Weekends are for fruits and flowers: Part 1 (Warning: PIC HEAVY)

vAs people have time to look at pretty pictures on the weekends (or will just ignore these posts because they have better things to do during the weekend...can't blame them!) I decided to post some recent pics of the garden as I don't think I share the prettier side often enough.

This is during a time when I had time and get my artsy pics on.  (Click to enlarge pics btw, I kept most of them at medium for easier loading, but they're obviously better when expanded)

Surprise! I left a daikon radish in the ground too long and it flowered!

 Unexpectedly pretty purple geranium-like looking flowers to me

 

 The everbearing strawberries have all been in full bloom and looking healthier than before.  Many are starting to bear fruit, but it will take a while before they go from this:

 ... to luscious and red.  This one looks like it's got a bonnet on and has fingers to its lips in thought.

 Even the mache has cute little flowers, tiny ones that I am sure hoverflies will like.

Some waxy broccoli holding onto a drop of water

Sweet, sweet sugar pea!  It's relatively hot, but I suppose for their cool steeple shaped flowers and nitrogen fixing properties even not get a good crop is fine (I started them a bit late too anyways)

Sunny mustard flowers. Look like little butterflies.

The salad burnet, which is doing AMAZINGLY well from the winter into this weather is flowering for me for the first time. Meaning: I need to cut it back hard and as I don't think I will be using this like a mad woman the flowers will probably have to go because it makes the leaves tough (like they sort of are now... probably a good idea to split this baby too.  It's big and beautiful!)

My happy columbine!  Love these unusual flowers!

 Closeup:  (each flower bud just prior to blooming looks like an alien space ship or a squid or octopus!  

A whole bunch of them together looks like a school of them swimming in an ocean!)


Finally, for this last part I leave you with a hyacinth bean just emerging:

Let us eat lettuce! Salud to the salad!

A while back my mother gave me a bunch of seeds that she thought were chard, then I realized when looking at them later they weren't and confronted her about this and she then said it was a Chinese vegetable of sorts, which after a while of talking with her I concluded that my mom is just a nut as usual. 

The seeds (sown under a raspberry plant) appeared to be lettuce like and after promising that inform readers of their fate this is what has sprung up in their place:

Looks like lettuce doesn't it? (Bleeds like lettuce too, you know that white sap that oozes when they're cut)

The only thing is, is that I have no clue what lettuce they are.  They were apparently 2 different lettuce varieties.  Obviously lettuce seeds are pretty standard tiny skinny football shaped things of varying shades of brown so if anyone is able to discern what is what here I'd appreciate it.  Both appear to be loose leaf lettuces, one I would not be surprised to be a generic black simpson and the other has light purpling about the leaves.

Here's the first type:

And now the second:

(closeup of purpling)

If you're a lettuce eater/grower/identifier, I'd appreciate any info!

On a similar note, husband and I made chirashi salad again with the plethora of greens that abounded in the garden!  In the basket is sorrel, salad burnet, siberian kale, garlic green, mache, mystery lettuces #1 and #2, mustard greens and Swiss chard.

Though not a "true" salad by some historical definitions where there are dozens of greens if not more, it was still quite delish with the pops of spicy of the mustard, the textures of the soft mache leaves/flowers (it was bolting now) to the ruffly kale, garlickiness of the... garlic and unexpected flavor of the chard.

It was my first year growing the Swiss chard and I was WEIRDED OUT by the saltiness of it.  Not unpleasant, just not expected.  I wonder if it really was as salty as I thought it was or if I simply note saltiness more than other people.  Other than dehydration, what might make chard more salty than usual I wonder? Large amounts of fertilizer (which I swear I didn't do)?

Garden Update: Plants bolting like greased lightning!

I didn't think the weather had gotten that nice, especially when I went away for a last minute trip for about a week, but over that time my tatsoi mustard decided to bolt when I wasn't looking:

It looked delicious, beautiful and rosette leafy when I left it, I made a salad from quite a few full heads before transplanting these guys before I left (to bolt, honestly) for eventual seed saving.  I still didn't expect the dramatic metamorphosis in the week I was gone.

They look great, and if they're like other mustards, will probably give me a plethora of seeds (ha, anyone seen the Three Amigos?) 

I wonder if my moving them might have stimulated bolting, or if one near 70 degree F day when I full-on gardened prior to my departure kicked them into bolting gear? Probably that one day, I don't think I've ever heard of transplanting to cause bolting.

In anticipation of the tatsoi mustards going to bolt, I planted kohlrabi seeds right next to the mustard base so that I'll have something to make up for mustard once it seeds and I have to cut it down.  Not sure if this will work well, but I figured I might as well give it a try.

