Fun for the neighborhood kitty cats

 Nepeta, one of the biggest plants in my herb garden, is blooming.  Even though it is not a culinary herb, I love it because of its attractive blue flowers and blue green pointed leaves. Nepeta is also called catnip or catmint because of its effect on cats. Some claim that Nepeta tends to have a sedative effect on humans, but it has the opposite effect on cats, making them  high by pleasantly stimulating their  pheromones. This  is why my neighbor's Siamese cat is often seen hanging around. She rolls around in it which drives my poor claw-less inside cat crazy as she watches jealously from behind the screened door of the kitchen. I'll have to remember to cut her a bunch as a treat!

Nature's temple

Lush green meadows, panoramic vistas, rushing waterfalls, 3000 year old sequoia trees. A perfect week of hiking in California's Yosemite valley.

Garlic scape breath

I feel a little bit like Julie from the movie Julie and Julia blogging about recipes that I'm cooking, but I promise to only write about food that comes out of the garden. So tonight's theme is garlic, scapes that is. It seems that garlic scapes were not a big seller out in the garage market that I've set up so I brought them inside and looked up a couple of recipes. I decided to make chicken with garlic scapes and capers and I served it over mashed potatoes with garlic scapes. The dinner tasted pretty good, but it is clear that I will need to carry a box of tic tacs with me tomorrow.

Chicken with garlic scapes and capers
2 boneless chicken breasts halved
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp olive oil
4 tbsp dry white wine
2 tbsp lemon juice
4 chopped garlic scapes
1 tbsp drained capers
Slightly flatten the chicken between sheets of plastic. In a large skillet, heat 1 tbsp of butter and the oil over  med high heat. Saute until cooked through. Season with s & p. Transfer chicken to a plate and keep warm. Pour off the fat from the skillet and add remaining butter, wine, lemon juice, scapes and bring to a boil. Simmer until scapes soften. Stir in capers and season with s & p to taste. Spoon over chicken and serve. Serves 4.
Mashed potatoes with garlic scapes
2 1/2 lbs russet potatoes peeled and cut up.
2 tbsp butter
1-2 tsp olive oil
1/4 cup garlic scapes
1/4 cup hot milk
Cook potatoes until tender. Drain and return to pot. Over med high heat, melt butter with oil in small skillet. Add scapes and saute about 5 mins. Add potatoes and mash. Gradually add milk. Season with s & p.

Arugula pesto

The arugula is gone, but I did buy more seed and will plant it again when space opens up. I wasn't pleased with the slow growing, short leaf 'sylvetta' variety that I planted the first time. It was difficult to harvest and had a very pungent taste that is too strong for my liking. Instead, I prefer the standard arugula with long dark green lobed leaves that reaches maturity in 40 days. The sylvetta variety was good for making pesto, however. I have it for sale in the garage freezer. But beware, it is strong and only for true arugula lovers only!  

Napa cabbage and cilantro

The cilantro is starting to bolt so I wanted to pick it while I still had the chance. I use cilantro later in the season to make salsas and guacamole, but I wanted to pair it with something that I could harvest today. I decided to make Asian cabbage slaw, from a recipe that I found in Farmer John's cookbook.

2 cups shredded cabbage (I used the Napa chinese cabbage from the garden)
1/3 cup grated carrot
1/2 cup minced red onion
2 tbsp fresh mint
2 tbsp fresh cilantro
2 tbsp rice vinegar
2 tbsp peanut oil
                                                      1 tbsp rice wine
                                                       2 tsp honey
                                                       1 tsp sesame oil
                                                       s & p
Combine cabbage, carrot, onion, mint and cilantro in a large bowl and toss. Mix the rest of the ingredients in a small bowl until mixed well and toss with the salad. You can refrigerate the salad for an hour before serving to combine the flavors.

