Spring Garden Progress

My spring garden is doing amazingly well this year and I couldn't be happier.
 

I've been picking baby lettuce for salads nearly every day for at least a week.  And well, you know about all the arugula I've harvested :)  And the beets are ready to pick as well.  As a matter of fact, I picked the first of the gold beets for a fabulous dinner on Friday night and we had roasted baby beets as part of our Easter dinner on Sunday.

I took a bunch of pictures of the garden last week that I'd love to share with you.  When I'm in my garden, I feel so humble and grateful for what I'm able to have a hand in growing and in feeding my family and friends.

Here are my gold and red beets and carrots

 

Golden Chard

Little Gem Romaine and Lolla Rossa Red Lettuce

Texas 1015 Onions - A couple of these are the size of large tennis balls!

And my tomatoes are growing beautifully and beginning to flower!

The three varieties of peppers, Italian white eggplant, golden scallopini bush squash, golden bush beans and Blue Lake bush beans go in the ground this coming week. I may be a bit late in planting these, but I have to keep reminding myself...it's only April!

The rewards I get out of tending my vegetable garden go far beyond good fresh food.  Being out there, working hard in the sun, watching things grow and flower, feeds my soul as much as (or more than) my appetite.  Yes, I am truly blessed. 

Puppies Are Growing!

I know...it's a gardening blog, Diane, not a puppy blog, but I can't help but post some recent pictures of the pups.  They are doing *so* well and I just love them.  They have become a huge part of my life~~like how about the main focus of my life~~besides Harry and my family of course :-) They are strong, healthy, beautiful, obedient (most of the time :), loving puppies and all they want is to be with me.  How lucky am I.

Laci

Gretchen

What more can I say? 

If you want to read more about these beautiful girls, here are a few links that will take you there.

http://dianestexasgarden.blogspot.com/2010/12/found-by-side-of-road.html

http://dianestexasgarden.blogspot.com/2010/12/puppy-update.html

http://dianestexasgarden.blogspot.com/2010/12/bonding-with-puppies.html 

http://dianestexasgarden.blogspot.com/2011/02/reflections.html

Arugula and Baby Romaine

I love this time of year when I'm able to wander out to my garden and pick stuff for dinner!  Tonight it was baby romaine and arugula.  This brand of baby romaine is called Little Gem and it is beautiful!  Take a look.

I've waited to thin the heads until they are big enough so I can use the thinnings in a salad rather than having to discard them like it do the beets (which I hate doing).  And it has worked great.  I get to eat it rather than compost it and that's always better :)

Tonight's salad was another creation of What do I have?  

 Here is what I had:

A beautiful bunch of baby romaine

Another bunch of arugula

It's not baby arugula anymore which means it's real peppery and spicy, which I like :)  The bugs are kind of getting to it because I don't spray it with anything.  I just pick the little critters off as I see them and wash the arugula real well.  Never had a problem with a bug in my salad :)

A couple of baby beets that I roasted last week. 

These were left over from the Farmer's Market bounty my husband and I brought home a week or so ago.

A tart green apple

A wedge of delicious, locally made blue cheese 

 

Blue cheese is one of those foods you either love it or you hate it.  My husband and I love it!  We bought this cheese at the Pearl Farmer's Market about 10 days ago and it is delicious.  It's made by Humble House, a local company that makes fabulous cheeses and different types of spreads. 

And some fresh chives from my herb garden

And my favorite extra virgin olive oil

 All these fresh ingredients came together beautifully. 

I thinly sliced the apples and fanned them out on a serving plate.

Next I arranged the washed baby romaine and arugula.  The greens were topped with a crumbling of blue cheese, the diced roasted beets, some snipped chives and I finished it with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and freshly grated black pepper.

I can't tell you how good this salad was!  Yes, there are a lot of strong flavors here but they work very well together:  the tangy blue cheese, the tart apple, the spicy arugula, the earthy beet, all brought together with the slightly peppery and tasty olive oil.  My wonderful hubby loved it too :)  Needless to say, this salad may become a summer staple at our house.

Buon Appetito!

Farmer's Market Bounty

Look at all this beautiful produce!

Last weekend my husband and I went to the Pearl Farmer's Market for the first time this season.  We were not disappointed (we never are, really).  What a haul we brought home:  Baby bella mushrooms, swiss chard, baby carrots, red cabbage, gorgeous spinach, Brussels sprouts, baby beets, radishes and plump, juicy strawberries.  I just love, love this stuff!  (As if you didn't know that already!)  And one of the cool things about all this produce is, with the exception of the strawberries and the mushrooms, I have been able to, and still do, grow all these vegetables for my family and friends in my little Texas hill country garden.  I'm very humbled when I think about it.  How blessed I am.

Tomatoes Are In the Ground

Yay!  I finally planted these babies and I must say, they are beautiful!  Each plant stands at least a foot tall, some of them are even taller.  And they are so healthy.  These are the first tomatoes I've ever planted in my garden that I grew from seed.  Well, how about that! :)

Yes, you could say, I'm a little proud of that fact.  Don't mean to be cocky or anything, but I nurtured and babied these plants.  I'm so happy and thankful to have gotten them to this point.  And after I planted these seedlings last night, it R.A.I.N.E.D!!  You have no idea how wonderful the sound of that rain was overnight.  It's been months, yes, months, since we have any rainfall.  And it was so very welcome here in the hills of South Texas. 

Anyway, I planted nine plants.  And yes, I probably overplanted for that bed, but I'll make it work:)  I'll just have a lot of tomatoes to cook with, give away, make sauces, maybe can some, etc.  I planted three Martian Giants, three Peron Sprayless,two Chadwick Cherries and one Genovese.  Here is a link to a prior post on my blog, describing these tomatoes.

So we'll see how these tomato plants fare through this coming summer.  And you can bet, I'll keep you posted!