How to Store Freshly Harvested Lettuce

I found a nifty little tutorial on how to store the lettuce I harvest from my garden. You can read it here from Pinch My Salt. It definitely works. 

First I put the fresh lettuce in a big bowl of cold water, and then rinse each leaf individually after taking it out of the bowl.

Beautiful! I love all the colors that come out of my garden.

I spin it in my handy salad spinner, which I use every day now. Ours is from Oxo, and it works great.

And then as the blog recommended, I wrap the lettuce in a paper towel and put it in a Zip-loc bag.

So far, this has resulted in crisp lettuce that lasts several days, which is nice, because I can make a big harvest of lettuce and prep it for several days worth of lunches.

Spring Has Sprung!

One of the best things about buying a house that had landscaping already finished, at least in part of the yard, is that every couple of weeks in the summer, new flowers pop up. I love it! Here's a glimpse of the colors gracing my yard.

Spots on My Chard: Not Sure I Like the Answer Why

Yesterday my chard looked like this, beautiful:

And now my chard looks like this, covered in brown spots, seemingly overnight ...

A quick search has uncovered the reason may be due to leaf miners. Which are disgusting. They are small grey flies, and they are "truly one of the grossest" garden pests, according to one writer. They literally lay eggs, which hatch, and the maggots burrow between the leaves of the plant.

Yes. Gross.

Keeping the Dog Out of the Garden

My dog Reese loves our new yard. We moved into our home about a year ago, and he just loves being outside while I garden.

We had to come up with a way that he would not actually try to garden with me though, so we bought decorative wooden garden fencing from Lowe's, I believe, and spray painted them white.

Now, my chihuahua can easily jump over them, but for some reason, most of the time, he doesn't.

Here's Reese saying hi from the right side of the fence!

Inspired by ... New Ways to Eat Rhubarb

Did someone say margarita? Yup, that's right, apparently rhubarb can be pureed and added to a margarita or to a smoothie.

It can also be roasted and sprinkled with sugar then added to salad greens (which I have plenty of!). Or added to salsa.

So says this blog from the Smithsonian Magazine on Five Ways to Eat Rhubarb, my inspiration for the week.

Why? Well, while according to a few sources, I can't eat a lot of my rhubarb plant this year in its second year, I still plan on harvesting some of it. And it's getting big!

This picture of my rhubarb was taken a couple weeks ago.
It's starting to get very tall.

A Lovely View While I Write

Here's my view while I blog this wonderful morning on Memorial Day weekend!

Zucchini Muffins in Parchment Paper Baking Cups

Love my zucchini muffins. I used up the rest of my shredded zucchini from last summer's harvest the other day to contribute to my work's breakfast potluck.

I used the recipe I outlined in this blog post and added golden raisins. I wish I had had walnuts to throw in because I love the crunch of nuts in muffins.

First Harvest Results in a Lovely Salad with Blueberries and Yellow Cherry Tomatoes

Growing lots of lettuce!

When I discovered my spinach had bolted, I decided to start harvesting my other lettuce for a salad. It turned out really well.

I took some red sails lettuce, some romaine, buttercrunch and a few pieces of kale. Added some blueberries and some yellow tomatoes for a deliciously sweet and fresh salad.

Yum!

An assortment of fresh garden greens!

Added blueberries and some yellow tomatoes. Delicious!

Hello Bolting Spinach

My spinach has bolted. As an amateur gardener, I was not expecting this to happen so quickly. Blame my ignorance. I planted my spinach probably four weeks ago now, before two snowstorms hit. And it hadn't got that big yet. (I guess I could have planted it earlier?) We didn't actually have that many hot days - just a few.

I discovered in my daily check of my garden yesterday that it had bolted, or gone to seed. So because I had company and we were having a nice grilled meal, I decided to harvest the spinach right away for a salad. Otherwise, as I've read, the spinach becomes bitter. I still have two spinach plants remaining, but I'm keeping a close eye on them.

Bolting spinach

Harvesting the bolting spinach

Why Does My Arugula Have Holes?

I have five arugula plants. Every single arugula plant looks like someone took a pin and poked holes in it.

I did a quick search on one of the best resources for gardening out there, and found that the likely culprit is flea beetles. 

Arugula with holes in it

Inspired by … Edible Landscaping

Starting small, with deck planters of lettuce
and herbs. I also have lettuce in smaller pots
on our table on the deck, and a bigger pot on
the ground with kale.

I have fallen in love with the idea of using edibles to landscape. Filling my deck with plants we can eat just seems like a double bonus: Nice greenery to look at and fresh greens and herbs to add to salads all summer long.

I enjoy browsing the web and looking at beautiful pictures of yards that my yard only aspires to be.

