Perennial Vegetable Corner: Asparagus

Asparagus officinalis

Asparagus is one of the more familiar offerings on this visitation to various choices in perennial vegetable gardening.  This succulent vegetable is loved or hated in our American cuisine.  One of the oldest vegetables on record, it grows well in our region.  The following website has an excellent overview of establishing your asparagus patch:

Michigan Asparagus Advisory Board

Varieties original to the United States are Mary, Martha, and Waltham Washington.  Hybrid varieties provide more male plants than female and are the Jersey Giant, Jersey Knight, Jersey Supreme and Jersey Gem varieties.  Other varieties are available in the southern United States and Canada, but the Canadian varieties may not be available to the home gardener at this time.  Purple passion, pacific purple and other purple varieties have been selected for a genetic color mutation but turn green with cooking.  White varieties are the normal varieties that have been "blanched" by mechanical means by the gardener.

Suppliers:

Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds

Territorial Seed

Grow Organic

Perennial Vegetable Corner: Groundnut

Apios americana also known as Groundnut

A vine native to North America, the groundnut has edible beans and tubers.  Tubers are crunchy and nutritious and have high quantities of starch and protein.  Before the European settlement of this continent, native Americans got the majority of their crop from the wild.  Documentation does show that some tribes did transplant these vines near their settlements to make harvesting easier.  I have not tried to cultivate these but it appears that they would be a good companion plant with the ramps we talked about recently.  Interested in starting a growth of these in the city?  Let us know how it goes for you!

Suppliers:

Sand Mountain Herbs

Local Harvest

Perennial Vegetable Corner: Garlic chives

Allium tuberosum also known as Garlic chives

The last in our perennial allium family, garlic chives are a versatile contributor to the garden.  Easily grown from seed or by separating clumps, this is a carefree addition to the garden.  The flowers also provide for a pleasant addition to the landscape.  The flavor is mild and a cross between garlic and chives.  These are an excellent pot herb or garnish.  Flowers make an excellent garnish and bloom in mid to late summer.  There are even companies that produce and extract for it's aphrodisiac properties.

Suppliers:

Swallowtail Gardens

Local Harvest

Victory Seeds

Perennial Vegetable Corner: Ramps

Allium tricoccum also known as Ramps

Ramps are an early spring vegetable of the onion family.  They have a strong garlic odor and pronounced onion flavor.  The mountain folk of Appalachia have long celebrated spring with the arrival of the ramp, believing it to have great power as a tonic to ward off many ailments of winter. Indeed, ramp's vitamin and mineral content did bolster the health of people who went without many green vegetables during the winter.  These delicious greens can be pulled straight out of the ground and nibbled on by those with a passion for strong tastes.  Chopped they may be used in various cuisines.  Excellent paired with eggs or in stir fries, many people develop a passionate love of these vegetables after being introduced to their robust flavor.  Ramps grow wild all over the United States and a patch can be introduced to your backyard by transplanting a clump to fill in some of the shady spaces.  When picking out your space, look for dappled light or shade and plant in a wood chip rich area.   Recently, the Carondelet Urban Farm went on a field trip to Macoupin County, Illinois to dig bushels of ramps.  It was an exciting and taste filled day.  We have had some discussion of what we actually dug up and are awaiting expert opinion on what we brought home to transplant.  Ramps are a great plant to tuck in your landscape and nibble on in the spring of the year.

Suppliers:

Prairie Moon Nursery

Ramp Farm Specialties

Everwilde Farms

Garden Chores for July

It's July and you don't know what to do.  It's hot, the spring plantings are going to seed and it's time to move on.   Here's an easy list of ideas:

1.  Fill your empty spots with fall plantings.  Beets, carrots, beans, chard, endive, kale, kohlrabi, lettuce, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, late cabbage, cauliflower, late beets, celery, turnips, radishes, spinach and others.

2.  Dig in plenty of compost in your empty spaces.

3.  Check the number of frostless days left and plan accordingly.

4.  Mulch, mulch, mulch.  We are going into the dry part of the season, conserve all the water you can.  Mulch will keep down your weeds and lessen the amount your soil changes temperature.  Mulch will also keep ripened fruit from going bad on the ground.

