This could very well be my working title for the garden this year. With several gaping holes left behind by an overachieveing winter season I vowed to plug in a vegetable crop wherever an ornamental plant had succumbed. Not a bad “plot line” for someone intent on exploring and blurring the line between ornamental and edible plantings.
Things have progressed quite nicely and our table is beginning to groan beneath the bounty. The eggplants are elegant in their dusky foliage and beautifully fruiting in the spaces left behind by my cut-back ornamental sage. My purple-podded peas are a thing of the past but have been tag teamed by ‘Royal Burgundy’ bush beans which are setting their slender purple pods almost faster than I can pick ‘em! Note to self: it’s so much easier to see to pick purple beans among lush green foliage!
But if the race goes to the fastest, I’m afraid the squashes and pumpkins are well out in front of the rest of the pack. This will be a banner year for winter squash as I greedily count my ‘Sugar Baby’ pumpkins. Given the number of ‘Cinderella’ pumpkins which have set so far I should be picking out my ballgown and hunting down mice for footmen.
But the yellow jersey of Lorene’s garden goes to Zuchetta rampincante – or the Climbing Italian zucchini. My oh my can this puppy put OUT! Curvaceous, s-shaped, pale green fruits appear seemingly overnight on the lush prickly vines climbing my humble bamboo structures. Truth be told these squash are fairly suggestive in form and the demure gardener is once again reminded of just how fecund and fertile a vegetable garden can be. Their mild sweet, slightly nutty flesh is dense and solid – none of that watery, seedy bland zucchini nonsense I usually think of when I think of summer squash. The other night I simply “shaved” long curls of the raw squash with a carrot peeler and dressed it lightly with a little vinaigrette – sort of a vegetable carpaccio; cool, refreshing, light and delicious. It’s way too hot to go near the stove anyway.
It’s actually way too hot to do just about anything. Our NW infrastructure is most definitely NOT set up to accomodate these extreme temperatures. Today is forecast to hit 100; I feel my good humor plummeting as the mercury rises. A day good for nothing but reading, lounging in the shade and sipping cool tea. But first – my long promised review of my latest, most favorite vegetable book…
The Great Vegetable Plot
The Great Vegetable Plot, delicious varieties to grow and eat
by Sarah Raven, with sumptuous photographs by Jonathan Buckley
“A vegetable garden is a beautiful thing to make, with the extra bonus of producing the best possible things to eat. If you get it right, the whole place can become your market, your haven and your playground.”
That statement right there, appearing on page one, captures the essence – the delicious, sensual, and utterly delightful truth – which comes across in the remaining 240 pages of this remarkable book. This is the way to a good and delicious life. Ms. Raven, a physician by training, now turned writer, broadcaster, teacher and gardener extraordinaire, expertly advises on how to produce delicious and beautiful food throughout the year. She concentrates on selecting those varieties that provide the deepest flavor, most brilliant color and generous harvest.
“This is not about growing for self-sufficiency’s sake, or growing as a chore – it’s about growing for pleasure.”
The book is divided into 3 categories: those vegetables whose taste is immeasurably better when grown at home, those vegetables which are only available to the home grower and what she calls her “desert island plants”; those plants which are her constant culinary companions.
“They’re the plants that every vegetable patch, however small, should include: the hard-working yet tasty characters, all big producers over a long period of time – not just weeks but months. They’re also easy, needing minimal TLC to grow well.”
As for the better-when-grown-at-home, the usual suspects – sweetcorn and tomatoes – are included. But Raven also covers the equally remarkable difference of homegrown peas, heading lettuce and carrots harvested at their peak sugars and swiftly eaten with relish. The “unbuyables” include rare heirloom squashes, beans and edible flowers available from seed as well as those ephemeral and secondary crops only available to those who raise their own: green garlic scapes, tender sweet-tasting pea tendrils, baby new potatoes, and beet greens to name just a few. But maybe the real reason I love this book is Raven’s love of broad beans as she calls them – Fava Beans to you and me!!! Absolutely one of my own personal “desert island plants.” I’m on the hunt for a crimson flowered variety to include in next year’s garden.
Perennial vegetables, herbs and ways to prolong the harvest as well as cultivation tips, garden planning advice and organic pest and disease controls are all covered clearly and soundly. The book concludes with a concise A-Zed encyclopedia of vegetables and a calendar of what jobs to undertake when.
The result is a book that is easy and delightfully engaging to read, beautifully illustrated with photos that capture the natural beauty of garden fresh food. One I know I’ll turn to year after year with every garden I build.
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Your vegetables are certainly beautiful additions to your garden. I will check out the book you speak of in this blog post. Thanks…….