Here are a few of the recent articles and photos I’ve been inspired by:

• Houzz.com’s Edible Garden
• Feast Your Eyes on Edible Gardens – Houzz.com
• 7 Edible Garden Ideas – Sunset
• Make an Edible Garden Border – Sunset
• Growing Vegetables in Pots and Planters – Gardeners Supply blog

Venison Meatballs, Redux

I have made venison meatballs a handful of times. This last time, I was able to reduce the gamey taste and paired them with sweet potatoes, which was a great idea.

Here's the recipe I use.

To reduce the gamey taste, I let the meat defrost entirely and drained it before mixing it with the rice and onion. It's not a pleasant activity - draining blood from raw meat - but does reduce the gamey taste considerably.

Building My Defenses Against Pests, Naturally

In my second year of gardening, I'm super-paranoid that my garden is going to get taken over by pests of all stripes. The horror stories I read online have entire gardens getting swallowed whole by a monster swarm of something - slugs, beetles, whatever.

Last year I had very little issue with pests in my garden, which is lucky because I had no idea what I was doing. I've read a lot since then and of course learned from the issues I did have last year.

While my gardening is not strictly organic, I have no desire to put pesticides on the plants I plan to put in my mouth. I also respect the animals - including my dog - that may venture into the garden from time to time.

What surprised me in my reading was that certain plants actually can act like pesticides without the chemicals. Plants like garlic, onion, sage, mint and others have a stronger smell and may mask the smell of other plants that attract the insects we do not want to attract to our gardens. Certain flowers are recommended as well. I plan to plant some of those as well right next to my garden.

There are also plants that attract the right kind of insects to your garden, but I haven't gotten that far yet. Baby steps.

I started with sage and mint.

This weekend I planted both. I planted the mint in containers, set in two places in the garden.

Water Drops Like Diamonds

After watering my garden by hand this weekend, I noticed what looked like a diamond on one of the kale leaves. It was a water drop. The water just beads up on the rougher texture of kale. I thought it was beautiful.

So I had to take a picture:

Four Herbs in One Planter

This weekend I planted my deck herbs – I put four plants in one rail planter. I followed a similar setup to when I planted my mesclun mix a couple of weeks ago. I love the idea of being able to fill my deck with edible color.

Last year I had a hard time with herbs. My basil did well, but everything else kind of petered out by the end of the summer. Looking forward to a much more robust season this year. I chose: two basil plants, oregano and parsley. In all the reading I did online, it's best to keep herbs that are grown in similar conditions together when you plant them all in the same container. I also love the idea of having a themed container - all herbs you can use in the same or related dishes!

I especially love later in the summer when I have fresh tomatoes and fresh basil. I stack them for an easy appetizer while we're grilling. Yum!

Here's how I planted my four plants in the deck rail planter this year: 

Deck planter, with rocks at the bottom to help with drainage.

Finding My Orphan Kale a Home

After planting kale a few weeks ago, and then adding to my kale (when I thought my original kale wasn't going to make it) a week or so later, I had two remaining that I didn't have room for.

The poor kale plants were outgrowing their seedling beds:

What a Difference Mulch Makes

We were lucky enough to inherit nice front-yard landscaping with our new house, which we bought a little over a year ago. The landscaping came with the extra bonus that every week or two, something new would be blooming, something we didn't know was there!

This year, as we have settled in, we've started to know the yard and what's there. Through lots of cleanup at the end of the fall and the start of spring (somehow all the leaves on the block get caught up in our bushes, etc.), I also got to know the plants I have. My father also did me a great favor by walking through all of the bushes and flowers and whatnot and informing me what they were, if he knew, and what I should do with them.

Fast-forward to today, and we did what badly needed to be done: remulch, I'm new to this having a yard thing, but it was clear to me by the sheer number of weeds popping up in areas of the landscaping that it was time to get some fresh mulch in there.

I went for red mulch, which scared me a little. But after it was finally all down, it was amazing what a difference it made. The greens popped and everything just looked cleaner and more organized.

Here's a few before and after pictures:

New Growth After the Snowstorm

A second snowstorm hit. Actually, the third, but the second since I planted my garden. I actually planted additional lettuce, some arugula and a few more kale plants the weekend before the second. But my garden survived. You'd hardly know it was hit.

Weekend Project: Mesclun in My Deck Rail Planter

I finally got one of my deck rail planters set up this weekend. I planted mesclun mix, another great container plant. My man doesn't like flowers on the deck - we don't want to attract the bees while we're having a beer. I have to say that that's fine with me. For some reason, I can't keep flowers alive.

So this year we're planting lettuce and herbs on the deck.