Cheshire Garden

10/20/2026

Even after 3 frosts, it’s worth checking out the raspberries___ they’re still firm and sweet!

10/20/2026

Today’s yummies!
Pies today [Tuesday]
Mooncakes and Strawberry Sunshine Cakes on Wednesday
Pies again on Thursday.
These should last us through Friday, when we’ll begin our baking break to catch up making preserves, sauces, and syrups.
We will resume baking around Thanksgiving-or as soon as we catch up.
Come and get some!

10/17/2026

Tiny Farmstand is stocked with our homemade pies and cakes [filled with our own organic berries], fruit preserves, elderberry syrup, herbal vinegars and salts.
Under the tent we have garlic bulbs and bundles including herbs and flowers.

We have LOTS of lovely pears for free - our gift to you! Take as many as you can use to eat fresh or put up into pear preserves, pear butter, pear syrup, pear chutney…we have a ton - literally!

We’ll be taking a break from baking beginning this week through late November to concentrate on preserve-making. We have 10 freezers FILLED with peaches, plums, peppers, tomatoes, and about a billion berries, and we need to make them into fruit preserves, pepper preserves, and tomatoes rustica for our mail-order friends.

We’ll keep Tiny Farmstand open, just without pies and cakes.
We’ll resume baking in late November and try to stay open through the winter holidays, weather permitting, with all kinds of goodies.

10/12/2026

Such a wonderful weekend! Thanks to everyone who came for pies, preserves, cakes, elderberry syrup, herbal vinegars and salts, honey, garlic, and more!
Lisha and Livvy made these beautiful bundles of garlic with herbs and flowers today, and we also have our own organic apples and pears - while they last.
Bring a box, bag, or basket, because the apples and pears are free! Pomona the fruit goddess was very very good to us this year!

10/07/2026

The first frost settled in this morning, taking the basils, nasturtiums, zinnias, and tomatoes in the low gardens.
The chili peppers and zinnias and salvias on the terraced hillside beds are fine, and nearly everything around the house and in the driveway gardens are fine.
The first photo is from Tiny Farmstand, looking down, and the second from the low beds near the elderberries.
The golden blooms are marigolds - guardian, one of my favorites.
We plant them in between the tomatoes where they provide protection from disease and confuse insect scouts.
Every spring I see young garden “influencers” promoting companion planting as if they invented it, planting those showy dwarf marigolds between their tomato plants.
There’s not much those little guys will really do to protect the tomatoes.
These guardians grow taller than me and really do a fine job of providing bona fide protection from disease and nematodes, and confusion to tomato-seeking insects. And guess what? The seeds cost about $3.— for a packet of couple hundred.
And, as the tomatoes loose their leaves and fall into senescence, the guardians take center stage- even surviving light frosts and continuing to provide golden joy nearly to Halloween.

09/30/2026

09/28/2026

Today in the cauldron….DAMSONS!
The little old hedge witch and the kindly old lion were giggling like school kids as we prepped, cooked, ladled, filled, capped, and canned the first damsons from the new trees.
The original orchard of about 2 dozen trees was felled by porcupines, and we haven’t had a good damson year since about 2017.
Ralph and the girls convinced me to plant again, and about 4 years ago we put in 6 trees. The blossoms are often lost to frost, but this year the stars aligned and we finally got fruit again.
We won’t have many jars, but this is an auspicious beginning!
Beyond toast, Damson Plum Preserve has outstanding savory and sweet applications; we’ve used it atop ravioli filled with duck confit, and swirled into a pumpkin-maple pie for a psychedelic twist to the autumn classic.

09/28/2026

Today in the cauldron….DAMSONS!
The little old hedge witch and the kindly old lion were giggling like school kids as we prepped, cooked, ladled, filled, capped, and canned the first damsons from the new trees.
The original orchard of about 2 dozen trees was felled by porcupines, and we haven’t had a good damson year since about 2017.
Ralph and the girls convinced me to plant again, and about 4 years ago we put in 6 trees. The blossoms are often lost to frost, but this year the stars aligned and we finally got fruit again.
We won’t have many jars, but this is an auspicious beginning!
Beyond toast, Damson Plum Preserve has outstanding savory and sweet applications, like this topping on ravioli filled with duck confit, and swirled into a pumpkin-maple pie for a psychedelic twist to the autumn classic.

09/25/2026

Wedding Pies!
And it’s National Bakery Day! Yay!