Lazy summer days in the garden

It has been a lazy summer, we are staying mostly home and we are enjoying our garden as much as we can. I try to find a little time to work on the garden in the evening after work and after the little one goes to bed.

We are harvesting beautiful and delicious tomatoes. For lunch I made myself a fresh tomato salad with basil just a little bit of olive oil. It was perfect. 

Let me show you in pictures how days are here in our Philadelphia backyard. 

Tomatoes

Pretty zinnias

Giant sunflowers

We had a lot of concord grapes

A mix in our planters

Hollihocks

Bird bath and a garden fairy

Garden fairy 

The last of our peaches. We had so much I wasn't ready. I mostly ate them fresh and baked a couple crumbles ( mixed with blackberries ... delicious )

What about you ?

What is happening in your gardens ?

deep greens

I hope you all had a great weekend, and if you are in the US, maybe you even enjoyed an extra long one. It's been a full week here, and then I just threw my back out (again!) so I'm a bit laid up. I didn't think I would make it here on Tend this week, but after dinner tonight I felt inspired to share my favorite way to eat kale (and my apologies ahead of time if I am starting to seem kale obsessed, haha).

I first learned about massaged greens from a friend of mine who is a caterer. I thought it sounded so fancy, and then smiled at how simple it was. I have been making my own massaged kale salads ever since, and love to sprinkle them with home made vinaigrette. It's my favorite way to enjoy kale, and I could eat it this way everyday, more than once a day.

If I'm including softer greens, like cilantro, I add them after massaging

 If you have never had massaged greens, it's a nice way to soften tougher and more bitter greens, and the leaves become infused with the flavors of the oil that you choose. I particularly love high quality olive oils, but sesame oil is a real treat as well. Simply chop your fresh greens into bite sized pieces, pour a drizzle or so of oil over them, and then basically squish firmly, or "massage" the oil into the greens with your hand. The greens will turn a very deep, vivid green color and will be soft and sort of wilty in appearance. You can then eat them as is, or add dressing or other toppings.

Garbanzo beans always make a delicious, protein rich salad topping

For my vinaigrette I just eyeball the liquids straight into the jar and mix to my taste. Everyone loves this dressing when they try it, and then are so impressed to learn it's home made. And then I can't help but feel like I cheated a little, since it's so very simple. My niece loves it so much, she recently asked for a big jar of it for her next birthday :) Sweet girl.

 Here is an attempt at rough measurements, which you will want to adjust to your taste. Makes about 2 cups of dressing:

2 cloves of fresh garlic, finely chopped
1 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/2 - 3/4 cup apple cider vinegar (start with the lesser and add to taste)
1/4 cup (or so) tamari 

I use a deep spoon to stir well and serve with.

Now serve yourself some deep greens and enjoy!

thinning out & a salad

am i the only one who hates thinning out seedlings? all i can think is that these little babies that i'm trimming could have the potential to grow into full sized plants, producing delicious veggies or beautiful flowers or herbs. (i actually found myself so incapable of thinning my tomatoes that i ended up transplanting them all into their own little pots and i'm now saddled with about 100 tomato seedlings! i have some very lucky friends and neighbors...)

last night i found myself desperately needing to thin out my radishes and arugula if i wanted any of them to grow to their full potential. so thin i did. but those little greens that i pulled out were not destined for the compost. instead, they headed straight for the salad bowl for a light dinner. if i were feeling fancy, i'd call it a microgreen salad.

toss some mini arugula and radish greens (or whatever you have, baby chard or kale would be delicious too) with sunflower seeds, some chopped gouda (chevre would have been delicious, but this was all i had on hand) and a little balsamic vinaigrette. some of the radish seedlings had begun to produce tiny fruits, so i washed those off and sprinkled them on top. delicious.

no seedling left behind!

Pink salad

Recently I made put together this salad for a dinner gathering with friends. Now that it's too hot for lettuces, I used beets, kohlrabi and purple onions from our garden. Once you add beets to a recipe, everything it touches turns a beautiful ruby pink. The other day I made another salad using beets, with couscous and chick peas. I like having a cold salad ready to eat in the summertime, and should make more of them.

Pink salad

* 2-4 beets, peeled

* 6-8 kohlrabi, peeled, fibrous parts removed

* 1 small purple onion

* 1-2 small lemons, juice only

* agave nectar, or sweetener of your choice

* fresh salt and pepper

* fresh herbs of your choice, if desired

Combine the dressing ingredients in a measuring cup, gauging the amounts to suit your taste. Cut the onion very finely and add to the bowl. Next, grate the kohlrabi over top. Pour the dressing in and stir. Then grate the beets into the bowl, season with fresh herbs, salt and pepper, and stir all together. 

This is so simple it's hardly a recipe. The only thing is the time it takes to grate the vegetables. As I was typing this post, I just thought perhaps sliced cucumbers would go nicely in this salad too. And oh, if you're wondering about the beet greens in the top photo, they dressed up some flower bouquets!

Before you go, will you share one of your favorite summer salads with us?

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.

homegrown spring salad

this spring i am finding that the garden is allowing me to slow down just a bit more. although the tasks of the garden may seem trivial- planting, watering, weeding, harvesting, preparing- they are becoming a necessary part of unwinding at the end of a long day. with this in mind, i am celebrating the smallest moments of preparing a homegrown spring salad from our garden.

the harvesting of edible flowers

gathering of greens

washing the dirt from our radishes

admiring earth's bounty

adding some broccoli sprouts for crunch


& enjoying each bite

i hope you, too, will enjoy the slowness of the garden to table.