A Brief Update

written by Yvonne

Tom and I have been quite busy the last few weeks, although not with the garden.  Luckily there hasn't been much to tend to - just mindful watering in the dark mornings, waiting for the seeds to germinate and watch what happens.  Here's a brief showing of what things look like at the moment.

Tom planted five different varieties of lettuce.  Here is one itty bitty seed that has broken ground.

This is another variety of lettuce popping up as well.

Collards are doing well.  Tom thinned them out this weekend so they aren't so clumped together.

 

Sweet peas working their way up the cages.

Spinach!

We planted a bunch of kale, but only 3 or 4 have come up so far. Tom bought some NC kale seed from Asheville over the weekend, so maybe we'll have more than these few throughout the winter.

Garlic, which will take its time over the fall and winter, and (according to our sources) be ready to yield in late spring.

Leeks (or possibly grass). No, it's leeks.

Carrots. We have two big ones, and Tom's replanting under the mulch was successful, so little baby carrots can be seen coming up in the background.

Collards close-up!

Bull's blood beets (an heirloom variety).

Turnip patch #2, ready to be thinned out!

Parsley left over from this summer.

Turnip patch numero uno.  Boy are these guys fast growing.  These are in box #3 and we planted about this many more at a later time in box #1.

Here is the actually turnip peeking out of the ground.  It's a good thing Food Network Magazine had several recipes that included turnips this month! This variety is a small, smooth all-white Japanese variety that's quite delicious.

Here I'm cutting some turnip greens to cook for dinner last Friday night.  Back in the Spring I bought a cook book called "Greens, Glorious Greens!" After consulting it, Tom found a recipe for turnip greens and potatoes. You start by blanching the turnip greens to get rid of the bitterness, then toss them with cooked, diced potatoes and garlic in olive oil and let all that cook for about 20 minutes.  Neither of us had ever eaten turnip greens so we didn't know what to expect.  We thought they would be bitter but boy were we wrong.  They are DELICIOUS!  The closest thing to compare them to is spinach. Yum.