The first rice farming season is finally over, I can now start to work on my vegetable garden until mid-November (when the second rice farming season begins). It has been four months since I could not attend to my vegetable garden. But it is good that most of my fruit-bearing trees are still producing fruit all year long. One of those trees is my Red Lady Papaya, It is only three years old but it already gave us its delightful fruits for about a year now. Another one that I am glad to share with the community is my "Lakatan Banana", like my Red Lady Papaya it is also about three years old, and this month I was able to harvest its first fruits.

Before the beginning or during the first rice farming season I was able to harvest ripe red lady papaya from the same tree where I harvested the red lady papaya above. This red lady papaya is the most delicious and sweetest ripe papaya that I tasted. It is perfect to gobble when chilled. Also, as you can see in the background of my selfie above there are lots of grasses, which happens to be my vegetable garden which I was not able to spare some time for because I was busy on our rice farm.

Above is another photo of my red lady papaya before I harvested them. Looking at them is amazing! I can only wish that the tree will last a lifetime and keeps on giving us delicious fruits. Red Lady Papaya is one of the most expensive varieties of papaya here in our country. So, when I was able to plant and grow one I am very happy. This papaya is actually the only one that I love because it is not saggy when overripe and not just like the others that look melting when overripe.

As always, after harvesting papaya I always put them on the table located in our dirty kitchen. I do not know, but I love to stare at them. This is also the first papaya that I fell in love with (taking care of them and most of all, eating them). Before I tasted this red lady papaya I am actually not into ripe papaya that much. But when I tasted this red lady papaya I immediately fell in love with it because it is very delicious. I actually gave the other one to our auntie who lives nearby.

And again I split it into two and removed the seeds (for planting). Cutting and peeling this papaya is actually very enjoyable because of the fact that I am going to eat it after I chilled it in the refrigerator (which I recommend, chilled papaya is the best). I can actually eat half of it in just one sitting because it is very delicious, very sweet, and super juicy!

The photo above shows how I like my papaya to be sliced. Those cubes are one-bite. You may notice that they are quite a few, it is because I am eating while I am slicing (I just can't resist this papaya, to be honest), that's how good this papaya is. After slicing I washed them and then put them immediately in the refrigerator. My wife also came to love this papaya, actually, all of us in the house love this papaya, even the kids.

When it comes to bananas, "Latundan" is my favorite, next is "Lakatan".Above is an image of me while I am carrying my first even Lakatan harvest on my three years old Lakatan bananas. This banana is nice too! It has a yellow meath when ripe and is perfect for any occasion. There is actually a much better variety of Lakatan than mine. Particularly, I love to buy this kind of Banana 7-11 convenience store back when I was still working in an office (which is just over a year ago).

And above is a close-up of them. I am actually regretting not harvesting this banana a little earlier. As you look closely at the bananas some of them have split open (maybe because of frequent rain and then a scorching hot sun ensued next, which frequently happens before I harvested these bananas. But, just like the saying goes "better late than never".

This is actually my first time storing bananas to ripen. But before this, I am actually seeing my late father on how he is preparing the banana for storage. Usually, he is going to cut and separate each bunch from the stem then let the nectar or resin flow and then store them inside styro containers or any container that is available.

And above is how they look after separating them from the stem (which can be seen on top of the bananas). What I can't clearly remember is if my father would wash them with water before storing them. But in this case, I did not wash them, I just put them straight into the styro container and then kept the lid open for the air to circulate, if not, they may develop molds.

The photo above shows how I arrange them. This technique is actually the one that I am seeing from my father when he was still alive. With this technique, any left nectar or resin will not flow to the body of each banana. If the nectar or resin flows to the body of the banana it will cause blackening of the skin of the bananas but ultimately will not affect the meat inside.

From papaya harvesting to papaya seedlings, that's how my gardening looks like now because I am still not able to personally spare some time for my vegetable garden. And since I am not able to, I am now preparing some seedlings that I can transplant into my vegetable whenever I am ready. But as the day passes by, my having a hand on my vegetable is very bleak because the second rice cropping season is two weeks from now before I officially start making moves on our rice farm.

Another tree that I have been longing to grow is the avocado. And you guessed it right, I love avocado in any form, I can eat an avocado right after opening it. I love avocado shakes too! But salad with avocado is also something I really wanted to try. In the Foodies Bee Hive community, I am seeing a lot of recipes involving avocado so I am very much willing to try them whenever I have time.

Prior to writing this blog, an unexpected walked through our door, his voice seemed familiar, and when I am about to see who it is, it is the voice of one of my closest cousins, and he got a surprise, he knew that I love to plant, he knew that I love avocado, so, he brought with him four avocados seems from the city where he is living, a six-hour drive from where I am living. I was so happy because I am actually planning to plant more than one avocado tree, he brought four, so it is very nice.

That is all for now guys, catch you up with the next one. Wishing you all safety, good health, and abundance.