The convergence of the beginning of my winter CSA and putting our garden to bed for the winter (the final clean-up day is Saturday) has got me in a bit of a reflective mood. Tonight for dinner I cooked the very last of the veggies that will come from our plot this season, some eggplant of all things. Who knew that this most Mediterranean of vegetables would survive into November? Probably the pepper plants that were still producing until last week.
My CSA, too, had some peppers and eggplants along with the first of the winter greens. I had all my fingers and toes crossed that they would include a few peachy mama peppers in the delivery box, but I was disappointed. They are the same shape and size of habaneros, with all of the flavor but none of the heat. I am enthralled by them, mostly because they are so good, but also because there is nothing else like them, and I have never found them anywhere else.
Last summer we got bags and bags of them, and as happy as I was, I know that some of my fellow shareholders complained, and so our farmer adjusted the crop. This year we received exactly two small peppers in early September, which is why I was hoping that they might find their way into the early boxes of our winter share. No such luck tonight.
I'm not the same passive consumer I once was, though. Now I am a woman with a garden, and so I set aside the immediate gratification of cooking with those two little peppers, and instead I dried them for seeds. If all goes well? Next year I won't be dependent on anyone for my peachy mamas, except of course the sun and the rain.
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