JDI Farm update

While drinking my green tea after lunch on JDI`s veranda today, I thought, I would give you an update about our organic farm.

This summer was an amazingly healthy and fresh one - with radish, eggplants and cucumbers almost everyday from our own little farm.

Summer is gone and a sudden cold autumn has come, which of course makes planting a lot of vegetables impossible...

The delicious eggplants and cucumbers are all eaten up, as are all the different kinds of radish.
We are currently trying to raise some cabbage, spinach, broccoli and salad - unfortunately there is nothing to be seen yet; we will have to wait a few weeks.

Besides the relaxing feeling to sit in the middle of green and red leafs and vegetables in the middle of smog-ridden Tokyo, there are still three plants that serve their everyday use in the kitchen here:

• Stevia: the naturally calorie-free plant with a heavy sweetness. You can use it as part of your herb tea or as a natural sweetener!
• Rosemary: not only does it look neat and smells wonderful, it`s aromatic flavor enhances - dried or fresh - South-European dishes.
• Laurel: I never quite understood how I could use the flavor of laurel for my food until I smelled an amazing and intense laurel essential oil.

Laurel is subtle but gives depth to the right dish. It`s evergreen leaves are also beautiful and make a nice addition to our "natural veranda". Here in Japan, laurel leafs are quite expensive, so having a whole tree from which one can pick seasoning for the next soup is a dream come true.

The broader the garden, the broader the creativity.

Yours,
Manuel