welcome, gus!

after many months of searching, we finally found him. please welcome gus to the garden! a weekend in leavenworth led us to this little guy.

pictured here, he's standing guard over the strawberry patch. i'm sure we'll periodically move him to watch over other crops, but he looks quite content in this shot.

said to be industrious nature-lovers, gnomes believe they are responsible for the earth, therefore, they care and nurture all living things with dedicated fervor. rosy-cheeked, smartly dressed and standing at attention, gus, the original garden gnome is the standard to which all gnomes aspire.

i found the above passage on a gardening website and thought it was hilarious. but in all seriousness, we're quite happy to welcome gus.

what's for dinner? (hint, it's not beef)

what's for dinner? a question that most of us attempt to tackle every day. last night, i headed straight to the garden for some inspiration. carrots and chard were looking mighty good, so i plucked away at the two until satisfied.

the chard is really something beautiful. golden stalks and bright green leaves - it would be a nice garden accompaniment even if left uneaten. but let's be real, we're going to eat it, and we're going to like it. fun fact: apparently, chard is in the same family as beets. the more you know...

the carrots took much longer than the chard to grow into what they are today. planted back in april, we've needed much patience to get to this point. when i first put the seeds in the ground, i had this idea that they'd be up in no time. then i read the back of the seed pack. 70 days until maturity. literacy - it's a good thing. little did the seed pack know that we'd have an unusually chilly spring here in the pnw.

we've planted another bunch that are growing much quicker than the first thanks to some steady sunshine. and i'm getting better at thinning them out so each sprout has enough room to grow (really important, i'm learning).

regardless, the carrots are ready now. crisp and sweet, i decided to roast them to maximize their sweetness and caramelize them. gave them a quick boil and stuck them under the broiler with olive oil, salt, pepper, and a sprinkling of brown sugar. we ate them alongside some homemade cheese ravioli that we'd been storing in the freezing for a couple months.

mixed with some sauteed chard, we topped the ravioli with butter, raisins, and goat cheese. the slight bitterness of the greens, the sweetness of the raisins (and carrots) and the tanginess of the goat cheese worked well together. it was a nice way to meld what we had in the fridge with what we found in the garden.

the garden grows

since the sun has been shining everyday for the past couple of weeks, there's been an explosion of growth. the golden swiss chard was about 2 inches high before all of this sunshine. it's now ready to harvest. looking forward to sauteing it up with some butter and garlic. speaking of which, we're experimenting with garlic - just planted a short row of bulbs that had begun to grow in our kitchen. so far, so good! green stems are shooting up. broccoli raab, red kale, french radishes, and gold beets are also on their way up - slowly, but surely. cucumbers, squashes, and tomatoes are nearing production stage!

in other news, the corn is doing extremely well, despite its prior victimization by a yet-to-be-identified garden intruder. (apparently, the corn got over this violation, but i did not. i suppose whatever animal did this was just trying to survive.) back to the corn, though, brian's family has this saying that it should be - "knee high by the fourth of july." well, we didn't think we'd get there a few weeks back, but the corn is definitely up to our waists and climbing. hopefully ears will start to develop soon.

corn is one of my favorite vegetables. i'm looking forward to picking fresh ears and eating it straight off the cob, raw. i also love it in macaroni and cheese. that's right. highly recommended with a side of ketchup. and, over the past several holidays, we've been sauteing it with shallots, butter and a few swigs of half & half or cream. a fresher take on creamed corn. and then there's corn bread, best eaten with honey butter alongside a hearty bowl of chili. alright, this paragraph is quickly turning into something out of forrest gump. enough already - you get it - we like corn.

as i was out in the garden taking pictures yesterday, i was really struck by the transformational beauty that's been taking place in each bed, with each plant. something that really caught my eye were the blossoms on the small red onions. they look like little presents opening up and stretching. we should probably eat those soon.

to market, to market

it's almost here. a farmers market is coming to mercer island. yay! it has been an amazing experience to play a role in the community collaboration that's taken place to get this thing off the ground. many people have dedicated countless hours of time, skill, and energy to make this happen. this has truly been a communion of sustainability and community building. who knew the two worked together so magically?! duh.

the inaugural season will be a short one, but we plan on running a full-season operation next year and beyond. if you're in the area, i hope you'll come check out the market - sundays (11am - 3pm), august 10th - Oct 12th. the website has many more details.

a good read

Just finished reading Michael Pollan's deliberate, funny, and thoughtful account of food and culture via In Defense of Food. The book's premise - "Eat Food. Not too much. Mostly Plants." - couldn't be simpler at first glance. But the rampant marketing of today's agricultural system obscures the simplicity and healthfulness of the foods - the whole foods - that we should be consuming.


At the heart of the book rests the belief that food, health, culture, and the environment are all connected - all working together in a system. To isolate nutrients from a whole food and stuff them into a not so whole food (vitamin-fortified Coke), or to extract one part of a culture and jam it into a diet (ie: the Mediterranean diet or the French paradox) - these creations and adaptations will not automatically result in a fit and healthy person.

Through food, Pollan explores the conception of quick fixes, band-aid health care, and twisted agricultural policies that are America. Sorry, nation.

But, he's not a total Debbie downer, nor is he an irrational idealist (not that there's anything wrong with idealism). In the final section, "Cook, or if you can, plant a garden," he offers the following:

"To take part in the intricate and endlessly interesting processes of providing for our sustenance is the surest way to escape the culture of fast food and the values implicit in it: that food should be fast, cheap, and easy; that food is a product of industry, not nature; that food is fuel, and not a form of communion, with other people as well as with other species - with nature" (p. 197)

So thank you, Michael Pollan, for summing up my own thoughts before I could put them down on paper :)

For more, feel free to borrow my copy of the book. Another goodie is Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma (also have that one, if needed).