symphony of greens

this is a dedication to all of the salad greens out there who fill our plates & warm our tummies. you make gardeners & farmers alike so happy & your harvest is plentiful. we thank you for your abundance & ease of growing.

i am a personal fan of the bounty of greens growing in our front yard garden. when we plan our garden, i use every bit of my restraint as to not purchase every variety or packet of seeds. this year we settled for only four varieties, although i would have been absolutely content to fill our entire beds with the goodness of greens.

one variety of huge success in our garden is the "encore" lettuce mix from johnny's catalogue. this mix includes green & red oakleaf, green & red romaine, and bibb among a few others. we simply scattered the seeds on top of the soil & watered. within a month we had an abundance of fresh greens perfect for light salads.

of course, a garden is not complete without kale. i am a serious believer in kale. we start our red russian kale from seed & then transplanted it into our beds very early in the season. last year we even over-wintered some of our plants. once the snow melted we were harvesting our kale & preparing wilty greens & kale chips.

spinach is another must for the perfect spring salad. our red cardinal spinach from johnny's catalogue is the tastiest when its leaves are harvested early & paired with ripe strawberries. many gardeners claim to have difficulty growing spinach. thankfully i have not experienced this, but i have noticed that the germination rates & maturity are much slower than other greens. the advice i give is to plant early so your plant has time to grow before the summer's heat sets in.

& as always, a mesculin mix is necessary. the beautiful thing about our mix, the "ovation" greens mix from johnny's, is you can plant it almost anywhere & it will grow abundantly. perfect for containers or beds, this mix packs a spicy punch & will rock any salad lover's world.

so get out there & scatter some of this goodness in your garden.