I did another guest post over at TNS last night, so go there if you haven’t been yet. For the sake of some content over here, and because Zoomie asked nicely (and gave me my first and only blog award a while ago) I’m putting up a shot of the sunflower labyrinth that I did at a sculpture park in upstate NY this summer. It’s 82 feet in diameter, so if you draw a square…
Category: Gardening
Finally, after much schlepping, I get to be home for a week. Then, after about 5 days back in the city, I’ll be home for a good long chunk of time and get to return to the normal pace of life. I can’t wait. Meanwhile, this week will be taken up with much canning and pickling since everything’s finishing up for the season. I have three or four beds planted with winter crops, ready for…
I am so happy to be back, and just working in the studio until it’s time to make dinner, with an occasional break to garden a bit so the perfection of these days doesn’t pass me by. Right before starting this meal, I finished a drawing that looks like wallpaper that William Morris would have designed if he’d had access to certain indole alkaloids. We eat a lot of salmon; it’s delicious, healthy, and most…
Chioggia beets occasionally lack any of the brilliant pigment that gives them their gorgeous candy-striping; the result is a pure white beet. One of the shades of rainbow carrot we planted is also a beautiful, creamy white, and since I had planned to make carrot risotto- oh, smoked duck broth in the freezer, how I love thee- combining the white roots with the white rice seemed like a neat idea. I roasted the roots with…
Today was not as warm, but the sun was out, and there was a nice breeze, and after a morning spent cleaning the studio (including scraping tons of rock-hard paint off the glass tabletop that I use as a palette) I was fed up and ran outside to get some exercise. This involved turning all the lovely composted manure into those beds which were to have hardier things planted in them. Pre-turning, I dug up…
Today it was warm. Rainy, yes, but warm. 65 degrees, balmy, no-jacket required warm. The smell of rain and dirt and leaves borne on the breeze (a warm breeze, mind you) was enough to send me into spasms of joy. I did the only logical thing and bought a shitload- that’s the technical measurement- of manure for preparing the garden beds. Milo actually came into the garden with me for a bit wearing his “farmer…
Today it’s sunny and relatively warm- around 40˚- so I was able to wrestle the plastic off the South side of the covered beds and see how the plants are doing. Growth is slow, but happening, and the hardy stuff is perky and beautiful. We’re going to have a huge head start with kale and collards come March; we’re already getting as much sun as we do in mid-November. Here’s a shot of the salad…
Last night we had our first frost, and the row covers worked well to protect the less hardy greens. My hope is that we’ll be able to keep some things going at least as far as full Winter, if not longer for the kale and collards. Those I planted a month ago will have a great head start in the spring if they survive. In any case, it will be a good chance to learn…
I owe the inspiration for this to cookiecrumb, who referred me to Becks & Posh based on the “Bolted Lettuce” post from the other day. The happy presence of duck broth in our freezer (they leave those giblets in there for a reason) made it even better, and let me clear out a large part of the lettuce bed for the fall crop. All the various bolted varieties went in: butterhead, red and green oakleaf,…
Now normally this is the bane of the gardener, since it means it’s too hot to grow sweet, tender salad greens until summer is almost over. But the slight bitterness and firmer texture of bolted lettuces allow other treatments to offer themselves, (though I likes me some bitter in my salad too.) Mash makes good use of midsummer lettuce trees, and so does wilting or even braising; try it and be delighted. Plus you can…