Great greens!

We are currently eating a lot of salads and greens.  I purchased some new seed varieties this year that have been a great success, so I thought I'd share the goods.

Rouge de Grenoblouse, Nevada, Kweik, Pirat, Merlot Batavian, Arianna Batavian

We have harvested all of our Rapini, which in my opinion is one of the best things to add to a shaped pasta with goat cheese and garlic.

The rest of the garden is moving right along and as much as I love green, I'm looking forward to some other bright colors in the coming months.

Tip of the day May 6th

Not to state the obvious, but don't forget to label your crops as you plant them.  I have lots of help with signage and spelling.

JG

One Potato, two potato...

Its potato planting time here in the Mountain West.  Here's how we do it.
About 3 weeks ago, I cut my seed potatoes up into 2-3 pieces each.  I've been taught to aim for 2 eyes per piece.

After a few weeks, the potatoes will seal up as to prevent rotting in the ground and they look like this

Next, you need to prepare your garden bed.  We like to grow a cover crop in ours during fall and winter which we cut in the spring, then turn the soil over.  Then we dig holes about 1 foot deep for each seed potato.

Next you place your seed potatoes 1 to each hole, I like to pick the best looking specimens and discard any that look like they might be a little rotten.  It turns out that 2.5 year olds are excellent potato planting assistants.

We cover our seed potatoes with a light layer of soil then keep adding, eventually mounding up as our plants grow.
After a few months, out potato plants will look like this

Happy spring garden season friends.
-J, T, &C

Feb harvest

Who would have thought that we'd be harvesting salad greens here in February?  To be honest, I've been trying to work out the conditions to achieve this for several years.

This arugula has been growing under a cover of row cover only that is propped up with some wire fencing.  Its gorgeous and nice and peppery.

These lettuces which include Nevada, Frisee, and Merlot are very protected under row cover with a plastic hoop structure 2 feet above.  If balmy in here.

These plants are Lacinato Kale, which I thought were petering out, but which are now growing a new generation of baby leaves below the upper leaves.  The baby leaves taste mild and a little broccoli like.  I'll probably let these continue to do their thing until I get a new crop of Kale started.

Since its going to snow almost all week here, not much else to do outside in the garden.  So, we'll do a little more of this...

However we will be supplementing our itching for the spring garden by eating some of this ...

Vegetable Stock

Early February represents a waiting game this year.  I had already started some seedlings last year by this time, which turned out to have been a bit of jumping the gun.  So this year, I'm exercising patience and will wait a few more weeks before starting some early seedlings in flats.  In the meantime, I'm spending a pretty good amount of time cooking warm winter fare, which today means vegetable stock.  This might be one of the easiest multi-use recipes I've ever come across.  During the summer almost all of the ingredients for this come from the garden.  At this point in the year, we harvest our goods from the grocery aisles.

The vegetables which include 5 carrots, 5 ribs celery, 2 leeks (halved and rinsed for grit), 4 onions, 2 Roma tomatoes, 2 cloves of garlic, a handful of parsley with stems are coarsely chopped and then placed into a stock pot.  2 bay leaves and some fresh oregano and thyme are added along with 4 quarts of water poured on top. Bring to a boil, lower to a simmer, the cover and cook for about 45 minutes.  Allow stock to cool, then strain.  That's it.  Pretty simple, right?

This week, the stock will be a base for vegetarian black bean chili, but the potential uses are broad and this stock gets used up very quickly around our house.  So while its winter outside, it smelled a bit like a vegetable garden inside.  Cooking tends to make us smile around here, see?

Lets start seedlings in a week or 2 shall we?

January Garden

January is a slow month in the garden itself, but we have more than welcomed the regular additions of backyard kale, carrots, and occasional greens to our winter diet.

Even though the growing is slow, there is still a lot to do inside and outside.  I'm in the process of trimming back my gangly grape vines and cleaning up garden beds with skeletons of summer plants when the soil thaws enough for me to do so.  Its good to have reasons to get outside in the sunshine even if it is cold.

Our spirits are pretty good considering that it has been a dry, snowless winter so far.  This month we will get into the work of planning for the spring and summer and the fun of thumbing through garden catalogs.  I'm going to continue to work on crop rotation this year and am excited to see what new things we can grow along with our old favorites.
Happy 2012.

Garden Recipe 1: Greens Tacos

I know what you are thinking, that this is some sort of vegetarian hippie thing, but you would be wrong.  These are authentic and delicious.

First you will need some greens

I'm partial to Swiss Chard in this recipe but you could use Kale or Collards or even Spinach.   The most recent batch I made included a few collards in addition to Swiss Chard.

Rinse greens and cut into 1 inch strips and trim stems

Blanche greens (although I skip this step when using spinach) until just shy of tender to remove any bitterness and soften ribs.  For Chard this is about 2 minutes.  Drain then Rinse in cool water.
While these hang out and drain.  Next you will want to sauté 1/2 of a medium onion, I'm partial to red onion, in olive oil until soft then add 1 clove fresh chopped garlic.  After 1 minute, add greens and cook together until greens are soft, about 5 minutes (longer if using kale or collard greens).

Warm up a few corn tortillas and assemble as preferred.  I'm partial to sour cream as a base, then greens topped with cheese and guacamole.

Yum.  Recipe based from Greens Taco in "Everyday Mexican" by Rick Bayless.