Promising summer fruits, blackberries, peaches and for now strawberries !

Our garden enjoyed the last heavy rain we had here in Philadelphia. The kale is so happy.

The last few weeks we have been struggling with a sick chicken, an eye infection. I had to give all of them some antibiotics. It seems that she is doing good now, but her eye is still closed. I will apply some antibiotic ointment on her eye. Having chickens can seem tempting and fun. It is, but it's also a lot of work. If anyone has suggestion to help my chicken. Thanks !

This week I wanted to share what's happening in our backyard. 

Clematis is in bloom

Some promising blackberries

The first strawberries ! I love strawberries.

I started to add some links in our resources. Check it out !

The strawberry roll looks delicious and amazing...

The peach tree is so happy ! So many peaches ... 

Check the resources I shared a peach salad recipe that I will with no doubt try.

yarrow, cosmos ...

The lilies bloom a little bit like fireworks, first it's all the yellow ones, then I forgot how they come but each color bloom at a different time.

Lettuce and pansies.

What is new in your gardens ? 

overwintering kale & a spring soup recipe

as my husband & i were working in the garden earlier this month, we were surprised to find overwintered kale & spinach! what a treat!

overwintering is, simply put, lasting through winter. we planted our spinach & kale in our fall garden. we've overwintered swiss chard & kale before, but we were surprised to find these garden goodies in the spring after such a harsh winter. to overwinter greens, we usually heavily mulch the base of the plant in late fall with straw mulch or dried leaves.

i harvested fresh kale from the garden one morning for a delicious crockpot soup i had in mind that evening. it was delicious & full of flavor!

if you don't have kale growing in your garden right now, you can find it at the farmers' market in big bunches. fill up your market basket & come on home to make this soup recipe -

  creamy crockpot lemon, chicken & kale soup. 

we paired this soup with a sweet potato for dinner, but a nice hunk of bread would be nice. you could also make this soup vegetarian with vegetable broth & white northern beans. enjoy!

- natalie

a bit of spring

after all that snow and endless winter (it is snowing again now, ahem), we had a few glorious spring days this past weekend and i did not squander that time. saturday afternoon, we held our annual community garden spring clean up. even though there wasn't much to clean up (we usually use this time to weed the paths between plots and, well, there just aren't any weeds yet!), it was great to be outside and reconnect with my gardening neighbors. one of the new gardeners even gifted me some of his excess kale starts when i mentioned that i never got around to starting my kale seeds indoors. i wrote a few years ago (a very long post) about why i love community gardening so much and continue to participate even though i now have enough space at my home for my gardens.

monday evening, i began clearing off the leaf mulch blankets that had been keeping my gardens warm and protected from the cold and snow over the winter. since i knew there was more cold weather in the forecast for this week, i didn't get very far, but it felt good to get my hands in the dirt. i also prepared one of my raised beds for planting by adding about 10 gallons of homemade compost and turning the soil. i got those kale starts right in the ground (although, some hungry squirrel seems to have been snacking on the leaves this week!).

even though spring is still just beginning here, i'm so glad i snagged the chance to get my hands dirty and be outside. such a necessary reprieve from this very long winter. hope you all get some planting or at least time outside this weekend!

dehydrated kale smoothies

well friends, still not much in the way of spring updates here in minneapolis. currently we are being barraged with more and more snow...but i'll stop with the depressing weather reports already! in fact, i did discover some perennials trying their hardest to peek out from under the bits of remaining snow and their thick winter blanket of leaf mulch. so far i've spotted some borage, french sorrel, garlic chives, tulips, and just the teeniest bit of rhubarb showing their defiance against this cruel joke of a spring we're having.

but onward, right? this is essentially a post that i never got around to writing and sharing here last summer, so i'm revisiting it now. i'm talking about dehydrated kale. while natalie's post of her first harvest of greens left my mouth watering, i know i'm months away from that bounty here (i haven't even started my kale seeds yet! for shame!) so i'm savoring my dehydrated kale from last season.

maybe some of you, even those kale enthusiasts out there (of which i'm sure there are many) are thinking dehydrated kale? i thought the same thing until last summer when i was drowning in my abundant kale harvest and was looking for some other ways to preserve it all in addition to the standard blanching and freezing that i've always done. i was chatting with the master gardeners at my local farmers market (a wonderful resource that i'd highly recommend seeking out for any and all gardening questions if you have them in your area) and one of them suggested dehydrating. i could easily rehydrate later to put in soups, stews, smoothies and more. which is exactly what i've been doing all winter long.

first, a few tips on dehydrating kale.

