Scenes From a Winter Garden

Little Gem Lettuce

Beets

Radishes

Spring Has Sprung?

Has spring come early to SoCal? We had rain and cool temps last month and even this month. But, in the last several days, there has been a high pressure system over the west so now we have unusually warm weather. It's hard to complain too much about gloriously warm days (70s and 80s) and sunny skies when the east coast has been blanketed with snow, but the plants are confused. And, the most confused seem to be our apple trees. They are blooming and it's mid-February. This is not normal. March, yes. February, no. They look beautiful though and are a buzz with bees. But, I worry about how they will fare when the weather gets cool again and rains return...which should be later this week. But, for now, we are enjoying the show.

Rain Finally Arrives in Sunny SoCal

After a long wait, it looks like the southern California rainy season has finally arrived. It has been raining steadily since last night. And, it is supposed to last all week. We desperately need this water in our drought stricken land and this is a nice way to start the new year. Though my heart goes out to those in the burn areas since this rain could create more hardships for them.

I will say the garden is loving the rain. Well, at least at the moment, it is loving it. I do worry that if the rain continues all week and if the precipitation is too long and too hard that we may have a few casualties. Lettuces and other delicate plants can only take so much pummeling from above.

According to one set of forecasts from AccuWeather, we may have rain next week as well. There was a prediction of an El Nino condition this rainy season...may be this is the beginning.

The Last Days of Fall

Fall is my favorite season. I will be sad to see it end on the winter solstice, December 21. Because we live in Southern California, we are blessed to be able to garden all year round. So, even though we will be heading into winter soon, the garden is still flourishing.

Our Meyer Lemons are ripening up and a few should be ready to be plucked in a few days. I'm thinking that lemon shortbread cookies would be the a nice choice to use them in. And, the arugula has been growing like crazy. I will need to harvest some soon. There is even a good chance that a couple of radishes will be ready as well.

Tomorrow is supposed to bring some more and much needed rain to our drought stricken city. The garden will be grateful.

Oh, and I'm grateful, that for the moment, the squirrels have stopped digging in the lettuce bed.

Cranberry Sauce with Port and Cinnamon

I love Thanksgiving. It is one of my favorite holidays. I have been hosting a Thanksgiving dinner for 21 consecutive years, until now. This year, I am taking a sabbatical. Dan could not be happier about this decision. Having recently been laid off from my job of the last two plus years, has also taken the wind out of my sails a bit so I am relieved as well. So, I'll be taking it "easy" for once and just preparing a few things to take to a friend's house instead.

One of those things is Cranberry Sauce with Port and Cinnamon. The recipe is from a Bon Appetit November issue from a couple of years ago.

Cranberry Sauce with Port and Cinnamon

(from Bon Appetit)

1 cup of ruby Port

2 cinnamon sticks

1 cup dried cranberries (about 6 ounces)

1 12 ounce bag of fresh cranberries

3/4 cup of water

1/4 cup sugar

1. Bring ruby Port and cinnamon sticks to a boil in a heavy medium saucepan. Reduce heat to medium and simmer mixture for 5 minutes.

2. Add dried cranberries to saucepan; simmer until slightly softened, about 3 minutes. Add fresh cranberries, 3/4 cup water, and sugar; bring to boil, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat to medium-low; cover and simmer until cranberry sauce thickens and is darker in color and berries collapse, stirring often, about 20 minutes.

3. Transfer sauce to bowl; cool. Discard cinnamon sticks.

Do ahead: Can be made 3 days ahead. Cover and chill. Bring to room temperature before serving.

Been Away So Long

It has been almost two months since I did my last post. I feel terribly guilty about it. A lot has happened since then and the biggest thing being that I have been laid off from my job. So, since I have a bit more free time on my hands, there is no excuse for not keeping this blog more up to date. I will have a new post a bit later today about my cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving.

Starting from Seed

It's now September, so Dan and I thought we should get started on planting some late fall and winter veggies in the garden. But, this time instead of working with transplants, we decided to start from seed. This is a first for both of us so we'll be keeping our fingers crossed that this little experiment works.

We selected a number of greens and root vegetables and discovered that only a few of them should be started indoors. The rest need to be sown outside. We just finished assembling the little seed pots and planting the seeds for Red Velvet Lettuce, Little Gem Lettuce (a mini-Romaine), Oak Leaf Lettuce and Black Tuscan Kale. Five little pots of each.

In a couple of more weeks, we will prepare the beds and sow the rest of the seeds directly into the soil. Right now, it's still too hot in sunny L.A. during the day and too warm at night to get the rest started. But, with any luck the weather will start to get a bit milder as we move closer to fall.

The other veggies we'll be growing are Bordeaux Spinach, Detroit Dark Red Beets, Easter Egg Radishes, Scarlet Nantes Carrots, Five Color Silverbeet Swiss Chard and Arugula. With any luck, we'll be able to provide some of our own produce for Thanksgiving this year.