Monday, March 23, 2015

Harvest Monday - March 23, 2015

I continued to clear out over-wintered vegetables last week and now the spring veggies are starting to mature also so it appears that I've avoided the hunger gap this year. It's actually turning out to be quite the opposite of a hunger gap and is looking like more of a glut. This morning I looked back at the February harvests for the past 6 years and 2015 was the most productive yet, surpassing the previous best in 2010 by nearly 10 lbs for a total of 28.7 pounds. And the March harvests are also on track to be the most productive since I started keeping harvest records.

Here's a look at how February harvests stacked up for the past 6 years.


February
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
Arugula
0.1



1.3

Beets
1.7





Broccoli
1.0

1.0

2.6

Broccoli, Romanesco
2.3
3.5


4.7
3.0
Cabbage, Incl. Asian 


10.5



Cabbage, Portuguese

1.2



4.7
Carrots
3.4



0.6
2.0
Celery
0.4


1.1
4.5
3.2
Celery Root
2.3


0.4
1.8
0.9
Chard
1.3

0.8
0.9

2.1
Cilantro

0.4




Corn Salad/Mache
0.4
0.4

2.3


Fava Leaves
0.2





Fennel
1.1




1.7
Garlic
0.5





Kale
0.1
0.6
1.6
0.4
0.3
2.0
Lettuce
0.1
0.9
0.5


6.8
Onions
0.5




0.2
Pea, snap and snow
0.3



1.5
.
Pea Shoots




0.2

Radishes





0.3
Rapini
3.1
0.2




Spinach




1.9

Turnips





1.8

18.8
7.2
14.4
5.1
19.5
28.7


Even more revealing are the year-to-date figures, the 2015 total just hit the 100 pound mark, that's a first for the garden in the month of March. Somehow I'm not so sure that my gardening skills are entirely to be credited with the bounty, once again we've had an unusally warm winter which put the garden in high gear, so I'm willing to share some of the credit with Mother Nature. But Ma, what would really be helpful would be some more rain. Please.

Now for the latest harvests. First the overwintered veggies. The celery is starting to bolt so I cut out one of the 4 heads. Much of this head went into a couple of salads, the first salad featured thin sliced celery, fennel, cress, pine nuts, dried currants (why do they call them currants, they're just x-small raisins), and a lemon-honey-mustard dressing. That was a tasty and refreshing crunch fest.

Dorato D'Asti celery

The celeriac is finally sizing up but also starting to bolt so I'm harvesting it as well. This one went into a simple braise with bacon and radicchio, more of a warm salad really.

Monarch celeriac
 I keep finding volunteer Spanish Black carrots to pull.

Spanish Black carrots
The Treviso radicchio wasn't going to wait any longer, I cut 6 of the 7 heads that were started back in late October. I used the outermost leaves from these heads in the celeriac braise and one of the heads went into a salad with thin sliced celery and fennel and chopped peanuts.

Rossa di Treviso 4 Precoce racicchio
I've got a glut of fennel. The heads shown below are volunteers and I also dug up the plants from last year that were producing again this spring. Fennel has been showing up in salads, sautes and soups. I pretty much followed the recipe for Fennel Soup with a Green Swirl from Heart of the Artichoke and Other Kitchen Journeys by David Tanis, I didn't have basil for the swirl so I used a lesser amount of tarragon and I enriched the soup with some cream. It was delicious paired with the aforementioned celery and fennel salad.

Romanesco fennel
The beets that were started at the same time as the radicchio last October couldn't wait any longer either, out they came yesterday. The Golden beets are waiting in the fridge for some inspiration. I would normally keep the beet greens, but it was all just too much, so I didn't save or weigh them.

Golden beets
The Baby Ball and Red Baron beets were all roasted and half of them went into a batch of Ottolenghi's Pureed Beets with Yogurt and Za'atar. We paired that with some local sheep milk feta instead of the recommended goat cheese. We'll be having beet salad tonight!

Baby Ball beets
Red Baron beets
The last of the bolting lacinato kale plants is gone from the garden. The lower leaves were incredibly infested with aphids and I'm not hungry enough to deal with that mess so they went to the compost bin. That still left quite a bit. I've already steamed half of the harvest, half of which went into a frittata.

Lacinato kale
Here's the final head of lettuce from the 2014 sowings. The new lettuces aren't far behind though so there won't be much of a lettuce gap.

Michelle batavian lettuce
Onto the spring veggies. The onions aren't new, I've been thinning the patch for a few weeks now.

Tonda Musona Bianca onions
But here's something that I haven't grown in years, Dutch Broadleaf Cress, the first round of cut-and-come-again harvests from the spring sowing. This was a nice mild peppery accent to the sweet fennel and salty celery in salad that I've already mentioned twice.

