Growing Chayote in Northern California

Growing up, I remember my aunt growing this odd vegetable in her backyard.  The plant was huge and took over her the shed in her backyard as well as the arbor that was about 10 feet x 10 feet.  The plant was so monstrous and was completely covered in these weid looking vegetables that looked like they were from another planet or from the movie "Little Shop of Horrors".

My mother would take home huge bags filled with the vegetables and stir fry them.  They were very tasty.

The vegetable above is called a Chayote and are grown in warmer areas around the world.  are now widely grown in tropical and subtropical areas around the world.  They are known as christophine, chocho to Madeirans, pipinella to Italians, and pipinola to Hawaiians.

I bought 2 from safeway and have them sitting on a plate in a dark cupboard in the garage, waiting for some shoots to emerge so I can plant them.

Here are some instructions I found:

How to Plant:
Select a mature chayote fruit from your grocery store.  If there is still danger of a freeze, put your chayote in a dry, dark place and wait for sprouts to emerge.  Once sprouts have emerged you can either plant the whole fruit about 4” deep in damp soil.  Position the fruit at about a 45 degree angle (fat side down), so that the shooting end points downwards, and that the other end peaks above the soil level (pointy end).  The fat end will produce both the roots and the plant.  If the soil is warm enough you can skip planting in a pot and plant directly in-ground.

Once the soil is warmer and the threat of freeze is gone, plant near a fence or other strong supporting structure in your garden. If planting more than one, space approximately 1 yard apart to allow plenty of growing room for the vines.  Build a trellis or better yet an arbor for your vines to grow on.

How to Water:
When first planted in the pot or in ground water sparingly because the plant does pull its nutrients from the fruit around the seed.  Once the Chayote is established it does requires a lot of water, to keep the vine growing. For it to grow appropriately, plan to water it regularly (esecially in dry periods and in late summer).

How to Fertilize:
Several weeks before planting, add a dose of compelte fertilizer or compost to the growing area.

Halfway through the summer growing season, apply another dose of the complete fertilizer to the plant's garden bed.

During second year of growth, fertilize again around the new shoots during early spring.

Gardening Challenges:
Chayote is normally pretty problem free. You may see some aphids, spiders, or pumpkin beetles.

How to Harvest:
Harvest the chayote fruit when light green and about 2-3” long. The larger the fruit, the less flavor.

Uses:
You can slice and stir fry them or boil them until soft, scoop out the flesh, mix with breadcrumbs stuff back into chayote shell and bake.  Or throw them on the grill.  Pretty much anything you can do with summer squash you can substitute chayotes.

When the plant is old enough you can even harvest the roots and eat them.

The first year you can expect 30-40 fruits and up to 100 fruits the next couple of years.

I try to update with progress on my chayotes when I can.

2010 Garden: Planning in process

I just started receiving all the gorgeous catalogs and am so excited for my 2010 garden.  I think I have decided what I am going to plant in my vegetable Garden.

Here are repeats from last years garden I will grow again because they were easy and productive.

Herbs and greens:

Arugala- this is pretty much growing wild now because it re-seeded itself.

Spring Mix: very easy to grow but make sure to protect it from the sun.

Genovese Basil
Our most popular basil offering. Basil Genovese comes from Italy to lend its fragrance and beauty to your landscape, and, more importantly, its flavor to any dish that calls for basil. Large, dark green, heavily perfumed 2" long. This is a choice basil selection.

Cilantro is still growing...one stem is over 2 feet long!

Chives
The sweet, oniony flavor of chives is well-known. Deserving of equal appreciation are the spunky lavender flowers, which not only serve as a decorative border for garden beds, but can be eaten in salads or used as a garnish for other foods. Said to deter Japanese beetles. Full sun to part shade; prefers moderately rich soil.

Sage
(Salvia officinalis) Besides carrying the banner for Thanksgiving, sage works well with virtually every kind of food. Harvest its leaves any time and use it fresh, dried, or frozen. Grows 12-30" tall; full sun; well-drained soil. Perennial.

English Thyme
This invaluable culinary herb is one of the finest herbs of French cuisine, and was once used in combination with beer as a cure for shyness. Its low-growing, gentle appearance and pretty flowers also make it a favorite landscape plant. Grows 1' tall; full sun to part shade; light, well-drained soil. Perennial.

Mint
Mint makes a lively addition to salads and teas. Our mint is grown from seed which allows us to offer you certified organic plants. Mint grown from seed does not grow true to type, so we cannot specify the variety, but we are told by our supplier the flavor is that of peppermint.
 
 
Tomatoes:
 
Black Krim
This is the legendary black tomato, known for its brown-black skin and sweet-rich flavor. Reportedly Russian in origin. We introduced Black Krim in 1995 and it has developed a steady and growing following ever since. Fruits are borne in strands and are large, firm, with fine-textured interiors.  This was very productive in my garden.

