19th it got down to 0.2 degrees Celsius. Close call, but the row cover seemed to help. The nights were cold in the first half of the month and have just started staying around 10 Celsius. Daytime highs are around 15-20 Celsius. A week after the tomatoes, on May 20th the eggplants and peppers got planted, but they haven't put on any growth, probably because of the temperatures. I will get a row cover on them to hopefully speed things along. And on May 29th all the curcubits got planted (zucchini, cucumber, and winter squash). I still need to assemble some type of cucumber trellis that stores well in the winter. One blueberry bush (bluecrop) was replaced because it didn't put on any new growth after an Easter freeze killed the young leaves. I went ahead and 'splurged' on a slightly older plant this time from a local nursery and bought a miniature variety( top hat) to plant as well.
Growth:
Some heavy rains followed by sun made the brassicas take off. Around May 15th I watered all the plants with our homemade nettle tea, which I am sure helped. The beets and fennel have started to bulb up. The radishes bolted and had to be composted and the carrots are very very slowly coming along. The peas started blooming around May 10th, but I have just got a few odd ones here and there. I am hoping next week will be the 1st big pea harvest. The favas are overwhelmed by aphids, and don't seem to be setting many pods (this could be because of the spacing or because of the aphids). The onions have bulbed up, but unfortunately are infested with onion maggot, I'll have to use row cover or a net next year. Also the drastic swings in temperature caused quite a few to bolt. The rather small strawberry plants are slowly growing, and have even given us a couple of strawberries every few days. They are a day neutral variety, so I hope they continue into fall. The red currents have started ripening (starting May 28th) and I hope in a few weeks at least some will be ready to eat. The flavor is supposed to improve as they stay on the bush, but then I will have to share with the birds! The broccoli has started to head (on May 25th) I hope to harvest the first next week and many side shoots thereafter. The herbs have taken off and oh yeah....so have the weeds!
Harvesting:
I have harvested rhubarb 4 times since April 15th, and about 800 grams each time. The plants still look strong and are putting on lots of new growth (and surprisingly haven't sent up a flower stalk like the neighbors) so I think I can get in another 1 or 2 harvests before the summer solstice, the date where you are traditionally told to stop harvesting because of the oxalic acid amount and to help the plant store energy for next year.
We haven't purchased salad since May 1st! the plants were slow to start off but seem to be doing really well in the sunny weather. Hopefully they wont bolt anytime soon, but I got more seeds of all the salad varieties planted this week as replacements (especially of the heading varieties that have to be pulled after harvest)
A few snap peas and strawberries as well as onions when we need them.
We had to pull lots of mint that was taking over other herbs and tried an entire jar full for tea etc.
Elder flowers are in bloom, we are just going to make a little syrup this year as we don't use very much.
Cooking:
Other than our daily salads, I have had fun experimenting with the rhubarb, so far I have made
Rhubarb streusel cake
Rhubarb crumble
Rhubarb custard tart
Rhubarb mousse
Still on the list: a small batch of refrigerator jam from the last harvest to use immediately thereafter and possibly a souffle, pie and classic compote.
Whew, that was a busy month, but now that all my seedlings are in the ground i am somewhat relieved! On to the weeding, harvesting and processing phase!
Flowers: the last of the daffodils and tulips are fading, and being replaced by borage, azalea and poppy
Planting:
Our last official frost date is May 15th, but the tomatoes were getting enormous and leggy, and the weather forecast on May 10th showed warm days for the next two weeks, so I went ahead and planted them. Of course a week later on May 18-19th it got down to 0.2 degrees Celsius. Close call, but the row cover seemed to help. The nights were cold in the first half of the month and have just started staying around 10 Celsius. Daytime highs are around 15-20 Celsius. A week after the tomatoes, on May 20th the eggplants and peppers got planted, but they haven't put on any growth, probably because of the temperatures. I will get a row cover on them to hopefully speed things along. And on May 29th all the curcubits got planted (zucchini, cucumber, and winter squash). I still need to assemble some type of cucumber trellis that stores well in the winter. One blueberry bush (bluecrop) was replaced because it didn't put on any new growth after an Easter freeze killed the young leaves. I went ahead and 'splurged' on a slightly older plant this time from a local nursery and bought a miniature variety( top hat) to plant as well.
