A girl's thoughts turn to...

We've had a cold a snowy several weeks in NJ (not like Boston though!)  I don't mind the cold - it was 3 degrees when I left the house this morning and I put on a zip up sweatshirt my friend Grace gave me with a sheep on it, fingerless gloves and my Devil's scarf - which is mostly open air.  I'm kind of getting tired of people feeling the need to inform me it's winter and asking me about the location of my coat... um my closet???  If I was uncomfortable, I'd put something else on.. seriously I'm not a moron, I do understand that if I feel cold, I need to put something more or different on.  I have a lot of hair - and I just don't have a good hat face - so my head is ok.  Sometimes if I'm going to be outside for a longer period and it's windy, I'll put a headband on to keep my ears warm.  When I walked Carl out to his truck (no coat, sweatshirt was in my locker) I got comments of do you know what the temperature is? and you'll freeze  to death.. Um I don't care about the actual number, and in 10 minutes it's highly unlikely I'll even get mild hypothermia.  I told Jim (groot) that love would keep me warm... he went grumbling off.... 

As much as I like winter, and truly enjoy making the people around me somehow feel colder because of my apparel, I find it great fun when my garden catalogs start arriving in the mail.  Right now, covered in snow, the possibilities are infinite... ok some things won't grow here... the possibilities are huge!  For me, the two things that makes summer bearable are going to racetracks and watching the cars, and having the perfect just picked tomato, pepper or other veggies.

My favorite place to order from is chiliplants.com , they have over 500 varieties of pepper plants (sweet, mild, all the way up to scorpion and ghost peppers) 180 different tomato plants and 65 different egg plants.  I order most of the plants either for pickup - or some years I have them shipped (it's amazing how they pack the plants for safe travels!) but I like going to the nursery - its about an hour away from my house, because they have a ton of different basils and tomatillos that aren't available on order yet.  I haven't been really successful with the tomatillos yet, but love all the different basils!

 The striped Tioga is an eggplant!!  While the leaves of the plant look like eggplant leaves, the plant is tall - and the fruit grows in bunches, they are about 3" long.  Toss with some salt and olive oil - put on a grill until the skins start splitting, then sprinkle with balamic...omg.. I'm getting hungry!

Kermit is another favorite, nd not just because in my brain it's named after the frog.  About a 2" globe - it's very versatile, since it's Thailand - I tend to cook it with sesame and ginger dishes - another grills well. Kermit also ripens relatively early in the season, so I can get my fork in early!

Cloud nine has become one of my favorite for eggplant parms..it seems to be less bitter than the purple eggplants.. and it's cute!

 
I'm adding this Rotundo Bianco to the mix this year - It's an Italian heirloom variety.

Tomatoes coming soon - it takes me longer to figure out peppers!


All the pictures are from the chiliplants.com website and belong solely to them.