Fall Harvest

In Alaska we may not be able to have tree-ripened peaches like the Pauley family in Wenatchee, nor are we able to grow watermelons and sweet potatoes like Grandma in Kansas...but some vegetables do grow, even after the 3rd coldest summer on record.
Mom and our neighbor, Rosa Meehan.

Picking, washing, cooking, drying and freezing vegetables and herbs is very tedious --but enjoyable-- work. The more I take part in harvesting the garden produce, the greater appreciation I have for the fresh food on my plate. And I didn't even break my back over the planting, watering and weeding.
To stock up our freezers for the winter we blanch the produce for a few minutes in boiling water before freezing. This quick scalding theoretically stops the action of enzymes that cause vegetables to mature so the nutrients, colors, and flavors are retained as much as possible.
Bringing in some red potatoes from the back yard. We will wait a few weeks before harvesting the rest of the underground crops.

It's interesting how different plants change as the snow creeps further down the mountains. After the first frost, cranberries get better because it takes the bite off. Root crops and tubers get sweeter after a few hard frosts because the sugars get pushed down. Most vegetables are best before it frosts, however. Rhubarb, one of my favorite vegetables, can actually be dangerous to eat after a hard frost because the oxalate in the leaves gets pushed down the stalks. High amounts of oxalate can cause acute poisoning and even death. Usually there is a harmless amount of oxalic acid in rhubarb, spinach, cabbage, and beet tops but it binds with calcium and interferes with Ca absorption-- so forget eating your spinach if you have a broken bone!
Cranberries on the Falls Creek trail