NewsBreak Original

Gardening is rewarding in many ways and definitely worth trying. One of the benefits is the availability of fresh herbs, vegetables and fruits on demand. Just walk outside, snip-snip and voila! Today my garden pickings are bay leaves, thyme and green onions for our Sunday lunch... crawfish and okra (on the next video).

First, some backyard garden harvest - raspberries, figs, pear, bitter melon and calamansi. Then, we made some crunchy toast topped with our backyard pickings, sprinkled with powdered sugar. The calamansi were turned into a carafe of calamansi juice. Cheers!

A pot of soup for dinner on a cold winter night. Slices of salmon, green mussels, a few shrimp left on the fridge, chopped red onion and vegetables freshly picked from the backyard garden - mustard spinach, broccolini and green onions. Then garnished with thinly sliced lemon, also from the garden. Slurp, slurp... yum!

A colorful and healthy dinner with some garden harvest - broccolini, lettuce and snow peas. The dressing is homemade with zest and juice of freshly-picked Valencia orange also from the backyard garden plus honey, mustard, a drizzle of olive oil and a pinch of Himalayan pink salt. Also on the plate are seared ahi tuna, steamed potatoes, sliced tomatoes and medium boiled eggs.

The days are getting a little longer again, have you noticed? It's almost springtime and today's weather is lovely and sunny and we have more of the same to come. We had breakfast in the patio, the usual, shredded pancake with berries freshly-picked from the backyard garden. It's a slow lazy happy Sunday! Have a great week ahead everyone!

Ah, finally it's weekend! We've been homebound all week and it's time to breathe some fresh salt air from the ocean. So off we went to Malibu Bluffs, spread out the blanket and ate our picnic. The picnic - apples and tomatoes from our backyard edible garden, sandwiches from an Italian deli and slices of store-bought watermelon.

Some juicy and sweet homegrown tomatoes and green bell pepper which I turned into shakshouka seasoned with paprika, cumin, a sprinkle of salt and freshly-cracked black peppercorns. Simmered for about 20 minutes, then I cracked three eggs and then I topped the shakshouka with homegrown herbs - shiso leaves and chives. Also on the table are some nectaplums and apples that were also harvested from the backyard.

Popped up early in the garden to snip some flowers and harvest some vegetables and fruits for our picnic. Some tomatoes, peaches, cucumbers, grapes, bell pepper and calamondin/calamansi. Then to the kitchen. Cracked five eggs, a sprinkle of salt topped with bacon, tomatoes, bell pepper and freshly grated cheese. On to the oven for 12 minutes and voila... our picnic frittatas. For the juice, I squeezed a handful of calamansi into a picnic carafe, sliced a cucumber, a tablespoon turbinado sugar, then filled with ice cubes, some freshly-picked splenda and a bottle of water. Closed the lunch boxes, grabbed the picnic blankets and drove to the coast for a lovely picnic overlooking the ocean. Then came the squirrels.. one, two, three,.... six of them playing that kept us entertained and amused. We walked a little bit. We could not hike on the trail because it's the season of the rattlesnakes.

We love Friday themed night dinner and this was our dinner some Friday back. Some harvest from the backyard garden - bell peppers, pears, chives and thyme. And some store bought. I will tag you along from harvesting to grocery shopping at Sprouts, preparing our raclette dinner and then dinner time.