It’s been rainy here, and the garden has gone feral. This afternoon I cut so much chard that the only place big enough to wash it all was my bathtub! It’s washed, and sitting outside in laundry baskets, waiting for morning when I’ll have time to cut, blanch, bag-and-seal and freeze it all. I hope I can get it all done before my nice cleaning person comes … SO much chard …
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Last night we had a perfect dinner in the garden. It was a beautiful day — sunny and warm with those big blue skies for which the state is famous. My friend Jim Fergus has been here for the past few days and so I invited Bill and Maryanne to join us for dinner in my backyard. I miss cooking and miss having people over. And so it was lovely to have a normal dinner in the back garden — the daisies are starting to bloom, as are the iris, the columbines and the pink shrub roses I planted last…
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I transplanted the tomatoes into the garden this afternoon … they’re cozy in their wall o’water cones as are the zucchini, some of the cucumbers, and the eggplants. The peppers are on their own, and I hope they’ll be okay — the temperatures have been in the mid-fifties during the day with intermittent rain, and down into the forties at night. The sides of the cucumber peat pots were growing little tiny oyster mushrooms on them. Interesting. But we’ve had lots of lovely soft rain, perfect rain for transplants, and it’s supposed to keep up for about the next ten…
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A couple of months ago, I ordered two Tess of the D’Urbervilles bare root rosebushes from White Flower Farm. They kindly sent me a note that they couldn’t guarantee them as my zone is too cold, but between global warming, and planting them on the south side of my house, in the tropical perennial bed, well, I think they’ll be fine. They look lovely in the photos, bushy dark-pink roses which should bloom continually and will make a nice contrast to the ancient and wonderful white rugosa roses that were here when I moved in. I’ve also planted a couple…
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The cold frames finally got a real tryout — the weather went cold again on us this week. Last night the temps went down into the mid-thirties, and this morning it was still a balmy forty-five degrees inside the cold frame. Hooray! They work! No blogging this week. My Dad is coming for a visit from Europe. I haven’t seen him in many years, so I’m a little nervous, but I’m hoping we’ll have a nice visit. I just wish the weather would clear up again so we can do some hiking … Anyhow, back next week …
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Here they are, the great cold frames I built for my garden. As you can see, Owen thinks they’re swell, too. The interesting part was that I’m not really much of a carpenter. I have a few skills, and my own power tools, but I only had about half a plan when I started. I knew how big I wanted the rectangles that form the front of the frames to be, and then it got a little tricky fitting the back sides up under this little wooden lip along the side of the house. Now, as everyone knows, I miss…
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So this morning, I wandered across the back yard and pulled up a medium-sized spinach plant (one that was crowding several others), and a spring onion. Then back inside for a little omelette — I don’t want to sound like one of those Alice Waters/Richard Olney cranks, but I have to say, growing my own produce has entirely changed my cooking. All that emphasis on freshness, and not mucking with the flavor of the ingredients — it makes much more sense when you’ve got produce so fresh that it was growing two minutes ago. (For instance, the French recipe for…
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Ah, The Kentucky Derby. When we were little kids, our parents belonged to a not-terribly-fancy Hunt Club in northern Illinois. Admitting that I come from people who foxhunted is, in the circles in which I travel as an adult, sort of like saying we wore hoop skirts or held slaves. Stange, exotic and totally not PC. (But if I was to take up riding seriously again, it’s the only thing I’d be interested in pursuing — hunting is fun. I once interviewed an infamous Himalayan climber, who originally hails from a working-class family in Yorkshire, and who was embarassed nearly…
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Spring is three to four weeks early this year, and it’s a little unsettling. My apple trees are on the verge of bloom, and the lilacs aren’t far behind. I gave a party last year for Patrick’s girlfriend on her birthday, which is the end of May, and I have photos of the lilacs in bloom. It’s not yet the end of April. My veggies are all coming up just fine, and it looks (knock wood) like my premature planting wasn’t so premature after all this year. I’ve started bringing the tomatoes and peppers up in the daytime and putting…
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My friend Gary Short was here this weekend. He’s touring around the west for his wonderful new book of poems: Ten Moons and Thirteen Horses. We had a great weekend, but come Monday morning, I find myself with that sloggy feeling one gets after a weekend of dinner parties. It was great fun, but there was a lot of food, and a lot of wine, and much good talk … but even after coming back from the gym I had that ooh-I-overdid-it feeling. So what’s the cure? Weed soup, of course. I was outside this morning checking the garden beds…