My Favorite Peas in the Garden

If you want to "grow protein" in the garden, you cannot overlook the cowpea.  We grow them every single year.  Mostly, we grow three varieties: Black-eyed peas, Purple Hull peas, and Ozark Razorback peas.  The lowly cowpea has nodules that set nitrogen in the soil.  They effectively produce their own fertilizer!  They thrive in heat and drought conditions and produce fantastic yields. 

Here are some black-eyed peas that are ready for picking.  Once the hulls turn a yellowish color, well, it's time to get out there with a bucket and start picking. 

Right next to the row of black-eyed peas, I have a row of purple hull peas planted.  You can tell how they got their name, can't you?  When the hulls turn purple, they are ready to pick as well.

I filled a large basket with black-eyed peas and had to go back inside to get a bucket to finish with the purple hulls.

Once you've picked them, the fun's just begun.  Now there's pea shellin' to do.  Pea shelling is great therapy, I think.  I like to sit down somewhere with a bowl and release them from the shells into the bowl.  We have an electric pea sheller, but I have to tell ya, I didn't even plug it in this year.  

These in the bowl below are black-eyed peas, as their black eyes testify.

Here is a bucket of purple hulls that are ready to be shelled.

Purple hull peas, once shelled look a little similar to black-eyed peas, but their 'eyes' are more pink, I would say.

This year we put tray after tray of cowpeas in the dehydrator and dried them for a bit.

Once they are fully dried, we pack them in half gallon-sized jars and vacuum seal them.  We have a gallon of peas put up in the pantry.  It's good to have a store of peas.

Growing them is gratifying, for sure.  Picking them is fun.  Shelling them, we've already established, is therapeutic.  But the best doggone part of it is eating them.  Cooking them in a pot with some onions, peppers and some smoked sausage and then serving over a big mound of rice with some homemade corn bread on the side.  Well, I'll tell you what.  You've got a southern meal that can't be beat.  It's comfort food that sticks to your ribs and puts a smile on your face.

I've got to brag on my wife's homemade cornbread.  She tried something new and it was a hit in my book.  She took some sweet corn scraped off the cob with the 'milk' and cut up some fresh jalapenos and added to the batter.  It made a moist, sweet and spicy cornbread that we all enjoyed.

Peas, If You Please

The cowpeas we have planted are producing in big quantities right now.  Each day I'm picking a gallon.  We have four different varieties planted and I'll show you three of them today.  We've talked about it before, but shelling peas is such a therapeutic activity.  You sit down with a bowl and start shelling, removing the peas from the pods.  The pods go in a big bowl to be composted later and the peas go into another.

These, off course, are blackeyed peas.

These are an heirloom we've grown to like.  They are called Ozark Razorback peas.  They are smaller and more round than blackeyes.

Finally, here is another heirloom variety I picked up at a seed swap.  They are called whippoorwill peas.  They are smaller than blackeyes and Ozark Razorbacks. 

Each year I save some of the seeds to keep for next years' crop.  The Ozark Razorbacks and Whippoorwill peas germinated from some really old seed I had.  

We don't separate the peas.  "Variety is the spice of life, That gives it all its flavor." is a quote from a poem by William Cowper in 1785.  It holds true today.  We shell all the peas into one bowl.  Aren't the different colors and sizes pretty?

In addition to freezing a bunch of these in bags, we eat a bunch of these, too!  They are nutritious and full of flavor, like the poem says.  We put them in a big pot with some water and cut up some smoked sausage along with peppers and onions.

Once a pot of rice is cooked and these peas are served over rice...  Mmmmmm.  One thing that kicks it up an extra notch is to serve the peas over some homemade cornbread with a good many dashes of hot sauce on top.  Comfort food at its finest.  My wife tells me I'm easy to please in that regard because fresh shelled peas over rice is a favorite dish of mine - especially in the winter.

A Brief Work Excursion AND Planting More Protein

I was out of pocket for a few days.  Russ, our oldest son, looked after the animals, fed them, gathered eggs and everything else that needs to be done around the homestead.  Tricia and I journeyed out to Baton Rouge for a couple of days for a work conference.  The Company put us up in a hotel that overlooked the Mississippi River.  We watched tug boats push long lines of barges stacked back to back up and down the river.

