Pav Bhaji, a Frugal Recipe

 You know that time of the year when the tomatoes from the garden won’t stop.  This vegetable stew with slightly sweet dinner rolls to sop up the juices is a perfect way to use up tomatoes and any spare vegetables you have lying around.  

I got this recipe from Indian Healthy Recipes and I adjusted it for my family’s taste.  The Pav Bhaji spice mix that I have includes the hot chili, so I didn’t add more.

The dinner rolls are fromSally’s Baking Addiction and this is one of my favorite dinner roll recipes.  This recipe calls for whole milk which I didn’t have on hand, so I added a tablespoon of dried milk to the low fat milk I did have.

Pav Bhaji is a popular street food in Mumbai, India.  Vendors pride themselves on how much butter they use but I was conservative (stingy?) and only used a couple of tablespoons.  Enjoy!

God bless,

Pam

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The Tomatoes are Better Than Ever

 Growing tomatoes in Florida is difficult.  In fact, gardening in Florida is a challenge.  Hot, humid weather with voracious insects and small hungry mammals. “I’m talking about you, squirrels.”  People move here full of confidence in their gardening abilities and within a year they are crying on the local gardening group.

Then we explain that gardening in Florida is like living in Australia; you must garden in the winter.  Basically, our gardening is done from September to May.  In the summer we are limited to okra, cowpeas, and sweet potatoes.

As an example, tomatoes won’t set fruit until nighttime temperatures are under 75F.  If by some miracle you have healthy tomato plants in the summer, they won’t produce fruit.  They have become an ornamental shrub.

So it is with much happiness that I show off today’s tomato harvest.

God bless,

Pam

Well, it’s been a wild two years!

Despite two years of Covid, Dear Daughter starting college, husband having two heart attacks and no longer working, I am in a good place. Probably happier and healthier (physically and mentally) than I've been for quite a while. 

 Dear Daughter has started her junior year at college, husband has taken up kayaking, and when Covid came to be I morphed from being an average gardener to transitioning into being focused on learning more about food production, year round gardening,Florida native plants,and creating a quarter of an acre outside sanctuary. Truly, without my garden, it would have been hard to get through the last two years. 

Change is hard for people, but the garden kept me grounded, focused on creating something of real worth, and exercising my body in a productive way. The garden gave me a purpose. I'm looking forward to sharing my life with people again and discussing these challenging times with you.

 God bless, Pam