Marvel Stripe
Luscious sweet flavor, lively coloring, and large, 1-2 lb. fruits make this one of the best of the heirloom beefsteaks. The fruits are bicolored red and yellow with a marbelized interior. Indeterminate. 80-90 days.  This was my most productive tomato plants...very sweet and juicy tomatoes.
 
Sungold
An orange cherry tomato that may be the most significant tomato introduction in the last decade. It has a distinctive tropical flavor that sets it apart, or, as one customer said, "like fireworks in your mouth." Produces long strands of fruit on vigorous, tall, indeterminate vines. Early. Hybrid. 57 days.

Sun Sugar
Judged the best tasting cherry tomato by the garden and food staff of Sunset Magazine. How could we resist offering to you for your consideration? Orange skinned and similar in appearance to Sun Gold. Crack resistant. Indeterminate. 62 days.
 
Sugar Snack
Sugar Snack produces impressive clusters of sweet and attractive cherry tomatoes, similar in appearance to Sweet 100. Unlike Sweet 100, Sugar Snack fruits are much less likely to crack. Ranked the #2 cherry tomato by the garden editors of Sunset Magazine, just behind SunSugar. A very heavy producer. Indeterminate. 65 days.
 
Cocozelle Zucchini

This is an easy-to-grow, productive and flavorful variety of zucchini that belongs in every summer garden. 45-60 days.

Charentais Melon
The most famous of the French cantaloupes, and a fixture at late summer produce markets in the south of France. Charentais produces small, 1-2 lb. fruits filled with fragrant and flavorful orange flesh. The slightly lobed fruit has a smooth gray surface with green vertical stripes at each lobe. Each fruit is perfectly sized for four delectable servings. 75 - 90 days.

Honey Orange Melon
This unusual honeydew has sweet flavor and pretty salmon-orange flesh that contrasts nicely with its ivory skin. Honey Orange produces numerous 3 lb. fruits that mature early and hold well after harvesting. It also tolerates cool conditions well. 74 days.
 
 
Here are some new things I will plant. for 2010
 
Jalapeno Peppers
Serrano Peppers
Garlic
Shallots
Pattypan squash
Orangeglo watermelon
Moon and Stars watermelon
Blacktail mountain watermelon
Crimson Sweet
 
Diva Cucumber
When we had to decide on a cucumber variety to offer in seedling form, Diva was the obvious choice. A 2002 All-America Selection, it produces delicious and uniform cucumbers with a sweet, melon-like flavor. Diva makes a first rate addition to salads, and it is so good it can be eaten all alone.

Sugar Baby watermelon
Sugar Baby's perfect sized fruits have made it the backyard gardener's favorite watermelon. The 6-8" round fruits have deep maroon-red interiors of sweet, fine-textured flesh, and weigh 8-10 lbs. - just right for the icebox. 78 days.
 
Tomatillo
Tomatillos are an essential ingredient in many Southwestern dishes and salsa verde, giving these preparations a distinctive clean, sharp taste. The plants are multibranching, 3-4' tall, and extremely prolific. The fruits are about the size of large cherry tomatoes and covered with easy-to-remove brown papery husks which conceal the dark green, smooth skin. 60 days. Open pollinated. OG. 35-45 seeds/pkt.


New tomatoes for 2010

Anna Russian
The oxheart has very delicate, wistful foliage as do many of the Russian varieties. Don't let that fool you! Anna is easy to grow and bears heavily during hot and cool weather. 65 days

Cherokee Purple
A legendary and beautiful tomato, at least 100 years old and said to be grown by the Cherokee People. 12 oz. deep dark dusky rose-purple, deep red inside, with sweet, rich and smoky, luscious flavor. Cherokee Purple is a garden staple, in everyone's favorite list for a good reason-- disease resistant, reliable and easy to grow, and great one for your heirloom or heritage garden. Seeds were sent to Craig Lehoullier by JD Green of Tennessee who got them from a neighbor whose family had grown them for more than 100 years. In 1990 Craig named it Cherokee Purple.

Cherokee Green
Another marvelous tomato from Craig LeHoullier. As Craig was growing our Cherokee Chocolate, one plant gave him ripe fruit which remained green! Growing on a big leafy plant, Cherokee Green fruits reach to 12" to 16" ounces and deliver the classic knock-out flavor and probably in the top 3 of the green varieties. Amber green with a yellow hue when ripe, they deliver a tangy rich sweet taste with meaty juicy texture. 75 days

Orange Strawberry
Vivid orange inside and out, with a rich, sweet taste to match. Orange Strawberry is an oxheart type of tomato with the fine flavor and distinctive shape for which oxhearts are known. Fruits run in the 1/2 to 1 lb. range. Plants are indeterminate, productive. Heirloom. 80 days.

