The "Free" Garden

I knew I wasn't going to be able to garden much this year because we had planned a trip during (what I believe to be) a crucial growing window. Because of that, I didn't buy a single plant or vegetable start this year from the store. My sage recovered from the winter. As did my green onions, citronella, and rosemary. My cilantro is flowering and going to seed. My kale is still going, purposely planted in the back of my raised bed to get some shade from the summer heat.  I'm excited to harvest more seeds to grow more cilantro in the fall. 

Cilantro flowers

As for any edibles, I wasn't planning on growing anything significant this year. I had pole bean seeds from a while back which I wanted to plant and experiment so I planted a row of six. That was it. So why does my garden look like this?

April 17, 2025

It's...a funny story. So I planted my row of six pole beans, but while I was waiting for those seeds to germinate, I decided to dig a trench around the front edge of my garden bed and dump in some incomplete compost into there to continue composting in the ground. My actual composter is a bin so it is not in the ground. Well, after a few weeks, I started seeing sprouts pop out. A lot of sprouts. I ended up with six tomato plants and two cucumber/squash/melon plants which have been yet to be correctly identified. This doesn't include the numerous tomato plants I had to pull due to natural selection to allow the six I wanted a better chance at thriving. 

Fast forward 10 days, and here's what my garden looks like currently:

April 27, 2025

Nature is pretty amazing. When I look at these two pictures next to each other, I'm still in awe at how much growth can happen in 10 days given a balance of moderate heat, good rain and sunshine. 

When I said I didn't buy anything for the garden yet this year, I really meant it. My net spend this year is $0 and that includes the water! I'm even impressed myself, but it's the truth and here's how I did it:

I didn't spend money on any plants this year. The bean seeds I planted were from a free seed box found at our local environmental center. Every single tomato plant was a compost sprout. Every single cucumber/squash/melon plant was a compost sprout. The kale was free from an event hosted by Central Market last fall. The broccoli from that same event has since bolted for the summer and been removed. 

My kale is still growing.

I didn't spend money on any soil this year. The leftover soil in the raised bed was kept and I added to it from last year's pots of tomatoes and pepper plants which didn't survive the winter. I've tried various overwintering methods and been unsuccessful now for two consecutive years. I probably shouldn't try anymore, especially when my compost sprouts tomatoes and I have a never ending supply of pepper seeds. 

I didn't spend money on fertilizer this year because I still have garden fertilizer leftover from last year. The efficacy of the fertilizer probably goes down over time, but I'm not at the point to care or to want to buy a new bag. Also, for my purposes, it works great. I mixed it in when I topped off the soil into the bed for this year and everything has been growing wonderfully.

I haven't spent money on water to water my raised bed this year because all the water I've been using is recycled! (Just for clarification, yes, we water our lawn with the sprinklers and that is not recycled water. But all of my potted plants and raised garden bed have been watered with recycled water) Ever since we moved into this house, we've been collecting the cold water as we wait for the hot water before we shower. Each evening, we collect about 3 gallons. I have 4 giant laundry detergent jugs (approx 2 gallons each) to catch the water and I empty them each day so I have space to collect more water that evening. 

During the winter, we don't use as much so I empty it slower. During the summers, we empty faster than we collect so there's no surplus. In addition to recycling water inside, we have a rain barrel outside which collects rainwater. I've been making sure to empty it before every storm so it can fill up again with new water. As the hot summer months approach, I know we're going to have to supplement with more water to keep the garden thriving.

Honestly, I'm busier than I intended with the garden, but the joy I get from growing my garden is really a fun adventure each year. Not sure what kind of harvest I'll get this year, but it might be the only year my garden is "free". 😊

Takeout with the Tos #11 and #12

It's been a busy few weeks so I haven't been able to write about the food I've cooked. Cooking has also been a little strange because I've cooked in little pockets of time throughout the week which don't fall on Sundays. For the most part, I still cooking on Sunday, but sometimes, I end up cooking on Saturday for a few hours too if it's more convenient.

