I always plant a row or two of okra in the garden. It is a high producing crop that is drought & heat tolerant. We plant two varieties from seeds we save each year. The first is a Clemson Spineless okra:
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| Clemson Spineless Okra |
The next variety is Burgundy Okra. It's obvious why it is called by that name!
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| Burgundy Okra |
Okra is a crop that you must diligently pick each and every day. It will produce from here on out until December or so. You can see all the okra blossoms that are about to open. Each one will yield an okra pod. You want to try to pick them when they are young and tender. If they get too large they will get tough and woody. You can tell what I'm talking about when you try to cut a pod that has grown too large. I usually just throw those into the compost bucket.
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| Clemson okra about to bloom |
Here is the same thing on the Burgundy okra.
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| Burgundy okra blooming and setting pods |
Okra plants have a lot of leaves that block out the sun. That enables the plant to maintain the moisture levels in the soil to help the plant grow and flourish.
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| Okra plants full of leaves |
We have okra in our fridge non-stop and it is always a nice, easy side dish to prepare.
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| Okra for supper |
So let's get supper started. First grab a couple of tomatoes from the garden and dice them up.
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| Chopped up Tomato |
Here is a little trick that we use with okra. Lots of people don't like okra because of the slime factor. When you cook it, it can get really slimy. We always add a cube or two of frozen lemon juice. The lemon juice counteracts and nullifies the slime. So throw a cube of lemon juice in the pot.
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| Lemon juice cube |
Next chop up some onion and all of your okra. This won't take you long.
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| Chopping up okra and onions |
Put the chopped okra, onions, and tomatoes in the pot with the lemon juice.
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| A colorful pot |
Add some water to the bottom of the pot, put the cover on and cook until tender. The Burgundy Okra loses its color when it cooks.
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| Okra & tomatoes |
We eat lots of okra around here!
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