Greens, and purples, and reds, oh boy!
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| Saisai radish leaves. |
The Saisai radishes keep popping out new leaves and I'm trying to harvest them before they get too big. They are best when they are young and relatively small like the leaves shown above (as compared to classic radishes those leaves would be huge). The stems are crunchy and the leaves are tender and not prickly, the flavor is mild with just a hint of radish spice. I've been cutting them up and adding them to salads and one day I added them to a pita sandwich that also featured
Fresh Fava Dip and feta cheese. (Check out my homemade pita breads on my twitter feed shown on my side bar).
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| Speedy arugula |
Speedy arugula is finally starting to bolt after producing for nearly 2 months, not bad for spring sown arugula. I read in the paper on Sunday that one grower harvests the arugula shoots as "arugula raab" for cooking. I guess that might be worth a try.
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| Spadona chicory |
Spadona chicory is another quick grower. I'm still trying to figure out how best to prepare these for my taste. They are fairly bitter so I've been blanching them and using them in cooked dishes. I think I may experiment with preparing them wilted fresh with pancetta or bacon, maybe add a sliced up sweet spring onion to the mix.
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| Spigariello Liscia and Purple Peacock broccolis |
I didn't get out to the garden to harvest for two days and the Purple Peacock broccoli nearly got away from me. Purple Peacock is a cross between broccoli and two different kale varieties. There's a fair amount of variation in the strain which you can see in the two heads that I cut. Both the leaves and the flower heads are good eating. Spigariello is another leafy broccoli that is a popular vegetable in southern Italy. I've read that it can be grown primarily for leaf production or for both the leaves and shoots - I choose to wait for the shoots and harvest it like rapini. That shoot shown above is the "main" head from one plant and there's lots of side shoots coming along.
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| Ruby Streaks mizuna |
More salad goodies, Ruby Streaks mizuna is resisting bolting so far but the Ruby Gem romaine wasn't so I cut the last three heads.
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| Ruby Gem romaine |
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| Extra Precoce Violetto favas |
This was one of two baskets of favas that I harvested on Sunday. This will definitely push the weekly tally up quite a bit since I weigh the favas in their pods.
Also harvested this week but not photographed was a head of Pixie cabbage that got away from me, it split wide open but I got to it before it started to spoil so there's quite a bit that I can salvage from the head. The last two butterhead lettuces were harvested, they were bulking up but not quite bolting, the outer leaves were not pretty, they weren't very photogenic. And I also harvested a few green onions.
Here's the harvests for the past week:
Speedy arugula - 5.9 oz.
Purple Peacock broccoli - 1 lb., 4.6 oz.
Spigariello Liscia broccoli - 2.2 oz.
Pixie cabbage - 5 lb., 7.3 oz. (that one really got away from me!)
Spadona chicory - 7.3 oz.
Extra Precoce Violetto fava beans - 18 lb., 2.8 oz.
Rhapsody butterhead lettuces - 2 lb., 4 oz.
Ruby Gem romaine lettuces - 1 lb., 5.8 oz.
Ruby Streaks mizuna - 4.7 oz.
Spring onions - 9.3 oz.
Saisai radish leaves - 3.8 oz.
Total for the week - 30 lb., 9.7 oz.
YTD 2015 - 224 lb., 4.8 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.
All of the deep purples are so striking! I especially love the purple broccoli. And those pitas look delicious!
ReplyDeleteI'm still anxiously waiting for my favas to come up. Since this is my first time growing them, I have no idea how long they should take and whether or not I should be getting nervous.
If the soil is still cool they can take a couple of weeks to come up, but they are very tolerant of cold soils unless it is too wet, so don't fret yet.
DeleteThat purple broccoli is so pretty. Purple is one of my favorite colors.
ReplyDeleteIt's amazing how your garden never quit producing this winter! Are you going to plant your summer seedlings early?
ReplyDeleteThe year we didn't have a winter, I planted more than a month early and was harvesting tomatoes in June. Good thing because the gardened burned up once summer hit with 3 months of hundred degree weather.
I love that you're growing so many pepper varieties. I was going to try Padron peppers but Bakers Creek was out of them when I was doing my seed order. Next year!
I'm just sticking to my normal schedule. Even though we haven't had a real winter this year the nights are still cold and most of the summer veggies don't like that.
DeleteI did go a little crazy with the peppers!
Great looking harvest, love seeing those shades of purple and green! Excited to get our garden season going!
ReplyDeleteThirty pounds of produce in April
ReplyDeleteRats, my comment posted before I was done. Thirty pounds of produce in April is amazing! Great job.
ReplyDeleteLove those purples and greens! And the red lettuce. And the pita bread. Why am I suddenly hungry for a snack? I have some Speedy arugula pesto I made this morning that will have to go on a cracker soon. That's my first time making pesto with Speedy. Normally, I have to tame arugula a bit with something else when making pesto, but Speedy is good as is. I planted more today, to keep the harvests coming!
ReplyDeleteLoads of colourful and fantastic produce in your kitchen. I have never heard of peacock broccoli, I am going to look out for some seeds here in the UK, I grow purple sprouting broccoli, but its on the heads that are purple not the stems.
ReplyDeleteNice harvest. The Purple Peacock looks great. Mine didn't do well so I haven't repeated.
ReplyDeleteI prefer 4 Seasons Leaf Radish from Evergreen - more strap. less serrated, and more tender - but it is treated seed.
ReplyDelete