Week #11

Pre-Seasoned Beef Tips $14.99

Chicken Karage (2 lbs) $25.99

Beef and Broccoli Stir-Fry $18.99

Green Bean Stir-Fry $14.99

Take-Out Total: $74.96

Tax: $6.18

Grand Total: $81.14

Chicken Karage

I've made this karage before, but the last time, we fried it using our deep fryer. This time, I fried it in the wok. I have to say, frying in the wok was much easier than I expected. Yes, it makes a mess of the kitchen but this is why our backsplash is covered in paper. When the day comes that we or our children or extended family sell this house, the stove and backsplash are going to look pristine and it's not from lack of use. It's from diligent cleaning and covering to protect from things like oil splatters. A gross kitchen is a gross kitchen....and I've seen my fair share at open houses and when we were house hunting. We're always going to have our house secrets from disasters which only we know about, but if it looks clean as far as you can tell, it's clean enough. 

This entire batch from last week went into the freezer, but I have a feeling it'll be pulled out (maybe today!) as a supplement to this week's food.

Green Bean Stir-Fry

I've done stir-frys with green beans before but never in this way. I've gotten into the habit of blanching my green beans before stir frying so they wouldn't be hard and fibrous at the end of cooking.  One day when scrolling, I came across this recipe and took a screenshot of it. 

In her video that accompanied this recipe, she said cutting the green beans on the bias would take extra time but it would be worth it. She wasn't wrong. It took a lot more extra effort to cut, but they were very tasty! I would do this again. Thanks Mama Tea!

Pre-Seasoned Beef Tips

I hardly ever buy pre-seasoned meat from the grocery store because it's more expensive and usually not worth it. However, H-E-B really got me last week for groceries because they sent me so many coupons. I saved 31% in coupons on that shopping trip and it included almost 13 pounds of meat. Win for them for getting my business and win for me for saving money. Did I mention they did it all with free curbside pickup and I didn't have to push a cart or walk around a store? And here I am giving them free advertising...😆

Beef and Broccoli

This is the first time beef and broccoli has made it onto my cooking rotation (and blogged.) I have a feeling I may have cooked it one week and not written the blog. But here it is! This is a favorite for me to make because the meat texture and the flavor of the sauce is good. My kids will also eat it and don't complain about the greens.

I don't follow a recipe for this so it is a rustic version of what they serve at the restaurant. I parboil my broccoli in salted water first so it becomes soft.  Then I marinate my beef in corn starch and cooking wine. The actual sauce I use for my beef and broccoli is a combiantion of LKK black pepper sauce and LKK sweet bean sauce. I used to make it with just the black pepper sauce and I found it was missing the sweetness I craved. I could probably use sugar instead of mixing sweet bean sauce into it, but I haven't experimented. And since I found these two sauces work well together, I've not departed from this mix. Maybe next time, if I remember. 

Then I saute the beef in my wok about 80% of the way cooked, add in the broccoli, and then add in my sauce. I do add some water to the sauce to make it more pourable to begin and then thicken the sauce during the last few minutes of cooking.

Week #12

Egg and Tomato $15.99

Mushroom, Snow Pea, Tofu Stir-Fry $17.99

Snow Pea Leaves $16.99

Pork Cutlet (not pictured) $10.99

Ketchup Shrimp $16.99

Soup (5 qts): $20.99

Take-Out Total: $99.94

Tax: $8.25

Grand Total:  $108.19

 

I forgot to take a picture of every single dish this week until Tuesday so that's why everything looks partially eaten. Pretty sure half the shrimp and half the soup was already gone by the time I remembered.

Egg and Tomato (top left)

I hadn't made egg and tomato in a while so I decided to buy tomatoes and make this dish this week. I am growing my own tomato plants this year, but they're not close to being ready, so I had to buy them from the grocery store. With the rise in egg prices, eggs have been more valuable and don't get used as quickly anymore either. But it was a nice change to add this dish back to the menu since for a lot of us it's the common "go to" dish to make since it's so easy.

Mushroom, Snow Pea, Tofu Stir-Fry (top center)

This was an impromptu dish I decided to make. The snow peas were on sale, mushrooms were on sale, and I picked up a pack of pressed tofu. I've always loved the flavor with the thick sauce you get from a corn starch slurry. I season with some soy sauce and chicken bouillon and then add cornstarch and water. It turned out well.

Snow Pea Leaves (bottom left)

Snow pea leaves randomly went on sale again so I bought a bag. I always remove 80% of the stems now. They're just so much more pleasant to eat without the stems. I used to think it was so wasteful to just pluck the leaves off, but since I compost all of my fruits and vegetables, I can justify removing any non-pleasant edible parts. It just helps me save money on my soil amendments!

