Week Four

This will be a short one – not only is the laptop still dead (resurrection pending), but my phone is swelling up and threatening to explode. It keeps rebooting…

This week we used sorcery fire to repell a horrendous invasion of potato beetle larvae, planted kohlrabi, trellised tomatoes plants up, hay mulched, and hosted family.

Grandma and Grandpa Carlson drafted in the battle for the potatoes

The garden is looking lovely overall (if you skip the warzone potato rows), (and the weed row where the beets are supposed to be).

Kristin asks, “Why is it so cloudy all the time?” And also,

Kristin says:

Week 4 box

Salad mix – this is the last of the salad for awhile..

Purslane –

“is packed with vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants and has the highest Omega-3 content of any leafy green.” It’s also an abundant weed in the garden. It doesn’t seem threatening and isn’t useless like bindweed and quack grass so we let it grow. I like it raw. Here’s some inspiration:

http://www.thegardenofeating.org/2014/08/purslane.html?m=1

Basil – mostly mammoth leaf basil.

Make some pesto!

Onions – yup.

Garlic scapes – Sleepy Root Farm let us harvest these from their considerably larger garlic patch. Oh the things you could do! You can make garlic scape pesto by food processing the following

1 cup garlic scapes, sliced crosswise (about 10 to 12 scapes)
¼ cup raw sunflower seeds
½ cup extra virgin olive oil
¼ cup Parmesan cheese
½ cup basil leaves
Juice of one lemon

You can cut them into short segments that could be stir fried. Mince them up for a creamy garlic dip or for a salad dressing. Use as a garlic bulb substitute in your recipes. Turn them into fridge pickles.

Zucchini and summer squash – cute when they are young. Sautéed with garlic scapes?

Peas – sugar snap and the flat podded snow peas that are preferred for stir frying.