• cut out the stems since they hold much more moisture than the leaves and it will not dehydrate evenly if you try to do it all together (you can compost the stems, or i used them in vegetable juices!).
• once you've removed the stems, chop the leaves into small pieces, but don't worry about the pieces being too big; you can crumble them into smaller flakes once they're dehydrated.
• i used a dehydrator (set at 125 degrees for about 9 hours) but you could also use your oven on a very low temp if you don't have one (sorry, i don't have experience dehydrating in an oven, but i'm sure you can find tips on this on the internet)
• once the leaves are fully dehydrated, crumble them into whatever size flakes you want (you could even grind them into a powder!) and store in a glass jar or other container until you're ready to use them.

and now...for the delicious smoothie! you could pretty much just add a handful of these flakes to whatever your favorite smoothie recipe is (you can really barely taste the kale so don't worry about messing with the flavor), but here's what i did. one other quick note: we don't buy a lot of juice in our house, so i usually just use whatever i have on hand. in this case, it was a mixed berry, but really orange, apple, or even mango would be delicious too!

banana blueberry kale smoothie
makes two 1.5 cup smoothies

1 ripe banana
1/2 cup frozen blueberries
1 cup frozen peaches
1/4 cup dehydrated kale flakes
1 cup mixed berry juice
1/2 cup oat milk (or whatever nondairy/dairy milk you have on hand. plain yogurt would work too)

put all ingredients in a blender and go to town! enjoy your smoothie and dream of summer.

ps: i HATE plastic and would normally not be using these straws, but someone gifted us a big bag of them, so we work our way through them slowly. once they're gone, i'd really like to get a couple of these.

leafy greens harvest & a recipe

this week we harvested our first bunch of kale & swiss chard of the season! there isn't anything much better than homegrown greens freshly harvested from the garden right after a long winter season.

harvesting fresh vegetables from our garden allows me to get a little more creative in the kitchen & with our meal plan. on tuesday evening, i meal planned a brussels sprouts side dish to accompany our mushroom & tomato stew. with a bounty of leafy greens right outside our door, i decided to add a mix of kale & swiss chard to the sprouts.

 with a pinch of salt, a drizzle of olive oil & a helping of minced garlic, my bit of experimenting in the kitchen turned out delicious. i want to share my recipe with you for a healthy green dish!

leafy greens & brussels sprouts saute

serves 4

 1 1/2 cups brussels sprouts, chopped in half

1 medium yellow onion, diced

1 cup kale, chopped & tightly packed

1 cup swiss chard, chopped & tightly packed

olive oil

salt & pepper to taste

in a cast iron skillet or nonstick pan, drizzle olive oil. allow to warm up just a bit until the oil starts to sizzle. add onions & brussels sprouts. cook on medium high heat for 8 to 10 minutes until brussels sprouts are tender. add swiss chard & kale. cook for an additional 4 minutes or so on medium heat until leaves are slightly wilted. add minced garlic & cook for another minute. salt & pepper to taste.

enjoy as a side dish or with beans as a main dish.

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as we enter into the season of bountiful leafy greens, i would love to hear your recipes for creatively adding greens to your meals! please share your ideas with us!

weekend garden notes

my garden has been a bit neglected lately.  i was starting to think that i wouldn't even have the energy to get my garlic in (and i was trying to convince myself that i was okay with that).  this weekend we continued to have unseasonably warm weather and i forced myself to head over to my community garden to harvest my potatoes.  it was a bit disappointing (especially after i realized that i harvested fewer potatoes that i had planted in the first place!), but they will still be delicious.  i planted all blue, german butterball, and rose finn apple.  this year i tried a potato tower method, which was clearly not very successful.  i think a few of my problems were that my towers were too big around (about 3 feet in diameter) and i didn't keep them watered well enough.  if i try this again next year, i will definitely make them smaller.  what's your favorite way to plant potatoes?

i also managed to get my garlic in, which i know i will be really happy about come summer.  since i wasn't sure i was going to plant any, i hadn't purchased any new seed garlic.  i just used the garlic i grew this summer- german extra hardy and georgian fire.  i planted cloves from the largest bulbs and covered them with a pile of leaves, since i didn't have any hay or straw. 

our kale is also still going strong, and now that whatever little bugs were munching on it all summer are gone, maybe we can actually enjoy some of it.  after ignoring my garden for the last two months or so, it felt so fulfilling to get in one last garden day before winter sets in.

kale

i adore kale.
i can honestly say it is one of my favorite vegetables.
i enjoy red russian, and curly but i have a extra fondness for dinosaur or lacianato kale.
i love it's blue-green color and it's towering stature in the garden.
i used to always cook kale but was once at a picnic where a friend had brought a raw kale salad that was absolutely delicious.
i could not stop eating it to the point that i was a bit embarrassed after the third helping.
of course i jumped at the offering of bringing home the leftovers that night and found that it tasted even better the next day.
i have since altered the recipe to our liking.

kale salad
1 large bunch kale rinsed, de-stemmed and chopped up fine (curly or lacianato)
2 or 3 carrots shredded
1 red pepper diced
1 cup sliced almonds

dressing
3/4 cup olive oil
1 small shallot minced
3 tbs fresh ginger root, peeled then minced
1 clove garlic sliced
3 tbs fresh lime juice
2 tbs rice wine vinegar
2 tbs toasted sesame oil
3 tbs chopped cilantro
zest of 1 lime
black pepper and salt to taste


combine ingredients and dress.
it tastes best if it can sit for an hour before eating
but i have been impatient and have also enjoyed it right away.

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.