Sidenote. I did this experiment weeks ago with snow pea leaves and I'm just now getting around to share it. At the grocery store, sometimes I'll see wilty leaves on the vegetables. This used to be a turn off for me, but then I realized, as long as the stems are intact and the leaves aren't bruised, there's a way to bring the leaves back to life - just soak them in water. I weighed the snow pea leaves I bought before and they weighed in at 518 grams. Then, I soaked them in water to let them revitalize. After, I weighed them again: 565 grams. That's almost a 10% increase post soaking. So don't be afraid of the wilty leaves at the grocery store!

Pork Cutlet (not pictured)

I had bought a 9 pound bone in pork shoulder last week which I cut and saved into multiple packs in our freezer. There were some pieces leftover that weren't large enough to make into a portion by itself so they ended up in a bag I labeled "cutlets." I think my original intention was actually to pound them into pork chops but I forgot to pound them when I actually cooked. So they ended up like pork...pieces.   

I browned them in a pan and they turned out nicely. There was no official crust on it, but they were still flavorful because I marinated with corn starch, cooking wine, soy sauce, and sesame oil.

Ketchup Shrimp (bottom center)

My daughter loves ketchup shrimp, as do I. It came up in the rotation again because I was looking for a protein to make as a stand-alone dish. This was my first time making it without measuring each ingredient (I've gotten pretty good at eyeballing...) and also my first time making it in the wok. It turned out well. Our wok has really proven itself in the last five weeks ago since we debuted it.  Really happy with this recipe and I should try and make it more often.

A note on the shrimp: I always use head-on shrimp for this recipe because I love the extra juices I get. I do make sure to use scissors to cut open the side of the shell which helps the sauce seep into the shrimp as well as make peeling the shrimp much easier. And yes, I remove the intestinal tract. 

Soup - 5 qts (right)

This was a random throw-together soup. I had extra broth leftover from cooking my pork shoulder bone so I figured I'd make a soup with it. I had leftover napa cabbage to throw in, some chopped up carrots, tofu puffs I keep on hand frozen in my freezer, and some frozen meatballs. I season the soup with soy sauce and chicken bouillon. That's really it. We eat it with rice because we're lazy, but you could definitely cook some noodles to go with it. 

I hate to say this because it's a little embarassing, but putting together this blog of two weeks back to back was more tiring than when I cook a week's worth of food. On the flip side, it means I use less brainpower to cook than I do to write now...which means I must be pretty good at cooking. 😅

 

The Power of Failing

My youngest turned 5 recently. Part of me is dying inside because age five just seems too old for it to be the age of my youngest child. At the same time, I'm loving this new stage of life we're in. I don't have to carry around a diaper bag, there are no baby food pouches, my kids can get in and out of the car by themselves 90% of the time (certain car seats are harder than others), and I can feel like an adult again instead of someone's mother. Don't get me wrong - I love being a mother and I wouldn't have had two children if I didn't and serve them in all the ways I have - but it's really nice to have adult conversation, be able to read books, and not be called on for miscellaneous help every 5 minutes.

But, there are still hard moments. Even though he's 5, he doesn't verbalize as much as he should when he needs help due to his shy personality. When he plays, he's super verbal. Otherwise, for the big things, he needs to be prompted in order to elicit a response. I'm trying to get him out of the habit because I need to know he can survive if he's not next to me. Could I just send him off to day care/school and force him to interact with others? I could and I can, but that's my choice not to. So these lessons need to be learned in other ways.

He asked for a snack last week and I gave him a cheese stick. Everything was going fine, but he couldn't open it, so he shoved the cheese stick in my face. Of course, I knew what he wanted me to do. I could have easily opened it for him, given it back, and life would have gone on. However, that's not what I did. I told him to tell me what he needed. He didn't. So then began a half hour ordeal of crying, pouting, and me putting the cheese stick back into the refrigerator.

I went over to him and told him: we, he and his mommy, had a special bond, and mommy could read his mind and figure things out without him needing to say anything. But not everyone had this special ability. And I needed to know, if it was required, he could verbalize what he needed to get the assistance or help he needed. He proceeded to cry on his bed and I left him alone and started to write this blog. 

Just under ten years ago, I remember having a conversation with my aunt. My husband and I had driven the few states over to visit her and it was the first time I truly sat down and had conversations with her as an adult. We didn't have children yet at the time, but we were talking about kids, how to raise them, and some memories my aunt had when her children, my cousins, were younger. At one point, we were talking about one of my cousins and a difficult period for him. I had commented that sometimes you have to let them learn the hard way. 

