The Grass is Greener!

...At least this is how I'm feeling after a much-needed trip out to the sunny (and foggy) California coast.

You probably heard about the drought we experienced in the Midwest this summer.  It was hot, scorching on most days and we went weeks on end with no rain.  This weather was punctuated by a fierce pop-up storm at the end of June that knocked out our power for a week when temps exceeded 100 degrees.  It's no surprise, then, that my my garden succumbed to it's miserable fate.

The zucchini and yellow squash were devoured by squash bugs (pictured left). The cucumber plant was ravaged by the cute yellow striped cucumber beetle. The green beans mildewed, and the tomatoes never ripened.  This left me with lots and lots of basil.

I knew that my dreams for my garden were naive, but I never dreamt that my only successful crops (other than the basil) would have been mosquitos and squash bug infestations.

This takes me back to California. To celebrate our 10th anniversary, my husband and I drove down to  Paso Robles and then over to the coast and up Highway 1 to San Francisco. On the way, we passed idyllic scenes of cows grazing in fields by the coast, farm stands piled high with gleaming produce, and green fields ripe with avocados and artichokes. 

Was the grass really greener in California?  The food fresher, tastier, and more beautiful?









While I'm sure that pests and extreme weather conditions are not unknown to farmers on the West coast, what we saw--the olives, grapes, tomatoes, eggplants, and peaches--looked perfectly magical compared to the drought-ravaged produce back home, and it made us think that just maybe, the grass was greener--at least this year--in sunny California.

"You want me to eat this?"

“Here, try this,” I handed my daughter a snow pea, just picked minutes ago from my garden and still hot from the stovetop where it was stir-fried.

“Eww,” she wrinkled up her nose.

I thought about my options.  I could force her to try it. I had done this with other foods in the past to little success.  My little drama queen would barely touch the dreaded food to her tongue, whine, gag, and then feign crying. 

“You don’t have to eat it, but I challenge you to try it,” I offered.

My daughter eyed me suspiciously and then brought the snow pea toward her lips. 

I looked down at my plate, pretending to take no interest in her vegetable-eating dilemma.

No longer than ten seconds later, I looked up.  The snow pea was gone and she was licking her fingers.  

“Where did it go?” I couldn’t hide my surprise.

“Oh, it was okay,” as she continued to lick her fingers.

I proceeded to tell my daughter that vegetables grown in a garden usually taste better than those bought in the store. Garden-grown vegetables have robust, complex flavors compared to their bland store-bought cousins. The snow peas tasted both lightly sweet and salty (I added salt when stir-frying), tender and at the same time crisp, and they tasted very green. I know that sounds strange but they tasted green. 

Last night I picked a handful of snow peas from the garden again to stir-fry for an evening snack.  My daughter watched me eat from the bowl of hot peas, and then put down her ice cream bowl to snatch one of the largest peas from me.  “Yum.  These snow peas are so good,” she said as she wolfed it down.

Basic Recipe for Stir-fried Snow Peas

1. Wash snow peas and remove strings (just a personal preference).  Let air dry (this is important so the oil doesn’t splatter when you add the pods to the pan)
2. Heat enough oil (I use canola) just to cover the bottom of your pan (I use a deep sauce pan to avoid oil splatters). High heat will scorch the pea pods so keep the temperature around medium-high. 
3. Add the pea pods and stir or turn to coat each pod in oil (approximately 30 seconds).
4. Add several tablespoons of water (The amount will depend on the number of pea pods you are cooking. The snow peas should not float in the water nor should the water be so little that it makes the oil “spit”)
5. Cover the pan partially and allow the snow peas to cook an extra 2-5 minutes to taste (I like my snow peas a little crunchy so I tend to cook them less).  Add salt to taste approximately 30 seconds before you take the snow peas off the stove.  
6. Serve immediately.

Enjoy!

Big Garden Dreams

Today, I unexpectedly pulled this from my garden: a winter carrot.



This carrot--grown from a seed leftover from last summer during our warm, snowless winter--got me dreaming about the great harvest I’ll pull from my garden this summer.

  

I have big dreams:  sugar snap peas, sweet yellow onions, carrots, and bush beans are already in the ground. I’ll add brandywine tomato, yellow squash, burpless cucumber, sweet basil, and buttercrunch lettuce plants later this week to fill the beds. 

My mind is racing with possible dishes these yet-to-be-planted veggies will be made into, simple recipes that highlight their full flavor:  tomatoes and basil—made into Tomato Caprese Salad (my absolute favorite summer staple), cucumbers and lettuce—made into a simple salad with homemade olive oil and vinegar dressing, zucchini—sautéed with olive oil and garlic.  I could go on…

This is how I start out in spring, (over) ambitious and idealistic about my garden.  Then in July, when my garden has turned into a jungle, squash bugs devouring my zucchini plants and mildew squelching my bean harvest, I reassess my goals.  I am thrilled to discover a zucchini untouched by the ravenous squash bugs or five slender beans I can save from my many bean plants.

But for now, the carrot has inspired me to dream big.  Here’s hoping for a good harvest!

What are you growing in your garden this year?  

Chopsticks…in the garden

It’s mid-spring here in Central Ohio, and time to get veggie gardens prepped for planting in a few weeks.  I have two raised beds in my backyard, a 4X8 patch made out of cedar planks and a long, skinny 1X16 bed (new this year!) behind my garage.  Everytime I go outside to work in the gardens, I find a new use for old chopsticks--chopsticks that are losing their paint/lacquer or that have been misshapen and dried out from the dishwasher.  If your family eats with chopsticks, chances are that you have several old pairs that are ready to retire to the garden.  

Here are three eco-friendly ideas that you can use this spring:

1. Use chopsticks to secure weed cloth to the ground.  

When installing a new raised bed, one of the first steps is to lay down some type of weed cloth or landscape fabric as a barrier to weeds before adding your soil.  After laying down the cloth, instead of metal garden staples (which often have to be purchased separately from garden centers), grab a few chopsticks. As long as the soil is relatively soft, you should be able to push the chopsticks through the cloth into the ground to serve as an eco-friendly (and cost-efficient) alternative to the staples.

2.  Use chopsticks to poke holes for planting seeds.  

Sure, you can use your finger, but if you (or any children helping you) don’t like dirty fingers, use a chopstick to poke holes for seeds. If you prefer an accurate measure of how deep you’re planting the seed, mark inches or centimeters off with a sharpie or pencil on your chopstick before you poke it into the soil.

2.  Use chopsticks to mark your rows. 

After planting your seeds, use the same chopstick as a row marker.  Simply write the name of your plant (again, a sharpie works great) on the chopstick, and you have a eco-friendly reminder of where you've planted the seeds.

               

These are just a few ideas. I'm sure I'll be discovering many other uses for chopsticks this planting season. 

How do you use chopsticks in the garden or outside of the kitchen?