Dutch Broadleaf Cress
Speedy arugula is back! This is my latest favorite arugula. Speedy does produce quickly and it's not too spicy, even when it starts to bolt.

Speedy Arugula
And Ruby streaks mizuna (I guess it's actually mustard but looks like mizuna) is back also. It's a quick grower and really perks up a salad with it's color and mild mustardy bite. It's good in stirfrys as well.


But wait, there's more harvests that I didn't photograph! I pulled out the surviving chard plants from last year. Those produced enough to make a batch of soup with lentils, and celery of course, not to mention some Spanish Black carrots, tomato puree from the freezer, and some shredded duck confit. And there were more onion thinnings that I didn't photograph.

Here's the harvests for the past week:

Speedy arugula - 4.6 oz.
Baby Ball beets - 1 lb., 1.1 oz.
Golden beets - 2 lb., 6 oz.
Red Baron beets - 1 lb., 12.5 oz.
Spanish Black carrots - 2.8 oz.
Dorato D'Asti celery - 4 lb., 7.7 oz.
Monarch celeriac - 13 oz.
Golden chard - 6.4 oz.
Peppermint Stick chard - 4.6 oz.
Dutch Broadleaf cress - 2.8 oz.
Romanesco fennel - 4 lb., .5 oz.
Lacinato kale - 2 lb., 3.8 oz.
Michelle batavian lettuce - 14.7 oz.
Ruby Streaks mizuna - 5.3 oz.
Mixed spring onions - 13.6 oz.
Rossa di Treviso 4 Precoce racicchio - 1 lb., 15.3 oz.

Total for the week: 22 lb., 2.7 oz.
2015 to date - 100 lb., 4.5 oz.

Harvest Monday is hosted by Daphne on her blog Daphne's Dandelions, head on over there to see what other garden bloggers have been harvesting lately.

11 comments:

  1. Wow, you didn't have much of a garden slow down. Everything looks delicious. And the volunteer vegetables seem so productive.

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  2. Most of those crops you mention are ones that I could only hope to harvest in high summer. Ottolenghi would have a Field Day in your garden! I once had some cress that looks similar to your "Dutch Broad-leaved" - it was called "Wrinkly Crinkly Cress"! You have evidently had more sunshine than we have, but we too are worrying about the lack of rain. I have had to water my garden with a hosepipe. Doing this in March is most unusual. I wonder if we will experience another drought year.

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    Replies
    1. I grew the Wrinkly Crinkly cress once upon a time, if memory serves it is more crinkled than the Dutch Broadleaf but I don't remember how it compares in taste. I've got my drip system on already, although it's set for far less output than for the summer garden.

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  3. Wow! Yum! I'm not much of a salad fan, but I sure do love soup. Especially celery soup using the tops and the bottoms (the ugly stuff some people throw out), onion and potato with skin (akin to mushroom taste). Ottolenghi pictures the most beautiful vegetable dishes, doesn't he? So what are you going to do with the rest of the za'atar? My package will last the rest of my life!

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    Replies
    1. Za'atar on grilled veggies or bread drizzled with extra virgin olive oil. Ooh, it will be great sprinkled on the first of the whole grilled favas. Sprinkled on top of a bowl of fresh green fava puree. It might even make potatoes more palatable (to me). Swirled into a creamy soup, perhaps the fate of one of the celeriac that needs to be harvested.

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  4. I'd trade some warm weather for some water. We have had a lot of precipitation over the last couple of months. And I've been envying the weather in the west. My mom keeps telling me how warm it is in Colorado. It is supposed to be colder there than here, but not this year.

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  5. I would gladly share some of our rain if I could. Today was the first day I could even think about working our soil, and it is still really too wet. But I had to get a spot ready for onions and potatoes so I did that much.

    I am enjoying Speedy arugula in the greenhouse. And I have more plants if I can get in the beds soon. I don't have a lettuce named after me though!

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  6. Wow - no kidding when you said you had a glut! 22 lbs. would be a great week, even in late spring/early summer. I can't believe how beautiful your celery is, especially as it's usually considered such a hard vegetable to grow.

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  7. Oh my gosh, makes me want to move back to the west coast! Harvest looks beautiful and the meals (especially the fennel / celery salad) sounds so GOOD. I tried to grow fennel a few years back but was unsuccessful other than a few fronds. I had no idea the root looked like that!

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  8. Like Daphne and Dave, I too will be happy to trade some warm weather for our rain. That sure is some harvest. I am growing Ruby Streaks Mustard for the first time this year, hope it does well in my garden.

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  9. Lovely vegetables! Your kale and chicory look so interesting!

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