Seventh Day September (finally!)

It's mostly annuals, including cosmos, alyssum, salvia, kale, celosia, bacopa, peppers, squash and marigolds, in this bed in the backyard.

Already, Sept. 7 seems like eons ago. Change happens fast in the fall, and we're seeing the rich golds, reds and browns of autumn (more on that later). Putting together this album is a good reminder of why I try to spend time in the garden every day. There's always something going on that wasn't there the day before.  

Annual fava bean supper

Fava beans are cushioned in pods. The skins of each bean will slip off after blanching.

I'm not sure how many years we've celebrated the fava bean, but it's enough that it's become an anticipated summer rite. The resident head gardener plants just enough fava beans in early spring so we're assured of one or two pickings and one or two generous dinners. Last night was the first one of 2010. In looking back, we're a few days early this year. Doesn't matter, the Fava Fest is one of those roaming, non-date-dependent jubilees.

Fava beans are easy to grow but require some work to prep them for eating. Hence, one reason we only grow enough for a few suppers. I harvested the gnarly-looking pods in the morning and shelled them immediately. It's a pleasant task -- peel back the pods and see how many beans are nestled inside the soft, comforting confines. The giant pods may hold six plump parcels of fava-beany goodness. After shelling there's still more prep work before the beans are ready for cooking. During a break from weeding, I blanched the beans for several minutes in a pot of boiling water, dumped them in a bowl of ice water and slipped them out of their skins. Each individual bean is pinched at one end so the edible bean slips out easily. Pinch and slip. Pinch and slip. Pinch and slip. The skins make a lovely pile of compost fixins'. The beans go back in the fridge until it's time to make dinner.

Now the favas are ready for a quick saute in butter and seasoned with salt and pepper. Quick, out of the pan and onto the table with lamb chops, garden-fresh greens, homemade chickpea flatbread (highly recommended!) and a bottle of pinot noir. Yum!

 Fava beans take on a beautiful color after a quick saute in butter.

In honor of deer

The knock at the door came early, though not unreasonably so. The gentleman said his daughter-in-law had hit and injured a deer on the road. They had called for help but it had been a half-hour already and did we by any chance have a gun? The doe was suffering terribly.

We're not really hunters but we do have a gun and a few minutes later the doe took her last breath and crossed to wherever it is we go when life is gone. Her body lay near the woods on the south side of our property.

Deer are as much a part of our gardening life here as the perennials and trees we plant, the vegetables we nurture, or the red squirrels who help themselves at the bird feeders. We take note of deer-resistant plants, wrap choice shrubs and trees in protective cages through the winter and spread deer repellent in the spring to keep them away from the crocus and tulips. I curse them when I see the damage they do to our plantings, and I love them as I watch them pass gracefully through the yard, looking for food in the winter.

So later in the day, as I was pushing bulbs into the ground near our newly constructed pool, I decided to give this autumn crocus a different name. I will call it the Doe Crocus. Because, after all, the deer are as much a part of our little landscape as we are.

A little something to keep me occupied

It must be fall; the asters are starting to bloom. This is Honeysong Pink.

Some of you may have noticed the slide show that popped up on this blog a few weeks back. The Seventh Day Project is my attempt to chronicle and document how the garden changes from month to month. (Yes, those winter months will be a challenge!) Each month, on the seventh day, I'll shoot photos around the garden -- some from basically the same angle, others will be random shots of whatever I find interesting. Then, probably within a day or two, I'll post some of the images in the slide show. To see a bigger version of the image, just click on it and you should go to the album where I'll also include captions.

Why the seventh day? Chalk it up to my Midwestern Lutheran upbringing -- Sundays were supposed to be a day of rest and reflection. And I just like the way it sounds. This seventh-day isn't always a Sunday, but it will be a chance to stop and think about what's working, what's not and what still needs to be done.

Beans star in weekend dining

A bowl of just-picked 'Jade' green beans. I nibbled a few as I harvested. Just to keep my energy up.

It's all about the beans. And the herbs. And the potatoes. Is it any wonder why this is one of the best eating times of the year.

