The absence of rain in the MidAtlantic, coupled with twitchy temperature shifts? My garden got confused. Among the disappointments was the poky growth of my okra, which just didn't seem particularly motivated to do much of anything. My first round of planting did nothing at all, even after I scored and soaked those dark ball bearing seeds, even though I waited until the soil was nice and warm. The second round was a little more vital, but leisurely. It came up, and rather than the startling rush skyward I'd seen in prior years, it took its sweet time.
Now, though, it's finally getting close to shoulder high. The coming of regular soaking rains and the end of drought conditions means my whole garden is happier, and those beautiful flowers and the resultant pods are starting to pop. I've got to be out there pretty much every morning with a steel bowl, snipping and clipping, to ensure that I catch the fast growing seedpods before they get huge and woody and inedible.
Okra pods flash-freeze brilliantly, making them remarkably easy to gather and store long-term. They don't need to be blanched, just lined up on a sheet pan and set in the freezer for a few hours, before transferring 'em into a gallon sized storage bag. I could have okra enough to fuel regular meals of gumbo and bhindi masala for months, gallons and gallons of tasty nutty nutritious n'gombo, a chest freezer full of it.
But that's not the goal. First, because I'm far and away the biggest okra fan in my family. Mom likes a bit of classic batter-fried okra on occasion, being a Southern girl and all. Rache likes bhindi masala, and is OK with gumbo, but...you know. One okra-based meal on infrequent occasion is more than plenty in my house. Sigh.
Second, because there are folks out there who do love it, who come from warmer-clime cultures...South Asian, Asian, African, and South American...where it's a staple. So rather than harvesting to the edge of my field, I grow my okra with the intention of sharing much of it. I put three-quarters of a pound or so of it at a time into nice breathable paper bags, write "OKRA" on the bags in a blocky hand-scrawled script, and take it to church with me.
Upon arrival, I'll place that bag or bags into my congregation's Little Free Produce Stand, which sets welcoming right next to our Little Free Pantry. I wasn't sure, at first, if I'd have takers. Okra does have a reputation amongst folks who haven't discovered the right ways to prepare it.
But I needn't have worried. Agricultural workers and lawn crews, day laborers and the folks who care for our elderly? They know what to do with ki ngombo. This last Sunday, for example, I set the bag out, walked the ten yards to my office, and as I was opening the door, an old SUV pulled up to the pantry. What did those folks take? The bag of ocra.
It's a way of being generous and hospitable to the wayfaring strangers who find themselves laboring in a strange land. Hospitality is, after all, one of the core Biblical virtues, a fundamental requirement of Torah and a bedrock non-negotiable moral imperative in the Gospel. It's particularly good to offer up that grace now, in a nation that's increasingly forgotten that the Lord God, Creator of the Universe judges the soundness of our souls by such things.
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