Another plant that's bolted (and has been in that state for quite a while now) is the baby bok choi).  It's nice to see some flowers in this weather, and their spoonlike cupped leaves beneath the flowers are pretty dandy too.  They've been in flower for good time... I wonder when they'll seed.  I realized that I didn't eat the bok choy as often as I should have, but I think I hadn't prepared/research enough recipes.  Ah well, seeds for me.

My gargantuan garden to do list is 3/4 done (except I always keep thinking of things to add to it...) The biggest change was some of the planned garden layout.  This change is due greatly in part to my rampant strawberries.  The daughter plants/offshoots have been wild and I have not had time to move them/thin them properly, so either I should allow the beds to be primarily strawberries, thin the strawberries to plant seeds in the bed with them,  or I need to seed start and plant large enough seedlings in with the bed to be able to compete (terrible I know) with the strawberry plants.  I'm going with the latter and will just start some seeds on a nice sunny day outside and then plant them in the bed.  There would be no way a seed could find some sun and air in that mess.

Here is the new garden setup (click pic to see all the detail):

Cut and Come Again! Hail the regrowing vegetable!

You gotta love a vegetable that will take your scissor-y vengeance and reward you by saying, "HA! Look at me!"  and burst into song with disco thumping in the background:

"... I will survive
as long as I know how to grow again
I know I will stay alive
I've got all my life to live
I've got all my chlorophyll to give
and I'll survive
I will survive

Hey! Hey!"

Winter gardening is so exciting and adventurous feeling!  It makes me feel like some Swiss Alps Mountaineer Gardener!

Growing tomatoes in the fall/winter is adventurous if you don't have a greenhouse, but in all reality, there are some super hardy greens and plants that just happen to be rather frost tolerant (to an extent of course) and don't leave you in the cold in terms of growth or taste!

My husband is not a fan of bland lettuces, and we tend to like it spicy here when we're freezing are little toes off so we stick with variety of kales and mustards in our salads and cooking for a bit of kick to warm us up.

Some well known cool weather "cut and come again" greens/plants include:

-Arugula (too bitter for the man here.  Bah, he doesn't know what tough is! :)
-Various Mustards such as: mizuna, tatsoi, india, purple wave, etc. (it's a hardy family!)
-Greens considered weeds (dandelions, lamb's quarters/corn salad/mache, chicory)
-Chervil
-Pak choi (Chinese cabbage)
-Gourmet greens: escarole, endive, radicchio
-Swiss chards
-certain spinach varieties
-beet leaves
-radish leaves
-sorrel
-miner's lettuce
-Some varieties of cauliflower and broccoli (if you cut off the main flowerhead, smaller shoots can form heads off to the side)

Many of these plants are eaten young before they get too bitter or tough, though are still edible at a more mature state;  a little cooking is just needed to make them more palatable.

As a great amount are of these plants' consist of are leaves, it's highly suggested to foliar feed them every other week especially as you will be cutting them constantly and need to make up for the loss of energy producing chlorophyll filled cells you're taking from the plant.

It's best  not to go plucking mad when you harvest your greens because you don't want to end up pulling up the shallow roots.  So use some sharp cutting scissor rather than a machete because whacking your greens to pieces is not going to earn you any points when it comes to them growing back.  It's not brain surgery, but you'll want to cut your greens (if they are the loose leaf type) at lowest an end above the ground to ensure you don't cut the growing tip and then no more deliciousness!

Like anything, you can wear a good thing out and it's suggested for the lettuces (and we'll see about my kales and mustards) that you should re-seed every other week to ensure continual harvests.  If you are planning to grow a nice variety of plants and greens I suggest you grow them in their own separate areas so that when you do harvest you make it easier on yourself and able to insure that you cutting them at a good height for future harvests to grow.  Mixing spoon shaped leaves tatsoi with frilly kales for example would make this difficult.

Don't  be put off if you think it's too late to grow these plants outside.  Many of them are germinate quite well actually in cool weather and to further shoot down any excuses, there's always indoor windowbox gardening!

Helpful Links:
http://vegetablegardens.suite101.com/article.cfm/how_to_harvest_the_same_vegetable_multiple_times
 http://www.gardenwiseonline.ca/gw/sustainable-gardening/2005/05/01/quotcut-and-come-againquot-vegetables
 http://www.veggiegardeningtips.com/cut-and-come-again-leafy-greens/
 http://www.channel4.com/food/on-tv/jamie-oliver/jamie-at-home/matt-james-cut-and-come-again_p_1.html
 http://www.victoriananursery.co.uk/vegetable_plants/cauliflower_plant_cut_n_come_again/
 http://www.ehow.com/how_5137454_grow-lettuce-patio-container.html