I attended meetings, but there was some fun intermixed and good eating, of course.  One adventure was a bus trip to TopGolf.  Let me be clear - I am not a golfer.  Back in the 80's, I went golfing for the first time in my life.  I teed off and the ball sliced or hooked or whatever you call it.  I knew that you needed to holler something, so I yelled, "Fore!"  A gentleman on the next green got out of his golf cart, looked my way and yelled, "What?"  Just at that time, my golf ball hit him square in the forehead.  A lump immediately grew on his head like in the cartoons.  He was very angry.  I realized that golf was a sport that required a lot of practice AND that I was dangerous at this thing.  Someone could get seriously injured.  I have not been on a golf course since then.

TopGolf is different.  It is more like bowling than golf.  A ball comes out, you hit it and you get points if you land the ball in lit up circles.  There is some sort of computer tracking of the ball.  It reads your score on a computer screen.  Food is served and everyone has a nice time.  Here is Tricia teeing off.

There are hundreds of bays and hundreds of people playing.  We were on the third floor.  The smile on my face shows my relief in that I didn't hit anyone with an errant ball.

While a golf club is a strange implement in our hands, a garden hoe and rake is not.  Last week once the rains came through, I got busy and planted two more 45 foot rows of Ozark Razorback Peas and Blackeyed Peas.  With threats of food shortages and inflation, I figured we'd get some more protein planted.  Rice and Peas with a little smoked tasso for flavor is a nutritious, quick, hearty, tasty meal.  

This planting was an experiment of sorts.  I was checking the germination in some OLD seed I had saved many years ago.  Both of the containers of saved seed were labeled with the name of the seed (Ozark Razorback and Blackeye - both Southern cowpeas).  They were also labelled with the year I saved them.  2012!!!  You read that right.  I saved them ten years ago.  Counting on diminished germination, I planted them one inch apart rather than the normal four inch spacing.  Look what happened:

The germination on the decade-old seed was pretty doggone good!  There are a few gaps, but they'll fill in.  Not too shabby.  Once the peas were up three inches or so, I pulled the mulch around the plants to discourage weed growth and preserve soil moisture.

We're still picking purple hull peas, ozark razorback peas, and blackeyed peas from the current garden.  When those play out, these will be ready for harvest.  It will soon be time to start planting the fall crop.  I'm looking forward to that!

Time For Purple Hull Peas

I like to grow Southern Peas.  They are also called cowpeas.  I read that they were called 'cowpeas' because, you guessed it: they grew it to feed the cows.  They were considered 'poor man's food' because poor people ate them.  Guess what?  They ain't just for po folk - they're for all.  I love to eat them and most people I know love them.  Here's the thing about them - they are a great source of protein (24%) and they fix nitrogen into the soil, making your soil more fertile and productive for the next rotation.  Cowpeas love the heat.  They thrive on it, actually.  I hear talk that there is a meat shortage and that beef prices are high.  Planting cowpeas combats this.

We generally plant several varieties: Purple Hull, Blackeye, Ozark Razorback, and Whippoorwill peas.  They fill in the rows and produce a bountiful crop.  Here is a row of the purple hulls.

Buckwheat, the goat, looks longingly at the ripening crop, wishing he could get through the fence, but it is not to be.

Purple hull peas are aptly named.  They are ripe when the hulls turn purple.  You can see the hulls below turning a tinge of purple, but they aren't quite ready.

Below are some pods that are purple and ready for harvest.  Once they start coming in, every other day you can walk down the rows and pick them.

Once you have a basket full, it's time to shell them.  We do not have an automatic pea sheller.  We shell them the old fashioned way - by hand.  There is something therapeutic and relaxing that you get when shelling peas.  Watching the peas pop into the bowl is rewarding.  Tuesday night, Tricia and I stood shoulder to shoulder and shelled a mess of peas.

We also shelled some Whippoorwill Peas.  Whippoorwill peas are smaller, and I think have a 'nuttier' flavor.

We love to eat them and Tricia finds them to be an easy meal.  All you have to do is put on a pot of rice and cook your peas, adding some diced onions and peppers and some smoked sausage for extra flavor.  A cast iron pot with homemade cornbread kicks this meal up an extra notch!

Growing a New (For Us) Type of Cowpea (Southern Pea)

Saturday morning is a morning different from other mornings.  We slow down the pace to that of a three-toed sloth or maybe a snail.  It is a day that we allow the sun to beat us outside.  We rise at a respectable hour, have coffee, and slowly make our way out to milk the cows.  Once finished, I usually take a stroll through the garden, not to work, mind you (that comes later in the day), but just to take in all the changes that I didn't get to observe during the week. 

It is usually around 9AM by this time and the sun filters through the live oak trees to our east and lights up the garden with soft light.  I notice the beautiful blooms of some peas.  If you look closely below, you can see that a fire ant is enjoying the bloom as well.  Can you see that dad-gum thing on the flower?