She responded to me and said, "It's really hard to watch your own kids fail. You will know when you have your own children."

Fast forward many years, and indeed, I had my own children. I love them dearly and they are so special to me. The other day I just sat in the car and stared into my daughter's face for what felt like a minute as she stared back at me thinking to myself, how is my daugther so beautiful? And I've also had many hard times with my children which have made me yell, scream, and smack some tables. It's an imperfect journey that will never be mastered. 

But I've watched my children fail. In our latest cheese stick scenario, I watched him fail, grab his penguin for comfort, and go lay on his bed and cry. As a parent, this is hard. I sat on the couch listening to him cry while I opened the mail. And as much as I hated to hear his whimpering, I knew this had to be one step in the long journey of life he has ahead of him. Even if he doesn't learn from this situation, it's going to be part of the building blocks which make up his experiences, his personality, and ultimately, what his life will be like. *He never ate the cheese stick, didn't respond to anything I had said, and it felt like this situation resolved without being resolved.*

A few days after this incident, he chose a packet of crackers as dessert for finishing his dinner.  He and his dad went to get it from the pantry and then he came over to me as I was still sitting at the kitchen table. He handed it to me and asked me to open it with a complete sentence, and very nicely at that. I wish I could remember his exact words as I remember being in awe he had come up to me and said that. Many instances after, I've heard him ask me to help him open individually wrapped food (including multiple cheese sticks).

My son failing with regards to this cheese stick incident has small repercussions in the grand scheme of things. But less than a week later, he got it. Was my aunt right when she said watching my own children fail is really hard? Absolutely. And this may be a very small representation of what is to come in our future experiences. But the cost may be ultimately greater if we don't let them fail in healthy ways.

Takeout with the Tos #10

I never thought I could be someone to get excited about food, but the menu I cooked this week really excited me. If you're joining me at this blog for the first time, this is part 10 in a cooking series I'm doing this year, documenting the food I cook (almost) every week for my family.

This week's menu includes:

Pork Tonkatsu: $18.99

Cauliflower: $8.99

Bok Choy: $13.99

Tempura Shrimp: $12.99

Teriyaki Tofu: $12.99

Lion's Head Meatballs: $39.99

Take out Total: $107.94

Tax: $8.91

Grand Total: $116.85

The menu this week was going to include lion's head meatballs. Because I was going to cook them the traditional way and fry them, I figured I'd find other things I could fry as well to maximize my oil. This is where tempura shrimp and tonkatsu were added to the recipe. I had a pack of frozen pork cut into tonkatsu pieces from September 2024 so it was about time to use it. No, it wasn't bad by any means. I vacuum seal all my meats in the freezer for long-term keeping and for these instances where they get stored longer than six months and I don't run the risk of the meat getting freezer burn. 

 

Tonkatsu (top left):

I'm sure there are great recipes out there on the internet for awesome tonkatsu. I don't follow any because I just wing it. I love recipes I can "wing" because reading recipes and measuring ingredients slows me down. The more I can make by feel, the more efficient my cooking process can be. And as you all know, I spend hours cooking on my Sundays. For this tonkatsu, I had about 13 oz of pork cut into thin slices. I seasoned them with soy sauce, sugar, corn starch, cooking wine, and some salt. I added an egg to it for the coating and then dipped in panko before frying for about 2 minutes. These were very thin pieces of meat. 

Cauliflower (bottom left):

We needed some vegetables and cauliflower were on sale this week. I hadn't cooked them in a while so bought one to make for the week. I'm pretty boring when it comes to cauliflower. My favorite way to eat them is to roast in the oven with some seasoning. However, if I don't use the oven for anything else, I probably won't turn it on just to roast cauliflower. So we are eating boiled cauliflower in salt water. I don't mind. It's actually a great simple taste compared to the strong flavors of other dishes I make. So although it's nothing special, it's a healthy vegetable. My daughter has no problem eating this. My son...has developed a certain amount of finickiness lately. 

Boy Choy (top right):

This was a leftover green vegetable from last week's grocery run. Again, I've mentioned before how vegetables keep in the refrigerator for a week when kept away from excessive moisture. If they wilt slightly, that's not a problem as they can be submerged in water and rehydrated.  Stir-fried with my usual garlic, salt, and sugar. 

Tempura Shrimp (bottom right):

This may be my last batch of freezer tempura shrimp for a while.  They came out darker than usual because I had already fried other things in the oil before frying the shrimp. I don't mind. They still taste great. 

