The Boy Discovers Fresh-Picked Peas

I've spent the last few weeks insisting that The Boy pick, shell, and eat the sweet green peas that are now ready in the garden. I've put up with grumbling, scowls, stamping of feet even. But despite these, I've continued to insist steadfastly.

My hope was to witness, in the fullness of time, that spark of awareness of the natural deliciousness of these viney vegetables. 

My efforts paid off. 

The Boy now picks, shells and eats with enthusiasm! I'm quite pleased with myself (and him).

Of course, his favourite way to eat the peas is right out of the freshly-picked pods. That happens to be my favourite way too.

My second favourite way is to sprinkle a generous handful on green salads. He's not so sure about that.

But I think it's just yummy.

How 'bout you? Do you eat fresh-picked peas? What's your favourite way to have them?

♥M

This heritage pea variety is Alaska (a.k.a. Earliest of All).

Parsnips Resurrected

Do you enjoy an inadvertent, accidental, slap-happy discovery as much as I do? I bet you do.

A couple years ago I ate my first parsnip. I'd never eaten this white carrot-like root before and my first exposure was a very sweet experience. If memory serves, I was at a potluck dinner. As with most potlucks, the foods were many, varied, and tasty to be sure. But my memory retains only one. A freshly picked, roasted root vegetable medley of carrot, sweet potato, turnip, parsnip with a touch of cloves, grown and baked by a friend's hands. It sounds yummy, and indeed it was. To my mind, it was the best part of the entire meal (including dessert) and when I asked whilst brandishing a forkful: "What are these white hunks of deliciousness?", I was informed that they were parsnips. Aaaaah yes! The fabled parsnip. The root whose name conjures up something decidedly inedible. Well... if you haven't yet tried them, let me assure you. Don't let the name fool you. They are much much tastier than they sound.

Last year, I just had to plant some. So we did. We planted several. In fact, we planted more than several. And, of course, we didn't eat them all nor did we harvest them all. We "forgot" a bunch in the ground... But they were having none of it. This spring I noticed little green shoots popping up from where they'd been last year. A few days ago my curiosity got the best of me. I needed to see what was underneath those shoots. Well, to my surprise there were gigantic (one specimen easily serves the three of us), fresh, sweet, scrummy parsnips buried 'neath the soil. Which just goes to show: it's impossible to ignore your roots...

I had no clue parsnips were biennial. But as I've discovered, they are! They survived our mild winter and came back for a second season. I'm so glad they did. More delicious treats for me!

Does anyone else have experience resurrecting parsnips?

♥M

FYI:  Go HERE to learn how to grow your own parsnips. Notice the site labels them as a "bienniel grown as an annual". I think we should be encouraged to grow them as both if we can, and take full advantage of this fresh, home-grown produce.

Mother Nature Made Me (with a little help from Michele...)

Spent some long-overdue time in the garden this past weekend! After several hours of work on both Saturday and Sunday, I'm happy to see the beast showing signs of taming.

So the garden story... When Lo and I took possession of our little house in 2004, there was one tiny flower bed in the back yard and a few shrubs barely subsisting in the front yard.

Not no more.

Now, the front yard is completely covered in garden. The back yard is lined with deep beds all around the perimeter. We have a vegetable plot. We have a patio (which we installed) covered by a gorgeous pergola (designed and built by Lo), and a rock garden which arose organically (oh the garden humour...) when we dug out a huge pile of grass to build the patio, and then were too lazy to move the pile. Yeah...

The result? A LOT of garden. Which I sort of neglected last year...

Despite the neglect, here's what keeps it all going... a little something I like to call "compost".

I LOVE COMPOST. I'm over-the-moon with my louvered compost bins: a gift from Lo (which he built using this template as a guide). I'm overjoyed to build the compost pile. I heart turning the compost pile. I am delighted to throw my kitchen scraps and garden trimmings on the compost pile. And I cannot cannot wait to harvest the compost from the compost pile.

Yes baby. That is the stuff.

So we harvested the compost this weekend! It never ceases to amaze me what kind of tricks Mother Nature has up her sleeve. LOOK AT THIS STUFF. It's beautiful. It's glorious. It's nothing short of magical. I LOVE IT. I want to roll in it all day.

We produce enough compost in our bins to keep our little garden quite happy. Every spring, I top-dress the soil around each plant with fresh compost.

And they love it just as much as I do.

The vegetable plot gets its fair share of compost as well, don't worry.

Funny story about these broccoli seedlings below.

In my utter laziness last fall, I left a broccoli plant in the garden and it flowered and went to seed. No joke, I have about 200 broccoli seedlings growing like weeds in that corner of the plot this spring. Certainly we eat broccoli. We love broccoli. But 200 plants worth? No. Eight plants worth? Yes. I'm still wondering what to do with the remaining 192 seedlings that I won't use. Also, I don't really know if they're going to look anything like the broccoli we know and love, but it's worth a shot. It's a horticultural experiment, don't you know.

Yes, it was a busy weekend and there's still much work left to be done. It's just a matter of when... Hmm, quandary.

You have a great day now. Maybe I'll be back with a craft on Wednesday... Hey, there's a plan, eh?

P.S. If you'd like to see more lovely gardens, stop by Amy's Blogger's Garden Tour!