Neves Azorean Red NAR. (Pronounced Neh-ves Ah ZOR ee uhn) 75 days. Boy are you in for a treat! This terrific, boldly flavored, 1 to 3 lb tomato is produced on a big hearty plant with a large central stem branching out into loaded branches of big beefsteak tomatoes so delicious they have become the talk of the tomato world. I have been custom growing this variety for certain very discriminating customers for the past couple of years, and now that the world is catching on to this spectacular fruit, it could become the ultimate sandwich tomato or to show off your special tomato salad. This one packs quite a flavor punch--not for sissies. Featuring great disease resistance and an excellent production right up until frost, we heartily thank Anthony Neves who brought the seeds home with him from a trip to The Azores, a Portuguese archipelago in the Atlantic about 900 miles west of mainland Portugal.

The fruits of Vietnam

Well, it is officially winter.  We had our first low temps of 29 degrees when an "arctic blast" came through.  I will post about the damage in another thread.

This cold weather makes me wish to be in the tropics.  Here are some pics from our trip to vietnam.

Hanging out under a large Mango tree.  This tree had to be at least 40 feet tall and 4 feet wide.  It covered half the parking area and we sat here to cool off.  There were about 20 other people under the tree.


The fresh fruit markets.  Notice the durian, mangosteen, longan, dragonfruit, mango and rambutan.  Yummy!!

Fall Garden: Broccoli & Cauliflower

My fall garden has not been as successful as my summer garden.  I need to figure out the timing to put the seeds in.  For the first round of beets I put the seeds in too quickly and the soil got too warm and the beets pre-maturely pushed themselves out of the soil and did not get very big.

here are the beets that I am going to throw in the compost pile. 

My broccoli first started to head the end of november and did not grow much for weeks.  We finally had some cold weather about a week ago and that triggered them to grow bigger.

Here is the picture of the broccoli from the end of november.

Here is the broccoli 2.5 weeks later.

I just found out that my cauliflower just started to grow heads this week as well from the frost and rain we have had.  I don't think I will grow these next year as they take up a ton of space for 1 head...unless they are amazingly delicious.

A small head of cauliflower.

a bigger head of cauliflower.  This one is about the size of a tennis ball right now.

Repotting the Chaffey Cherimoy

We bought our Chaffey cherimoya tree this spring and never got around to putting it in the ground.  The tree lost all of its leaves in April and looked dead so we neglected it but the tree came back!!

Even though it would have been more ideal to plant the tree inground in late winter/early spring I decided to plant the cherimoya inground and just protect it during really cold spells.  My sweet husband was kind enough to plant my tree in the dark!!

Here is the cherimoya in the pot.  It is about 5 feet tall and when I got it, it was a stick with 2 small branches and about 4 leaves.  It doesn't look that much bigger but considering we thought it was dead 4 months ago, it has made a huge improvement.

I am very pleased that there are new branches lower on the tree because ideally I would like to max the tree out at 6 feet tall so that it is shorter and bushier.

Here is the soil we put in the hole.  It is organic matter (mostly compost from our compost pile).

The hole is about 2 feet wide and 2 feet deep in a clay soil but surprisingly the soil a few inches from the surface is not as hard as we thought it was.

The very tiny root ball.

The cherimoya in its new home.  It is south facing, under a pine tree, and gets full on morning sun, then dappled midday sun, and then some afternoon sun.  I'll try to post a picture of the tree in the daytime.

Vegetable Garden Update: November 2009

I can't believe we are still picking ripe tomatoes in November.  Granted, they are not as sweet as they were in their peak but they are still quite yummy.  I think next week I will pick the last of the green tomatoes and make fried green tomatoes with them.  Yummy!!

Here is the cinderblock garden on November 4, 2009. 

Here is the same garden bed November 14, 2009.  As you can see, this bed does not get any protection from the bugs and this has caused the brassicas to grow at an inconsistent rate.

This is a picture of the biggest and "healthiest" brassica in my cinderblock garden and you can see how chewed up it is compared to the plants in the protected garden.

Here is the wood garden that is protected with tulle.  This picture was taken on November 4, 2009.

Here is the same angle of the garden taken 10 days later on November 14, 2009.  See how the plants have filled the tulle!!

This is a closer shot of the protected brassica and you can see the leaves are pretty much untouched by bugs and are perfect!!

Mango Update: Lancetilla Mango Tree

Here is an updated picture of my Lancetilla Mango tree in a container.  It is the most vigorous grower out of my 4 mango trees.  It was 4.5 feet when I got it but I pruned it down to about 3 feet to keep the tree at a more manageable height and to also help the tree branch out...it has definitely done that.