It was a good day around the "farm." We sowed the last of our warm-weather summer vegetable seeds (although we held off on planting out our tomato starts). I think this weekend was the first time this year that our veggie garden started to feel like it was amounting to something. This unnaturally cold spring has really been getting us down, in terms of our gardening schedule and just generally. However, I realize that we are freakishly lucky that we've only had to deal with depressingly cool weather here. When you factor in tornadoes, massive hailstorms, hurricanes and whatever other craziness has been going on around the country, we really don't have much to complain about. So I am counting my blessings!
Today did turn out lovely, after a chilly start, and we made good use of the mile-high stack of empty Costco lettuce tubs in our basement as cloches for heat loving seeds.
After we took our our weed-infested strawberry bed earlier this spring, I thought we'd have to wait another year before replanting, but I couldn't resist the array of perfect little strawberry starts at a local nursery. What is summer without at least a few garden-fresh strawberries, I ask you? So five Quinault starts made it into my cart, and into a big pot in the garden. They're an everbearing variety, so I should get a smattering of delicious berries throughout the summer.
Pepper starts, too. My indoor-started seeds didn't germinate this year, so I sprung for two pony-packs of small, not-too-hot pepper varieties.
Speaking of seeds, things are progressing on that front, despite the cool weather.
And here's a gratuitous shot of The Biggest Rhubarb Plant Ever (T.B.R.P.E.). I haven't made use of it this year, because I'm trying to find rhubarb recipes that are low-ish in sugar. Not easy. Other than chutneys, which isn't what I had in mind. If I ever go missing, look for me under the rhubarb plant...that thing scares me a little.
Perhaps, The Astronomical Rhubarb Plant (T.A.R.P.), given it's the size of our big, blue Northwest-inspired flags.
ReplyDeleteThe current issue of Clean Eating has a section on rhubarb recipes. I'll check tonight to see if they have sweetner in them. I was reading it during the storms that passed through about 3:30AM. No hail this time - just straight line winds and heavy rain. I can deal with that.
ReplyDeleteThank you! I actually get Clean Eating, but my copy is sitting in a to-be-read pile. I'll have to pluck it out. I may make something strawberry-rhubarb...the presence of strawberries at least reduces the need for sugar. It's a shame that I have two huge rhubarb plants (I only photographed one) and haven't been using them this year!
ReplyDeleteOops! I was wrong. That's what I get for reading in the middle of the night during a thunderstorm. It was actually Veg Times. There is one recipe that has no sweetner in it whatsoever. It's an Indian lentil recipe with spinach and rhubarb. If you don't get it I can email you the recipe. There's also one for a rhubarb pineapple salsa that sounds interesting but it uses honey.
ReplyDeleteI don't get Veg Times at the moment, so if you have time to e-mail the recipe, that would be awesome. I do love Indian food. I did find that the previous issue of Clean Eating had a recipe for uncooked rhubarb compote that looked interesting.
ReplyDeleteI sent you a PDF file of the section on rhubarb. Fortunately our copy machine scans things into a PDF file which is then easy to email. Hope you find something good to do with your rhubarb. Would you believe I've never tasted it?
ReplyDeleteI got the recipe, thanks! My mom made rhubarb sauce when I was a kid (kind of had the consistency of chunky apple sauce). I've always made rhubarb crisp myself, but rhubarb generally takes a lot of sugar to make it "dessertlike." You'll often see strawberry-rhubarb pies and crisps, and the strawberries help reduce the need for sugar, but not eliminate it. I think savory recipes will be a good way to use a fraction of my two huge plants (they grow like weeds!).
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