I am not allowed to buy any more plants for my garden.

Yesterday, Gastronomicon co-author April and I went to Chapon’s Greenhouse in search of the very last thing we wanted for our respective gardens: Thai basil. Sadly, they claim they will not be getting any in this year. Even though I repeatedly asked her to talk me out of buying other plants instead, I walked out of there with five new ones. Of course, someone else came out of there with two new ones, as well. At least I talked myself out of a new windowbox and three everbearing strawberry plants. After bringing everything home and doing some planting, rearranging and uprooting/potting, I now have a full garden, two full windowboxes, and five potted plants on the front porch.

Garden: Vegetable section

• 1 Roma tomato
• 1 Jersey Devil tomato
• 1 tomatillo
• 2 green bell peppers
• 1 sweet banana pepper
• 1 hot cherry pepper
• 2 cayenne peppers
• 2 Hungarian wax peppers
• 2 jalapeño peppers
• 1 chili pepper
• 2 Ichiban eggplants
• 1 okra
• 6 kohlrabi
• 3 cucumbers
• 2 zucchini
• 2 garlic, being grown as source of seedcloves for next season

Garden: Herb section
One each of:

• Bay Laurel, which grew back from last year
• sweet basil
• French tarragon
• rosemary
• fennel
• dill
• caraway
• sage

Porch: herb boxes hung from the railing

• chives
• Italian parsley
• cilantro
• oregano
• marjoram
• thyme

Porch: Pots

• 1 Roma tomato (It had been chewed off by some critter, and I am trying to revive it.)
• 1 cayenne pepper (Same reason as above.)
• 1 red bell pepper (An extra from adm — the other one was eaten from the garden.)
• 2 hot cherry peppers
• 1 habanero pepper (A replacement for one that was eaten from the garden.)

Hopefully, the gnawed-off Roma will come back so that I have enough tomatoes to make it worth my while to can them (and use the awesome pressure canner I got last December.) Most of the peppers will be used as they ripen, but a lot of the cayenne and chili peppers will be dried and stored. Most of the windowbox herbs and some of the garden ones will be used fresh as-needed, and the rest will go into storage for the winter. My house’s cellar has nothing in it save for the remains of last year’s harvest: large bunches of dried herbs hung from the ceiling with twine. It’s so convenient to be able to just walk down into the cellar and pick a handful of whatever herb I need.

Oh, yeah. I lied about not being allowed to buy any more plants. If I find Thai basil, I am so allowed to buy one. Just one. Honest.