Veggies in Bloom

So my bolting broccoli is now flowering--no yummy Romanesco for us this season. Even though I tried to keep the soil cool after I noticed that the plant had started to bolt, there was nothing I could do. I'm trying to the cauliflower as cool as possible, but I'm concerned that the spot I picked wasn't ideal since I didn't realize how much afternoon sun this part of the yard was going to get since this is our first spring in this home. This fall I'm going to try to pick a different spot with more morning sun, less afternoon sun which should help according to the folks at BHN and possibly plant earlier.


I know Outback has a bloomin' oinion, but I much prefer my blooming green onion--I forgot how fun onion flowers are. And my chives look like they will be next!

Where did it all go?!

No matter how many times I cook greens I always forget how a lovely big bunch of greens disappears so quickly in a hot pan. I brought in a big bunch of our bright green and orange Swiss Chard for Brendan and I to enjoy last night. Into the pan with more garlic than most people can tolerate (yum!), and the lid goes on. Moments later, when it was ready to add a splash of red wine vinegar and its almost all gone! Luckily our small servings of chard were delicious, I really enjoyed the slightly mellower taste of this variety and the bright orange stems sure are pretty, even after cooking. I'm glad I waited for it to grow some more--I thought it was never going to get any bigger. Next time I'm planting at least twice as much!

Sunday Gardening

Since the rain has finally stopped I have a chance to get out in the yard again. Since we ate the last of the Mixed Lettuce planted in October last night at dinner I bought some Buttercrunch/Bibb lettuce to replace it and planted that this afternoon. Since the soil is pretty dense clay I mixed in some sand to see if that helps with drainage. I also added some vegetable food into the soil too since I think the soil is still repairing itself after bearing barren for who knows how long. We'll see if that helps my new little lettuces.

I also noticed that my broccoli is starting to flower unfortunately. I guess with that heat spell we had the soil got too hot and it started to bolt. I found this article on growing cold weather crops and keeping the soil cool, so I'm going to try to keep it cooled down with cold water and may have to shade them if we keep getting so much sun. I pinched off most of the flowering part and after such a sunny day I'm going to put some ice cubes on top of the much between the plants to slowly cool down the soil. I was really looking forward to eating some of this fun spiral variety so hopefully I'll be able to salvage some of it.