I used Napa Chinese cabbage from the garden, a savoy type that has a fine flavor, tender texture, and thin crinkly green leaves. I also had the cilantro and mint in the herb bed. I will seed more cilantro to use later in the season. Time for dinner...

Beautiful harvest

I picked this basket of vegetables from the garden this morning. Bok choy, garlic scapes, radishes, Hakurei salad turnips, green and red leaf lettuce and Napa Chinese cabbage. I rinsed and bagged up the extra and put it out in the garage to sell to my friends. I am certainly encouraged by what the garden is producing so far and I'm looking forward to enjoying these fresh veggies for dinner tonight!

Eating out of the garden

 It is wonderful to be eating out of the garden again! This is a salad that I made a couple of days ago from some spinach that I had hidden away in the back of the fridge.

Working mondays

Hooray! My gardening buddies all working together ! What a great way to start the week! It seems that the best day to get together as a group is early monday morning. A simple twist of fate had me scheduled to work in the office so I missed getting dirty with all of you, but I plan to be free most mondays from now on.  You did a  great job of weeding and planting more beans and Swiss chard in the empty space created by removing the cold frame and harvesting the spinach and arugula. Over the weekend I squeezed some fennel, basil, and lettuce in between the squash and eggplant. The garden is now fully planted and I will have to wait for more space to open up before I plant anything else. I was also busy harvesting and have quite a variety of things for sale out in the garage, including mixed baby greens, red and green lettuce, bok choy, Napa cabbage, garlic scapes, and radishes. In addition, I made some arugula pesto to try, Colleen has refilled the freezer with her delicious soups, and of course there are fresh local eggs available. I am always amazed at how much can be grown in a small area and with great help from my gardening buddies, we are off to a terrific start to the season!

What are garlic scapes?

Garlic scapes are the curlicue flower stalks that appear on the garlic plants in June, about a month before the bulbs are ready to harvest. Garlic scapes can be eaten and enjoyed now while we wait for the bulbs to be ready. It is important to snap off the scapes because we'll get 30 percent bigger bulbs as the plant redirects its energy down toward the root. Garlic scapes have a milder taste than the bulbs. Just chop all the way up the green stalks, saute and enjoy the mild garlic taste in many of your favorite dishes.

Bok choy anyone?

Bok Choy is a satisfying plant to grow. It likes the cool spring weather, grows quickly, and is one of the first plants ready to harvest.

Bok Choy is a great nutritional gift and often touted as the garden vegetable highest in calcium. Bok choy is an excellent source of vitamins A, B-complex, C, and some minerals. All this for only 24 calories per one-cup serving!

My problem has always been what to do with it. My neighbor Jeri suggested I cook it in the bamboo steamer. So this is what I did:

I placed bok choy leaves in the bottom part of the steamer and laid a piece of salmon filet on top. Then I cut up the remainder of the bok choy, some scallions, garlic scapes, a Hakurei salad turnip and the turnip greens that I harvested from the garden, and mixed them with a combination of sesame oil, soy sauce, and honey, salt and pepper. Then I steamed it on top of the stove and voila! A yummy Asian inspired dinner!

Cucumbers

I took the cold frame down. It is warm enough for everything to be outside and I needed the space for the cucumbers which I planted along the fence.

- photo of cucumbers
The poly house is still up, but it is being used primarily as a holding area for extra plants and those waiting to be put in the ground.
Cucumbers are vines that  like to climb . I am hoping that they will grab onto the chicken wire along the base of the split rails and grow horizontally along the fence.
Did you know that cucumbers are 95 percent water and contain small amounts of vitamins A, C, and a few minerals. Although not the most nutritious of the garden vegetables, cucumbers are surprisingly rich in vitamin E. Like many vegetables, their gift comes from their seasonality. The summer heat usually coincides with a prolific cucumber patch. A light and cooling vegetable, the cucumber helps us replenish the fluids and minerals lost in our perspiration, leaving us "cool as a cucumber." (From Asparagus to Zucchini, Madison Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalition.)
I picked the rest of the spinach and planted basil. I still have a half tray of basil plants that I'd like to get in the ground. I plan to make a lot of basil pesto this summer, enough to freeze, for that 'middle of the summer'  taste in the dead of winter. I also planted seeds of fortex pole beans around the two trellises which will provide vertical interest and crunchy, nutty beans towards the end of the summer.
I seeded more zucchini and summer squash. I find that zucchini pushes out a big crop of fruit, but then poops out after its major growth spurt and becomes suseptible to fungal disease. So, I find it helpful to plant every couple of weeks for a continuous supply.