Let's start with the beans. Few vegetables give you so much bang for the buck, even in a semi-crummy growing season like this one. The green bush beans (variety is 'Jade') were ready for harvest last week. The bean harvest means one thing: Stir-fried Green Beans with Pork and Chilies from Madhur Jaffrey's "Far Eastern Cookery." This recipe has become a summer ritual for us; of course, we eat it other times of the year, too, but the first harvest of beans seems like an especially good time to enjoy it. You can adjust the amount of heat with the number of chilies you use. Here's the drill:

1 1/4 pound green beans
12-16 garlic cloves
6-9 fresh hot green or red chilies
5 tablespoons vegetable oil
10 ounces lean pork, ground
1/2 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon dark brown sugar
3 tablespoons fish sauce or salt to taste

Cut the beans into quarter-inch pieces. Peel and chop the garlic. Cut the chilies crosswise into very thin slices.

Put the oil in a wok and set it over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, put in the garlic and chilies. Stir and fry until the garlic turns golden and then add the pork. Stir and fry, breaking up any lumps, until the pork has lost its raw look. Put in the beans, paprika, sugar, fish sauce and 1 1/4 cups water. Stir and cook on a medium-high heat for about 8-10 minutes or until the beans are tender and most of the water has been absorbed.

We also used our own homegrown chilies (superchilies, well-suited for northern climates) and garlic in the Saturday night dinner. The psychic taste buds get a boost from using ingredients that came out of the garden only hours earlier.

We have never tried a Madhur Jaffrey recipe we didn't like. She's that good.

The beans and pork are just about done stir-frying in the wok. Serve them over jasmine rice.

And then there was Sunday dinner. Beans again, but this time it was the French filet beans (variety is 'Nickel', thinner and more delicate than other bush beans). They were steamed and sprinkled with summer savory, an easy-to-grow annual herb that will self-sow. It doesn't get much better than this. Except when you add freshly dug Norkotah mashed potatoes with fresh rosemary and chives and chicken baked with a poultice of rosemary, thyme, sage and olive oil tucked under the skin.

It's an herb extravaganza. Those are bits of summer savory on the filet beans. I love the garnish -- sage leaves with rosemary and chives. Sort of evokes a bird.

Fa-va-va-va-voom: Fava beans!

A pile of de-podded fava beans ready for blanching after which their outer skins or husks will be removed. Is your mouth watering yet?

Summer Fest at A Way to Garden is focusing on beans and greens this week. We're a few days away from harvesting green beans, but the fava beans, well, that's another story.

Fava beans (Vicia faba) are among the first vegetables we sow here. They've also evolved into one of our must-grows. Not that we grow a lot of them -- just enough for a meal or two -- but it's always fun to anticipate a plate of the plump, pillowy beans.

Favas go in the ground in late April, six weeks or more before the bush beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) or the pole beans or the Chinese long beans and about the same time as the peas. We use a bacteria inoculant when we sow (You can buy the stuff at many seed/garden suppliers). Spritz the seeds with water, roll them in the inoculant and sow. The bacteria form nodules on the roots and help to fix the nitrogen from the air into a form more readily useful to a growing plant. (You can use it for other beans and peas, too.)

Favas here grow several feet tall and have very cool black and white blossoms. We grow a variety called 'Aquadulce' that we get from Stokes Seeds.These broad beans need a long, cool growing season and judging by our harvest, the cool temperatures I was complaining about earlier this summer were a boon to this year's crop. Harvest when the pods are thick and bumpy with the beans.

Once harvested, there's the matter of prepping the fava beans for cooking. Remove them from the pod and blanch them for several minutes in boiling water. Now it's time to remove their secondary husk. One by one, take each bean and squeeze one end to push the bean out of the husk. Yes, it's tedious, but not so bad if done while watching the news and having a cocktail. After this husking, all you need to do is warm them in a pan with some butter and salt. A vegetable like this doesn't need any fancy extras. If you do have leftovers (unlikely, but it can happen) try them in an omelet the next day.

Good to know: A small percentage of people have favism, an acute anemia caused by a reaction to eating fava beans or being exposed to its pollen.