This beautiful bloom is on a new plant for us.  Several years ago, we went to a sustainable agricultural conference.  In one part of the conference, they have a seed exchange.  They invite attendees to bring heirloom seed to trade.  It is a good opportunity to pick up some new varieties of old heirloom seeds that you can't buy from seed companies.  These are seeds passed down in families from generation to generation.

This bloom is from a plant in the Southern Pea family called a Whippoorwill Pea.  I had never heard of it before.  I opened the small brown envelope with a hand-written label containing the seeds and planted them a couple months ago.  The seeds were old.  I was not optimistic, but lo and behold, they grew!  And now they are blooming and setting pods of peas.

The peas seem immune to the heat and dry conditions of south Louisiana and send out vines that stretch across the ground and climb up the trellis supporting the luffah gourds and birdhouse gourds.  This is an old seed!   This seed was harvested from the gardens at Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's garden.  Here is what is written about it from the Monticello website:

In 1798 Thomas Jefferson wrote that the cowpea (also called southern, crowder, or field pea) "is very productive [and an] excellent food for man and beast."  He also praised the species' ability to improve the tilth and fertility of the soil.  Cowpeas, first brought to the southeastern U.S. by African slaves, were sowed in the South Orchard at Monticello between 1806 and 1810.  Whippoorwill Cowpea, a bush variety with short runners, purple flowers, and 7-9" pods, was popular in the 19th century.

The pods of the Whippoorwill pea turn white when they are ready for harvest.  I've been picking quite a few of them. 

In the evenings I sit in the kitchen and shell peas.  Sometimes the boys help me if they are around.  It goes faster when you have help, but like Saturday mornings, we don't get in a rush.  Shelling peas is a relaxing exercise.  Time seems to stand still.  The stress of the days' demands roll off of you like water off a duck's back. 

When you are done, there is the gratification of a job well done.  Here we have a nice bowl of fresh-shelled Whippoorwill Peas.

Whippoorwill Peas are different from other cowpeas.  They are a little smaller and have a green-grey mottled color.  I like the way they look.

Now, to complete our review, we just need to cook up a pot of them and taste them.  The flowers are pretty, they laugh at the heat and dry conditions of the summer, the yield is great, and they are nice to look at.  The proof, though, is how they taste.  I'll report back on that.  I am optimistic and have saved some of the best looking pods to hold back for next year's Whippoorwill Pea seed planting.

These peas have survived for over 200 years in America.  Might as well do my part to keep them going for at least another season.

Cowpeas Continue Giving After the Crop is Harvested

One doesn't have to walk far in the garden to realize that The Creator designed things.  Today I'd like to briefly mention one of those things - specifically nitrogen fixation.  Let's take a look at our cowpeas:

They are in the center of the row and you can tell that they are petering out.  The leaves are turning yellow, all pods have been harvested, and after a busy summer of producing many meals for us, they are tired and their life cycle is complete.  Good financial stewards leave a legacy to their offspring, often of money, land and gifts, but also advice, wisdom, and memories.

Some plants, amazingly, leave a legacy, too!  I'm talking about nitrogen fixation.  Cowpeas (Purple Hull peas, Ozark Razorback peas, and Black-eyed peas) are legumes that we plant that are excellent fixers of nitrogen.  Here's how it works:  I wasn't very good at chemistry, but I've read about the process.  See 80% of our surrounding atmosphere is comprised of nitrogen (N2), but it is unusable by plants.  Plants use ammonia (NH3), a form of nitrogen though.  Cowpeas have the God-given ability to convert N2 to NH3!

Bacteria in the soil works in conjunction with the plant to do this job.  The bacteria live in little nodules on the roots of the plants.  I'm sure you've seen them if you've ever pulled the roots up on legumes like cowpeas or soybeans.  The bacteria is working in these nodules to produce NH3 which is absorbed by the plant.  Some, however, is absorbed in the soil when the roots decompose and helps enrich the soil for crops planted later.  (Hence the legacy!) 

The photo below shows the "After" shot that followed the photo above.  I took out my weedeater and chopped down the cowpeas, leaving the roots intact.  I didn't want to pull the roots, but letting them stay to provide food for the next crop - in this case cabbage seedlings that I'll plant amongst the chopped down cowpeas.

Long after our meal of purple hull peas over rice with tasso is long gone, the purple hulls will still be providing food - but no longer for us - this time for the cabbage crop in the form of nitrogen.

