Akebi aka Chocolate vine...

This plant is a novelty... native of Japan...

The Japanese folks call them 'Akebi' while the English speaking world labels it 'chocolate vine' because their flowers seem to smell like chocolate... 

We are very lucky to have these vines growing wildly in our property...

Ours is the three-leaved variety as opposed to the five-leaved ones that can be found in the nearby hills...

The fruits do not look attractive when green...

However, they take on a very pretty pinkish-purple tone as they ripen...

At the same time, the fruit splits vertically from top to bottom, revealing a whitish pulp....

Birds love this flesh as we sometimes observed empty fruits that are either left dangling on the vines or have dropped onto the ground...

We carefully split open the pulp and were pleasantly surprised to see the insides being quite 'intricately designed'...

The taste is faintly sweet... the seeds can be quite bitter if chewed on...

Just out of curiosity, we tried cooking the skin with some miso sauce...

The taste was slightly bitter and some Japanese folks say that it goes well with Japanese wine (sake)...

Pumpkin 'art' and the two loofahs...

Pumpkins are believed to originate from North America...
The Japanese call them 'kabocha', which rhymes with Kampuchea...
Apparently, to the Japanese, the pumpkin came into Japan from Cambodia, hence the name...

Our pumpkin harvest is not too bad this year...

All in all, we manage to harvest seven fruits of this 'Ebisu' specie...

With no scissors on hand, I just ripped the stalks off from this pumpkin...
And woah, do I see a 'bird' here?

And this one... a little monster flexing its muscles?

Now, the loofah is supposed to originate from India...
We grow both types...
The pictures above shows the Egyptian loofah which is rather smooth-skinned...

I observe that it flowers in the morning...

The second type is the angled loofah...

They seem to prefer flowering in the evening...

My sweeto haato prefers the smooth-skinned Egyptian... better taste, she says...
Rather unfortunately for her, our angled loofahs were more productive this season...
Perhaps, 43 angled loofahs compared to about 30 Egyptian loofahs...
In any case, we usually make soups out of them...

Chestnut, pumpkin, beets, and rocoto...

Tried planting chestnut for the first time last year...

The strain we chose is called 'Porotan'...

Don't ask me why it is called such a name, but they are supposed to be easy to peel...

We could manage only one fruit... yes, only one, weighing a great 35 grams... ;=)

 

Actually, there were four fruits forming...

They eventually dropped off before they could fully mature...

Our butter scotch pumpkin did not do as well this year...

Yes, we could harvest only one fruit...

Compared to 6 fruits last season... 

Wonder why, really... 

Beets... just harvested a bunch of them, and was quite amused to see one of them taking on the shape of the bottle gourd...  

Rocoto peppers... yes, from seeds given to me by a former student from Peru...

Their color combination on the insides are really fascinating to observe...

I plan to ask my sweeto haato to preserve them in vinegar...

Bitter gourd, pumpkin, and long beans...

Been very busy with work lately...

Bitter gourd is standard fare on our dining table... 

My sweeto haato specifically says, 'grow the long type and not the stubby type'...

They are quite easy to grow... at this point of time, we have on record a harvest of 54 fruits...

My missus tried to make this dish (known as Yong Tau Foo in Malaysia) and they tasted, yes, bitter... but good...

Pumpkin too, is a staple for us in the summer...

This season, managed to harvest five of them, totaling 8.1 kilos...

Gave one to a neighbor...

I don't know what it is but the yellow pumpkin seeds I bought from Los Angeles some time ago had never given me any good harvest...

After growing to a certain size, they begin to wrinkle away, and eventually, drop off altogether...

So, I decided to just harvest them young, very young...

We had them with the bitter gourd dish above...

Long beans... I love...

They are a very convenient veggie to grow...

You harvest and they keep producing...

Flowers... of Soap wort, Oregano, Jerusalem artichoke, and Lotus...

Japan is in the midst of the O-bon season, as in All Souls Day...

The university is closed for a full week... 

Put in the two weekends, and yours truly is only too happy to be having a 9-day break...

Which means, an excellent opportunity to catch up with the chores in the potager...

Yes, it is a joy to be able to work in the garden, but still, the heat... ooh, it's killing...

We have been trying to grow this soap wort for a while now...

Am happy to see that they are growing well...

Belongs to the carnation family and has sweet smelling flowers...

Apparently can be used as a mild soap but we haven't tried doing so...

The wild marjoram a.k.a. oregano looks pretty but my missus prefers the sweet marjoram for cooking...

And so is the Jerusalem artichoke... it looks pretty...

We tried eating their tubers but did not quite like their taste...

The mini-lotus flower is doing beautifully in the pond...