Teriyaki Tofu (top middle):

My current nonstick pan is a small one so I had to cook these in two batches. That was slightly annoying, but they cooked fine because nothing stuck. I'll take it for now. Eventually, I will need to pull out my pan with the larger diameter but that one is still brand new at the moment. Officially, I didn't add teriyaki sauce to this batch of tofu, just salt and sugar. 

 

Lion's Head Meatballs:

I follow the recipe from Woks of Life.  I've made this recipe many times and it's delicious every time. I've even baked them in the oven instead of deep frying in oil. The color and texture of the outside of the meatball is very slightly different, but the overall flavor isn't. I deep fried them this week as mentioned earlier so they are more true-to-the-recipe this week. I also figured out I don't really ever have to buy breadcrumbs. I didn't actually have breadcrumbs as the recipe called for. I ended up toasting two pieces of bread on low heat for an extended (15+ minutes) and then crumbling them between my hands into the mixing bowl. You could probably also smash them in a plastic bag before dumping them in as well. I was just trying to save on waste/dishes. I had fresh bread this time, but bread keeps in the freezer for a long time, and the only way to use frozen bread is to toast it. So I really never need to buy pre-made breadcrumbs ever again.

 

Approx Cooking Times: 3 hours

Takeout with the Tos #9

So this was totally unintentional, but I didn't go grocery shopping this week and ended up cooking a decent amount of food for us. Here's our take out for the week:

- Cucumber Salad: $9.99

- Seafood pancakes: $19.99

- Tofu Chicken Casserole: $29.99

- Instant Pot (Dry Rub) Pork Ribs: $22.99 

- Chinese Vegetable Stir Fry: $13.99

Take Out Total: $96.95

Tax: $8.00

Grand Total: $104.95

 

Cucumber Salad

 

I forgot to take a photo of this dish because I made it ahead and put it in the refrigerator to chill. By the time I cooked everything else, took my photos, and went on with the rest of my Sunday, the photo of the cucumbers was long forgotten. My kids ate quite a bit of it so what you see left in this dish is probably 1/3 of what I made to begin with. I had a recipe I followed a long time ago, but it's evolved to eyeballing the ingredients: soy sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil, and white pepper. I think sometimes I add a splash of vinegar but this time I forgot. This was about 1TB of everything except the white pepper for 1 large cucumber. 

Seafood Pancakes (right)

 

These came out more egg-y than pancake-y this time around. They're almost like a scrambled omlette in my opinion. I still like it. Easy to make, I practically make it by memory, and fast to cook. I've started cooking a lot more with my stainless steel wok, but this is the kind of recipe which still requires a good nonstick pan. It's just so much easier not having to think about the heating requirements and just putting food in and out as it cooks. 

Tofu Chicken Casserole

 

This is a first for this recipe in 2025! I was thinking to myself recently that I had started to repeat a lot of my recipes. Mentally, there are still some I'd like to share with you as dishes I've made which I love, but whether due to time constraints, ingredient prices, or simply lack of intentionality, I haven't made them. This is a recipe I learned from Woks of Life a while back. I saw them post it and immediately thought this would be a great recipe for me to make. One pot, easy ingredients, most that I have on hand all the time, and delicious. 

I made this recipe in the wok for the first time and it's great! Even if the chicken sticks when I'm browning it, I'm able to scrape it up later once the rest of the sauce components get put together and there's more sauce in the wok. The original recipe calls for shiitake mushrooms and peas. These are two ingredients my children complain about. Sometimes, I add them anyway and force them to eat it. Sometimes, I split the dish into two batches and add peas to one batch only. Other times, I add neither, like this week. Honestly, it tastes good however I choose to do it. So although the nutrition may change slightly, the overall integrity of the dish is kept. 

Instant Pot Dry Rub Ribs

 

We needed a protein dish this week and I couldn't think of anything else to do. We pulled out a pack of ribs from the freezer and my husband made the dry rub, stuck it in the Instant Pot, and let it cook. Super easy, super delicious. 

Chinese Vegetable Stir Fry (left)

 

I've only ever known the name of this vegetable in Chinese. If I literally translated the characters, it would be "oil vegetable." Not very enticing...I decided to look up what the actual English for this vegetable is. It's rape, also where rapeseed oil comes from. So while I won't be using the English terminology to name this vegetable...perhaps ever...I have now learned one new fact for this week. 

 Total Time Elapsed: ~2.5 hours