The fava bean bed in May. Good things come to those who wait. We harvested in August.

A bowl of just-picked favas. We'll take them out of the pod and then shell them again before eating.

The beans cozy up to each other in the pod.

Fava beans prepared simply with butter and salt are the main attraction; peppered flatiron steak and puff pastry/blue cheese pinwheels play supporting roles.

OK, I can't resist, you've read this far -- here's the famous line.

Chilling out

It may have been the best 15 minutes of the day:

Early evening, warming up after a cool, gray day. Sitting on a bench that Brian built. The bench resting on the brick-paver terrace (probably too grand a term for this landing spot, but I like the sound of it) that we laid some years back. Surrounded by some of my favorite plants -- rosemary, heliotrope, scented geraniums, chocolate cosmos, night phlox and 'Painted Lady' sweet peas on a trellis I made from bamboo and willow prunings on a Sunday afternoon in May. A cold mojito in hand, made with mint plucked minutes earlier from the garden. Watching the hummingbirds work over the bee balm (just outside the view in this photo). Listening to their wings whirring in harmony with some bees buzzing around the allium.

Any nagging doubts, fears and frustrations held at bay.

Favorite plant of the day: Clematis

Claire de lune is the only clematis I'm growing. That's crazy; I need more.

So much to catch the eye right now: bearded iris, Siberian iris, sweet woodruff, ajuga, forget-me-nots, veronica, viburnum, roses. But this morning it was the clematis Claire de lune Evirin. The surprise factor made it the clear winner. Enjoying the morning ritual of a stroll through the garden, I turned a corner and there it was with three open blooms. It's taken several years for this clematis to reach this point. I was tempted several times to pull the darn thing out; it seemed a waste of the copper trellis, a handcrafted birthday gift from my husband. At one point it appeared to have died. But it stayed and persevered and now I know that pale lavender is the color of patience rewarded.

The color works well with the blue-purple Ajuga reptans (bugleweed)
in the background. The clematis is growing in a semi-shady spot
on the north side of the house.

Baby, it's cold outside

The furnace kicked in again a little while ago keeping a cold, damp evening at bay. It may be June tomorrow but we had frost this morning followed by gloomy skies and rain. Most of the plants that wintered inside that I'd moved to the garage and then to the back deck and front walk went back into the garage last night. And the potted banana came into the dining room for what hopefully will be a short stay.

The shuffle is nothing new, but it does tend to make one grumpy. Schlepping potted plants from one location to another to avoid cold damage or worse tries one's patience. But then I remember the exuberant, fragrant, colorful, amazing plants I enjoy all summer and, well, what I can do but grab another couple of pots and tuck them in behind my car.

Today. Bottled.

Today was one of those days that I need to keep with me. It was the kind of day I need to remember when everything just seems so grim. The day was special because of its simplicity.

Brian and I spent nearly all day in the garden. The weather was cool and gray; the neighborhood was quiet. I worked in the front yard; he was in the back. We were united in working the soil, but still had our own space. While he prepped the vegetable beds and planted potatoes, I weeded and edged the bed of ornamentals in the center of the lawn. There is something incredibly satisfying about getting the grass out of the sedum. And creating a sharp line between lawn and perennials. And knowing that (knock on wood) we'll be enjoying at least 10 varieties of potatoes next fall and winter.

Today was one of those days that I wish I could bottle and always have on hand.

Beginnings
A particularly long and cruel winter is finally fading as spring announces itself at the five acres in northeastern Minnesota I call home. One of the great pleasures this time of year is the renewing of a morning tradition: I take my coffee outside and inspect the gardens and surrounding woods for signs of activity – crocus, tulips and chionodoxa; phlox and forget-me-nots showing green under the tree lilac; buds swelling on the forsythia, roses and lilacs. Every day, there is something new.

Meanwhile, the silly dog secures the perimeter of the yard, checking the ground for the scent of creatures that passed through during the night. But the reverie can't last. There are perennials to cut back, vegetables and annual flowers to sow inside and new beds to dig as the ground dries out. Time to move on.