Green Garlic Dressing

purple sprouting broccoli shoots, kale buds, pea shoots, ruby steaks mustard, baby kale, green garlic and chive

its hard to believe that yesterday was the first day I got a whole salad out of the garden. everything seems a month behind at the moment, the spuds only just got their heads in gear, the over wintered cabbages are yet to form heads (will they?) and my peas just poked through the soil a week ago.

 

the salad bed (from bottom left to top right): easter egg radish (with mixed leaves to follow), ruby streaks mustard, garlic, little gem, garlic, beetroot, snow pea and ruby streaks mustard

this year I took a page out of joy larkom's creative vegetable gardening book and planted my salad bed with contrasting colours and texture, as well as planting the rows on the diagonal for visual interest. as you can see from the above picture its still has a bit more to fill out but the idea is starting to shape out.

 



a small garlic shoot for thining and using as green garlic

I only recently learned about green garlic (a.k.a wet garlic) as an ingredient. before the garlic reaches maturity the whole bulb and stem can be used, I picked mine very early as a thinning measure. its great in soups, dressings and marinades. the flavour is more subtle than mature garlic lacking the strong spicy edge. think: chives but better.

 



green garlic

the great thing about growing garlic yourself is a) its super easy and b) you can have a go with green garlic in the kitchen. (I've only seen it one or twice in the green grocers ) the use of green garlic is starting to pop up more in cookbooks and restaurants lately, so if you don't grow you're own you might see it popping up at a good green grocers soon. 

 

DIY Seed Saving

carrot seed heads

growing veg from seeds saved from the previous years crops is an age old art. for the DIY-er its a climax in self sufficiency. its also easy to do with most veg or flowers. the trick is patience, as well as learning to let your plants go to seed rather than harvesting their crop. which at times can make a veg plot seem untended and messy. its just the natural course of a plants life and a great way to get more in touch with different plants and their life cycles.

in the not-so-distant past, commercial seeds where unavailiable to most. so every farmer knew to have enough food for the years to come - you have to save seeds from the best plants, at the end of the growing year. we can now get almost any imaginable seeds in garden centers, supermarkets, and farm supply shops. 'so why save 'em whe you can buy em ready to go?' im all for buying new seeds, its actually one of my vices, my collection expands every year and i love trying new varieties of veg. especially ones that are hard to find in shops: romanesco, heirloom tomato varieties, raddichio, coloured carrots, and painted corn.. have all joined my seed box collection recently, and these are the rare seed varieties i try and save seeds from. there is also an added benefit to saving seeds from successful crops: every year the seeds that mature and grow are more adapted to the surounding climates, so they'll grow better for you each year! so its a very handy skill, for our rainy climate.

dried carrots seeds (center, spiky) ready for storage

Saving your own seeds:
i've included pictures from two types of veg that have a slight trick to saving their seeds: tomatoes and carrots. tomato seeds need to be fermented before drying, and to get good carrots from your own seeds you need to wait till the second year of the plants lifecycle when the plants are matured.