More planting and harvesting

Work in the garden continues to keep me busy. Even though I am keeping a daily written journal of what I'm doing, I'm behind on my blog entries. I am trying to write too much and I'm getting bogged down. My goal is to post shorter, more frequent entries. I  need to get into the habit of typing my lists right onto the blog rather than writing everything down in my planner. I appreciate all of you who are still reading! I'm hoping that my blog will be more current and fun to read, so stay tuned!

I finished planting the dahlias, 165 total. I sent the remainder to my sister Kathy in Chicago. I wonder how long it will take her to become a crazy dahlia person like me! The plants are doing well and this morning I saw buds on some of the larger plants which means I should start seeing flowers in a couple of weeks. I read that I should cut the central stem to encourage fuller plants, however, I am hesitant to cut a flower bud when it is so close to flowering. I know I have to do it though to have healthier fuller plants later in the season.

Photo of dahlia stem and bud

 

I picked the rest of the broccoli raab and cooked it for lunch and dinner for almost a week! Broccoli raab tastes great sauteed with chicken or sausage, garlic, tomatoes, and cheese. Broccoli raab and sausage pizza is one of my favorites! I have been chosen to be part of a 3 month food study and was keeping a food journal last week. Broccoli raab everything and lots of chocolate chip cookies in between.  Not your average diet. The good news is just when I was getting sick of eating broccoli raab, the bok choy is ready to harvest.  This really is the best part of eating right out of the garden. Just when you start to get tired of one thing, something else is ready to pick.

photo of bok choy

I filled in the area where the broccoli raab was with more eggplant and peppers. I planted fennel where a block of  arugula was. It is hard to believe that I am already planting the second crop of the season.

I went to the home depot and bought 8 foot 1 x 2's that I cut in half to use for the tomato stakes. I planted 45 tomato plants. And then the next day I planted 20 more.- That's it, I think! I still have some nice looking tomato plants growing in the poly house. Perhaps some of my gardening buddies will want them to take home - hint hint... 

I want to make a correction to one of my recent posts. Last week I commented that some of the plants in the garden were yellowing.  I thought the nitrogen was being tied up because of too much organic matter in the soil. Nancy questioned my reasoning and I'm glad she did. Organic matter provides nitrogen. The reason that it may not be available to the plants in my garden is that too much organic matter has raised the soil PH which is most likely what is making the nitrogen unavailable to the plants. I spread sulphur on the garden to lower the PH, but I have learned that I did not spread the correct type. I think another reason some of the plants are yellowing is because it has been drier than normal and the plants are thirsty! I've had the sprinklers on the past couple of days and everything has perked up. So thank you Nancy! It just goes to show you that you shouldn't believe everything you read!

Farewell

This is the week that we say goodbye to my neighbor Jeri's magnificent maple tree. It is hard to believe that something so beautiful must come down, because from a distance, the tree looks healthy and vigorous and strong enough to last another several decades. Unfortunately, the tree is diseased. A large branch came down in a spring storm and upon closer  inspection, the trunk was found to be almost hollow and eaten away by insects and disease.

The tree has quietly provided beauty and shade as well as a

 wonderful space beneath its branches to share a glass of wine with our friends Bill and Jeri.

It is always sad when a large tree has to come down. Farewell fine Sir. You will be missed.