10  GARDEN INSPIRED COCKTAILS THAT WILL SURPRISE AND DELIGHT YOUR GUESTS 

Artisan cocktails are one of the hottest trends in home entertaining. What will be your special new drink at your next gathering?  You can turn to your own garden for the answer!  You may already have plants growing in your garden that can be used to create a unique, refreshing cocktail.  Here are 10 exciting new cocktails I have made from fruits and herbs from my garden.

Here is the link to the GARDEN ARTISAN COCKTAILS presentation with recipes and photos:

https://acrobat.adobe.com/link/review?uri=urn:aaid:scds:US:bc72659a-26ac-331a-b79f-1695711ed05f

If you love pasta using fresh produce from your garden, this one features bell peppers instead of tomatoes. Also onion, and fresh herbs: rosemary, oregano and basil  I left out the habanero, too hot for me!

Peruvian-Style Pasta with Creamy Pepper Sauce

 1 pound linguine

salt and ground pepper

¼ cup olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped

2 medium red, yellow, or orange bell peppers,

   Stemmed, seeded, and chopped

1 habanero chili, stemmed, seeded, and chopped

1 cup shredded Italian cheese

½ cup half-and-half

½ cup milk

1 Tablespoons fresh rosemary chopped

2 TBS fresh Oregano chopped

1 TBS lime juice

1/2 cup pitted Kalamata olives, chopped

Fresh basil, chopped and shredded parmesan for garnish

 

1.    Bring 4 quarts of water to boil in a large pot.  Stir in pasta and 1 TBS salt.  Cook to just shy of al dente. Drain and reserve cooking water.

2.    In a sauté pan, heat the oil and add onions, peppers, and a pinch of salt.  Cook on medium-low, stirring occasionally until the onion is softened and beginning to brown, about 15 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes.

3.    Transfer the onion-pepper mixture to a food processor along with the cheese, milk, half-and-half, lime juice, and ¼ teaspoon each of salt and pepper. Puree until smooth.

4.    Pour the puree into the sauté pan.  Add the fresh rosemary and oregano, the drained pasta, and ½ cup of the cooking water and cook on medium until the thickening sauced begins to coat the pasta, about 5-7 minutes.

5.    Serve sprinkled with chopped olives, fresh basil, and parmesan cheese.

Cast Hypertufa Birdhouse

 Amazon Prime Cast Birdhouse 

 

Here is a project that uses some of the many boxes one begins to accumulate when shopping on Amazon.  You can already recycle the boxes conventionally, but they just happen to make great re-purposed molds for this bird house project.  It is not the type you hang in a tree, but mount on a fence or a post instead, since it is cast using a mold made from a reconstructed Amazon shipping box and of course has a bit more weight.

 

What You Need:

 

Plastic covered worksurface

Mud gloves

i-3 assorted Amazon shipping boxes

Box knife

Scissors

Hot melt glue gun and plenty of extra glue sticks

Sharpie

Masking or duct tape

One or two 1” lengths of 5/8” PVC pipe

Pile of straight twigs

Any color latex paint

Mixing bucket

Trowel

Brick

Hypertufa recipe ( Here’s mine: http://fromthesummersgarden.blogspot.com/p/normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-ja-x_10.html)

 

What You Do:

Select a shipping box that is a good size for the birdhouse you’d like to make and carefully take it apart where it is glued or stapled together.

 

If there are staples, remove and discard them.  Use the box as is if you want a flat roof. If you’d like your roof slanted, cut two opposite sides on a slant. Reassemble the box inside out using a hot glue gun 

 

Glue the flaps down on the outside of the box to serve as reinforcements.  The inside should be completely smooth with no flaps. Use masking tape to cover all seams on the inside. 

Glue the PVC pipe section(s) onto the inside of the box where you’d like the hole to be.

 

I used two to make two holes, one on either side. Use pieces cut from another box to make relief designs on each of the four sides.  I used arches inspired by gothic architecture for mine.  

 TIP: Whatever you decide to do design-wise, keep it simple and repeat your shapes. Glue the pieces onto the inside surfaces of your mold using the hot glue gun. Finally, run a border of masking or duct tape around the perimeter of the box mold at the bottom and again at the top.  This will prevent the box from sagging out of shape as you construct the birdhouse. 

Cut and glue together a cardboard tray with a bottom and one-inch sides.  This will serve as the mold for the roof.  It should be 1-inch larger both ways than the dimension of your box mold. This will ensure that the roof overhangs the birdhouse.

