Visitng the County Fair

Silly pork butt picture at the county fair.



I've spent the last three days at my brother's house and the family garden babysitting the twins while their parents have been on vacation. It has given me some time to can and freeze.

Back at my own home, my son managed to hold himself together, care for Faithful Companion, get to work, and feed himself, barely. Dirty dishes were "neatly" stacked, laundry overflowing, and he only slept one hour on Thursday because he and his best friend went "out" to breakfast at 2 AM.

Hmmm.

So as I work my way through mountains of his dirty clothes and do dishwasher after dishwasher of dirty glasses and plates (Have I mentioned his normal feeding schedule is about once per twenty minutes?, and make and can salsa today, I will mention I made my annual trip to the County Fair, yesterday.

County Fairs are a wealth of resources, particularly, which vegetable varieties have grown well for gardeners in the local area. One of judging rules requires naming the variety, great for me!

So far I have yet to see red sweet peppers for sale at Farmers' Markets. The best sweet red sweet pepper I saw displayed was a green 'Carmen', the variety I planted this year also.

Of the cherry tomatoes, the winner was another variety, of which I have already written, the 'Super Sweet 100'.


Broccoli 'Bay Meadow'


Tomato 'Celebrity'
'Celebrity' was the consistently largest tomato of all the entries.


This tomato, 'German Red', was particularly tastey-looking.


Celery 'XP-266'

Until last year I didn't realize celeruy could even be grown here. Last year a single entry of the variety 'Michigan' was entered. THis year there were many entries, no 'Michigan', but lots of 'XP-266' and 'Green Bay' or "self-blanching". I grew 'Tango'. I didn't see seed for these other varieties.


Celery 'Green Bay'


Grapes 'King of the North'


'Sweet corn 'Ambrosia'

We wanted to stay away from GMO and hybrid sweet corn. I'm not familiar with 'Ambrosia' and will have to check that one out further.

Today it is back to salsa-making.

Tomorrow: More of the county fair.