It's been below thirty in my yard for the past 10 days. I didn't have much that had sprouted earlier, which I was worrying about, but I did have 12 little bok choy sprouts. They are still out there, and today I have spinach sprouts. Every morning I expect to go out and see them dead. Today I decided to stop worrying about it and just fix it so I didn't have to do anything more for them. So I had some old windows and I put my containers up against the west facing foundation of the house and propped windows over them. The ends are open, but I thought it might just give them the little extra that might help through this cold spell. I actually had to water all the containers today because it was sunny and cold here yesterday. Looks like another week of this weather on the forecast and I've planted my peas early for the first time in years, of course. [g]

As a matter of fact, I DID make a nice Goulash (and misspelled the name, too, hehe)! Thanks, Rick and Bruce :-) I got the recipe from somewhere, and then I just used the Hungarian Wax peppers and the paprika powder + the dried Hungarian powder/flakes from my own stock. Here's the basic write-up that I did: "Hungarian Goulash - beef pepper stew :-) Chuck beef, beefstock, onion, potato, carrot, Hungarian hot wax pepper, parsley, caraway seed, garlic, paprika, olive oil, seasalt and black ground pepper to taste.Olive oil or bacon fat in pot, low cook the onions until translucent, salt to make tender. Add cut beef, sear all sides, add beefstock and water about one inch above the beef. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer until meat is tender - could take 1 to 2 hours. Bring back up to a boil, add potato, carrot, pepper, caraway seed, paprika powder, and the parsley bunch (tied with butcher's twine). Reduce heat, simmer until vegetables are properly cooked. Salt and pepper to taste."

I just popped $45 for 3 different kinds of shallot seed from Territorial, places are running out but Territorial still has some in stock. Building on last years success but they didn't have the same seed variety so I'll try three different ones, (along with one kind of sweet pepper and one kind of squash that jumped into the cart at the last minute when I was distracted... I'm now ordering from a badly dog-eared, item-circled Johnny's. And this time, I went to my seed stash in the freezer, twice, to check that I'm not ordering something I don't have enough of already. And I have a lot, already. Edited to add that as I'm doing this, I'm reminded of something my elderly gardening neighbor, who always had spectacular gardens, once pointed out. In the overall scheme of gardening inputs, seeds are about the least expensive component. If he wanted a row of, say, radishes, he'd buy 4-5 packets, and plant them all, then thin them out. Ending up with a beautiful, full row of properly spaced radishes, weeded as he thinned them. Anywho, as I'm ordering seeds, in many cases if you buy the quantity one up from "packet", you get several more multiples of seed for not even twice the price. Particularly with peppers and tomatoes, I always start 3 or 4 times the seeds for the plants I need, then I get to pick the strongest ones. All in all, trying to insure a good start. This post was edited by david52 on Thu, Jan 22, 15 at 18:35

At least w/ mine they were started as normal this yr (same as yrs that I have started harvesting 2nd wk or so of July) I don't think that earlier would have done much for me. Frankly, I start obsessing just after Christmas and think that I should have them started by New Years, lol. But logisticts (sp?) get in my way ;o) . I think it is just boils down to the 'type' of season I've had. our nights have been much (15 degrees on average) cooler this yr. That's why I said it feels like I'm back on the other side of the mountains this yr (killing frosts in July)......sigh I don't know what your true conditions of your z6 is (they can vary) but, some of my favorites have been: Goliath, good size maters and lots of them Pinapple, not so big on flavor, but huge beautiful maters that compliment other maters in a mix, ie, salsa, mater salad etc... Cherokee Purple, new this yr, very prolific, tasty and cool lookin' Black Cherry, have to plant multiples to keep the fist fights down. They don't have the 'standard cherry flavor' but they are a fav here. you might do a search on the topic, there have been lots of discussions about this. I found one that might help. Peoples taste varies so much (plus growing conditions play a role in flavor) that it takes experimenting (sp?) I know that I won't grow mortgage lifter again and some (a lot) people love them................Happy growin'.........T Here is a link that might be useful: if you could only grow one