Growth:
Some heavy rains followed by sun made the brassicas take off. Around May 15th I watered all the plants with our homemade nettle tea, which I am sure helped. The beets and fennel have started to bulb up. The radishes bolted and had to be composted and the carrots are very very slowly coming along. The peas started blooming around May 10th, but I have just got a few odd ones here and there. I am hoping next week will be the 1st big pea harvest. The favas are overwhelmed by aphids, and don't seem to be setting many pods (this could be because of the spacing or because of the aphids). The onions have bulbed up, but unfortunately are infested with onion maggot, I'll have to use row cover or a net next year. Also the drastic swings in temperature caused quite a few to bolt. The rather small strawberry plants are slowly growing, and have even given us a couple of strawberries every few days. They are a day neutral variety, so I hope they continue into fall. The red currents have started ripening (starting May 28th) and I hope in a few weeks at least some will be ready to eat. The flavor is supposed to improve as they stay on the bush, but then I will have to share with the birds! The broccoli has started to head (on May 25th) I hope to harvest the first next week and many side shoots thereafter. The herbs have taken off and oh yeah....so have the weeds!
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| beets and fennel, lettuce and radishes |
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| baby brassicas, lettuce and favas |
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| carrots FINALLY have first set of leaves |
I have harvested rhubarb 4 times since April 15th, and about 800 grams each time. The plants still look strong and are putting on lots of new growth (and surprisingly haven't sent up a flower stalk like the neighbors) so I think I can get in another 1 or 2 harvests before the summer solstice, the date where you are traditionally told to stop harvesting because of the oxalic acid amount and to help the plant store energy for next year.
We haven't purchased salad since May 1st! the plants were slow to start off but seem to be doing really well in the sunny weather. Hopefully they wont bolt anytime soon, but I got more seeds of all the salad varieties planted this week as replacements (especially of the heading varieties that have to be pulled after harvest)
A few snap peas and strawberries as well as onions when we need them.
We had to pull lots of mint that was taking over other herbs and tried an entire jar full for tea etc.
Elder flowers are in bloom, we are just going to make a little syrup this year as we don't use very much.
 |
| rhubarb and radishes |
Other than our daily salads, I have had fun experimenting with the rhubarb, so far I have made
Rhubarb streusel cake
Rhubarb crumble
Rhubarb custard tart
Rhubarb mousse
Still on the list: a small batch of refrigerator jam from the last harvest to use immediately thereafter and possibly a souffle, pie and classic compote.
Whew, that was a busy month, but now that all my seedlings are in the ground i am somewhat relieved! On to the weeding, harvesting and processing phase!
Flowers: the last of the daffodils and tulips are fading, and being replaced by borage, azalea and poppy
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| borage, a bee magnet |
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| a wonderfully scented rhododendron(i think) |
Thursday, May 31, 2012
bee swarm
This was actually taken from our Apartment balcony when I noticed a swarm of bees on a tree in the courtyard. We live on the 4th floor, so they were VERY high up. I later was informed by my mother in law (she is a hobby bee keeper) that I should have called the fire department, as bee hives that swarm usually are looking for a safe place to live and rarely find one and die. The fire department apparently can catch them and has a list of bee keepers that will take them. Hope these guys made it somewhere safe! I spotted them in the morning and they were still there went i went to bed at night. They were gone the next morning, so were there for 15-25 hours.
Monday, May 28, 2012
Pentecost
Monday was a national holiday because of Pentecost, so we took advantage of the fantastic weather to do a bike tour from Zurich to Zug and back. The first half of the tour was riding upstream along the Sihl river from Zurich to Sihlbrugg and then after a short stretch on a main road, we went uphill to catch a great view of the Zugersee. Heading toward Zug we stopped at a lovely Kloster with a fabulous kitchen garden. It was enourmous, and they had over 30 tomato varieties growing (under glass roofed tomato houses, of course, to prevent blight). Along with using glass covered cold frames for seedlings, they had plastic foil high tunnels where they had finished harvesting the first round on florence fennel! Amazing how early they were able to get a harvest. It looked like they were selling transplants as well, and I probably would have bought one had we not been on bike with still a ways to go. Then we passed through the town of Baar before arriving in Zug. I promptly demanded a Zugerkirschtorte. The first one we got was from cafe Meier, which was eaten on the steps next to the Train station and the second one we tried was from Confiserie Speck, which was eaten next to the lake. I think I prefered the first one, as it was a bit less boozy and had a bit more icing to take away from the bite of the alcohol. (can you tell I am not a big drinker?) Then we headed back to Zurich, which was considerably easier as the last half was downstream. Definitely a moderate bike tour to do in the area!
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