First Fall Crops Are In the Ground

The cole crops (broccoli, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, and cabbage) are all sprouted in the seed pots.  I'll have to show you pics in a couple of days.  However, there are a couple of crops that I can plant directly in the ground - right now.  On Saturday, I fired up the weed eater and cleaned up the weeds that were knee-high.  I weed-eated (or weed-ate?) them right down to the bare ground.  I allowed the hot August sun to beat down on the barren ground for a day to dry things out.

On Sunday afternoon after church, we ate a satisfying meal and had coffee and planned out the week.  Then I talked myself into getting the shovel out of the garden and sharpening it with the grinder.  Hot sparks were flying.  I walked out to the garden and in about an hour, I had the side garden soil all turned over.  Sweet corn and green beans grew here this spring.  Turning over the dirt was labor intensive for sure.  Whew!  Good exercise, but hard work.  I slept good Sunday night.

Monday afternoon, I rushed back from work as fast as the traffic would allow me.  It was time to plant a couple of fall crops right in the ground.  The first item was Purple Hull peas.  We've already been harvesting some of these and have eaten several meals of peas and rice.  We are planting a fall crop so that we can put some up in the freezer and eat some fresh.

I also planted another variety of cowpeas - Ozark Razorback Peas.  These are saved seeds.  I like the way they look as they are speckled - either red & white or black & white.  These are seeds I saved from back in 2012 so the germination may be a little off.  To compensate, I planted them extra thick.

All in all we have four rows of cowpeas that are 22 feet long. 

The miracle of a seed in the ground

The peas were all in the ground, but we still had half of the side garden left to plant - totaling 23 feet.  I was going to plant more peas, but decided to put in a fall crop of potatoes.  The LSU Vegetable Planting guide lists the fall window of planting to be between August 15 - September 10th.  Last year I planted too late.  I gambled and lost and the frost killed my potato plants deader than a door nail.  I try to learn from my mistakes and planted early this year.

We have some small potatoes in our bin left over from our spring potato harvest.  We'll use those for seed potatoes.  I enjoy using our own seed as much as possible.

Seed Potatoes from our potato harvest back in May

I dug holes four inches deep and a foot apart.  My potato planting helper, Benjamin, helped me by placing the potatoes with the biggest eye sprouts into the holes.  It was nice having him help me.

Some of the sprouts on the potatoes were pretty good.  One nice rain and it will be popping up out of the ground.

I used a hoe to cover the peas and potatoes.  Planting, in my opinion, is an optimistic and hopeful exercise.  It is a leap of faith to put the peas and potatoes in the ground.  We could have just as easily eaten them, but with risk comes reward.  In a leap of faith we planted them.  Hopefully we'll have a healthy crop with a bountiful yield.  We'll keep you posted with the progress of the peas and potatoes in the side yard garden.

Sunday Morning Silent Garden Stroll

11 For as the soil makes the sprout come up and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign LORD will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.  Isaiah 61:11 NIV

This morning after Sunday morning milking I wanted to walk through the garden.  Last night we had a family night out to the movies in Lafayette and didn't get to pick okra.  Okra grows so doggone fast.  If you miss a day picking, the okra goes from tender to woody and inedible.  I wanted to make sure I picked it early this morning.  The morning sun was filtering through the trees on the east side of the garden.   

Yesterday's refreshing rain had everything blooming.  Here are some beautiful lima bean blooms.

Just underneath the canopy of lima bean leaves that cover the trellis, you can see pods full of fat lima beans!

On the next row I see black-eyed peas blooming.

A luffa gourd that came up volunteer from last year's seeds is blooming as well.  Its bright yellow flowers full of nectar is attracting honey bees as you can see this one making a "bee-line" for the flower.

It landed and began filling itself with pollen.  The bee hive in our column is gone.  It makes me wonder where his hive is now.  It is good to know that there is still a colony of bees in the vicinity to keep things pollinated.

Just a few steps down and you can see purple hull peas blooming in the center of the photo, with a pod that will be turning purple soon.  In the top left corner of the photo is a dragon fly.  Can you spot him?

Towering above the garden near the end of the garden are the stalks of okra.  Big beautiful blooms announce the soon arrival of more pods of okra. 

It doesn't take long for a bloom to turn into okra pods.  You can see okra at various stages of development just behind the flower below.

More black-eyed pea blooms pop up in the Sunday morning sunshine.  Cowpeas and okra relish the warm, humid conditions prevalent here now.

They keep thriving, putting out pods that we'll be shelling soon.  Lots of work still remains to be done in the garden.  We'll be busy harvesting and then working on getting the fall garden in pretty soon.

I spotted this guy trying to blend in with an okra stalk!

It's Sunday morning.  He's not in any hurry... Nor should I!