Growing Table Grapes in the High Desert

Quail SpringsFarm and Garden, Permaculture 1 Comment

This past April, Margaret Waterhouse, a former farm and garden apprentice, came down from Davis California to the high desert home of Quail Springs Permaculture Farm in southern California with about 120 grape cuttings carefully packed in moist wood shavings. A small group of friends, family, former apprentices, and students had gathered for the weekend to visit, walk the land, …

Growing Chile, Part Two: Starting Seeds

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Today I was delighted to find my order of seeds had finally come through the mail. I combed through internet and catalog trying to find the right plants. I finally found the gold mine in Native Seed Search, an awesome and inspiring organization. Here is their mission statement: “Native Seeds/SEARCH conserves, distributes and documents the adapted and diverse varieties of …

Growing Chile, Part One: Bed Prep

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As the cold of winter is replaced by the mud and rain of spring and our powdered and dried chile alchemizes its last few pozoles, our stomachs begin to rumble at the thought of a fresh crop of Capsicum annuum. We came to the table with a fiery ambition of creating at the very least enough dried chile to last …

Harvest Day Pesto

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Harvesting is one of the many wonderful jobs here at Quail Springs. As the months pass, we get such a large variety of goodness from our organic garden. In the middle of February, we are aiming to do about two harvests a week. With the climate here being rather warm, we are harvesting all sorts of greens as well as …

Grainy Goodness: Bread

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As a community, we love our wholesome bread. This recipie provides for a simple and hearty piece of toast or freshly sliced bread.  The process goes over two or three days. It’s simple and effective. To my surprise, I managed to make a few loafs yesterday without killing the 100 year old whole-wheat starter we have. Pressure is off! Over …