 

When both the birdhouse and roof molds have been constructed, paint them inside and out with a coat of latex paint and allow to dry. Coat the inside of both molds liberally using a paintbrush and vegetable oil. Mix up a batch of your favorite hypertufa to a clay-like consistency. Pack the mold by handfuls, firmly pressing the material against the side of the mold and forming a smooth inner surface.  Be sure to apply ample material across the top edge, smoothing to create a firm, durable edge.

When the birdhouse mold is cast, move to the cardboard tray and fill it with hypertufa using a brick to evenly tamp the surface smooth.  Lay twigs into the soft hypertufa and tamp into the mold using the brick.  

TIP:  Cut twigs the same size as your roof mold and have them ready to add when casting the roof.   They lend a nice natural look as a surface texture for the roof. 

Allow both molds to cure and harden.  This may take two to three days.  Remove the mold and

allow the birdhouse and roof to cure further for one week out of the sun.  Because the roof is heavy, it may simply rest on top of the birdhouse, making it simple to lift off for cleanout at the end of the season.  

 

TIP: To ensure the roof stays in place, apply hot glue to the top edge of the birdhouse at each corner, immediately place the roof on top and hold until the glue hardens.  This will keep the roof in place for the summer.  To remove the roof for cleaning, simply pry the corners gently with a screwdriver.  The hot glue will give easily.

 

Leave your birdhouse natural or add accents with exterior latex paint and mount on a wooden platform on a post or fence.  Use the hot glue technique here also to hold the house in place for the season.

TREE STUMP WATER BASIN

 

These days it’s wise to be creative in using what we have and “turning a sow’s ear into a silk purse” as my mom used to say.  I just had a large, messy silver maple taken down in my front yard.   Having spent plenty just to get it down and hauled away, I wasn’t about to spend another fortune to have the stump removed. Instead, the tree guys cut the stump a bit higher than usual and with as flat a cut as they could manage to result in a perfect pedestal for a large shallow water basin for the birds. At the same time, a load of topsoil was delivered to fill in all of the pits and ruts in the lawn from the tree removal.

The mound of topsoil made a perfect hump mold for a hypertufa water basin.  Here’s a very simple method for making a water basin in your garden.

 

What You Need

 An open space in your garden where you can build a mound of earth to the desired size of your water basin.

 

Your favorite hypertufa recipe.  Here’s mine:

http://fromthesummersgarden.blogspot.com/p/normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-ja-x_10.html

 

large mixing tub

 

shovel and garden rake

 

plastic tarp or heavy dropcloth

 

nail, string, and a sharpie

 

paintbrush and can of paint

 

mud gloves

 

a brick, a trowel, and a length of rebar

 

bag of sand topping mix and a large paintbrush

 

What You Do

 

1. Using your garden shovel, build a mound in an open area of your garden larger than the desired size of your water basin.  Use the rake to shape the mound and to get a nice smooth surface.

 

2.  Spread out the tarp over a flat area.  Tie the end of the string to the nail and push it into the center of the tarp.  Measure out the desired radius of your basin and tie the other end of the string to the sharpie.  Keeping the string taut, draw a circle around the nail. Using the brush and paint, go over the sharpie line to make it easily noticeable.

 

3.  When the paint has dried, center the tarp over the mound of soil.  Weight the corners to keep the tarp in place. 

4.  Put on a pair of mud gloves and mix up the hypertufa, increasing the Portland cement by 1/3.  This will fortify the mix and make it stronger.  Mix a normal batch and if you run out, make more.

 

5. Scoop the hypertufa into the center of the circle, the top of the hump.  Lightly spread out the material so that it is thicker at the top of the mound, about 2 inches, and gradually thins to 1 inch at the edges.  

 6. Use the brick to firmly tamp the entire surface of hypertufa, melding the mass into a single large disk. Then use your hand to polish and smooth the surface.  Use the trowel to press in the outer edges of the basin so they are firm and not crumbly.  Remember the edge is where you will be lifting the basin and you do not want it to be weak and break.

7.  Finally, press the length of rebar into the hypertufa creating flutes all the way around the disk.  These add strength as well as a nice decorative touch. 

8.  Cover the basin with plastic and allow it to cure slowly for a week. 

 

9.  When completely dry, invert the basin and transfer it to its desired spot in your garden.

 

10.   Mix sand mix concrete mix and use the large paintbrush to skim coat the inside surface of the basin. This will ensure it will hold water.  Let the concrete dry completely and then you can leave it as and fill it with water or mosaic a decorative pattern with glass and tile on the inside. For this example, we used pieces of mirror, glass and marbles creating a dramatic focal point.