5.  Get your canning equipment together.  Stage your jars, wash everything and clear your shelves for storage.

6.  Renovate your June bearing strawberry beds.

7.  Raspberries - remove 3-4 inches of shoot tips on new growth to encourage branching and cut out canes that just finished fruiting.

8.  Mulch around fruit bearing trees.

9.  Fertilize and dead head flowers to promote new blooms.

10.  Harvest herb leaves for drying before they start to bloom.

11.  Stop harvesting asparagus and rhubarb.

12.  Water at least weekly during dry spells.

13.  Keep tomatoes irrigated regularly to reduce blossom end rot.

14.  It's a good time to plant delphinium, daisies, forget-me-knots, pansies, lupines, dianthus, wall flowers, snapdragons, columbines, poppies, and evening primrose.

15.  Deadhead your roses

16.  Prune wisteria back hard.

17.  Feed all perennials, shrubs, and trees.

18.  Plant rhubarb, shallots, egyptian walking onions, and fava beans for harvest next season. (I usually wait for later due to frequent late winters here in St. Louis)

19.  Transplant strawberries that have rooted from runners.


Here's another excellent blog about what to do now:  A Way To Garden

Garlic of the Day - California Early

Todays Garlic of the day is .... the California Early !
This one of the two Gilroy cultivars is the one you're least likely to find in the local supermarkets because it is processed into dried and pickled and otherwise processed garlic products. California Early is a little bigger and sweeter than California Late, which is definitely on the hot side. Cal Early is said to be very early maturing but it seems to be more of a mid-artichoke-season garlic for us, though it is a prolific grower and a good commercial garlic. It does seem to tolerate our hot spring weather well and stores well also.

I was pleasantly surprised by how much better our Cal Early garlic was than the ones we bought in the stores. The difference our healthy soil and careful handling makes is phenomenal.When grown and harvested properly, Cal Early is an excellent all- around general use garlic and a wonderful baker.

It ranks 4-5 on the garlickiness scale and 3-4 on the pungency side. It has a semi-rich flavor and a little bite, but is still on the light side.

It's a very good growers garlic as it has many large cloves (even the innermost cloves are of good size) and it stores well under proper conditions. The Gilroy growers knew good garlic when they saw it, it was their agricultural practices and resulting soil conditions that made the difference.

 

Garlic of the Day - Paw Paw Garlic

Todays Garlic of the day is ...... The Paw Paw Garlic 

The rich, mellow Rocambole hardneck Garlic of the Midwest.

Rocamboles grow better in cold winter gardens.

Harvests in early summer - stores through fall into winter.

Paw Paw is rare because it is a full flavored mellow Rocambole with little or no hotness to the taste - excellent for Pesto.

Paw Paw is a generally good sized and can be a rather large garlic. Its flavor is rich and mellow like shallots but almost buttery and not hot or spicy and a warm pleasant aftertaste sticks around for a while. A very enriching taste experience and not one to burn your tongue.

From a grower's perspective, it grows well in cold winter areas and usually grows healthy surprisingly uniform sized bulbs. It has thick bulb wrappers for a rocambole and they have a lot of purple and brown layered across a white background - very attractive.

Paw Paw usually has anywhere from 8 or 9 easy to peel cloves that are of good size, with no smaller inner cloves. The outer bulb wrappers are thin and flake off easily so it is not a very good storer, but no Rocambole is. For those up north who want to grow their own garlic, it is said to grow well in wet conditions. It only takes a year or two to grow all you can eat. It harvests in early mid-season (Julyish) along with most of the other Rocamboles. Bulbs are usually over 2 1/2 inches in diameter and are of good size are grown primarily for their rich flavor and good growing characteristics.

Garlic of the Day - Applegate

Todays Garlic of the day is Applegate :
Harvests in early summer - stores into mid-winter

Applegate is a superb mild garlic that is excellent for raw eating as in pesto or added as something crunchy to tuna or chicken salad (it's that mild) or cooking where you want only the most delicate hint of garlic in your dish.

Applegate is an early harvesting fairly good storing garlic but should be grown in conjunction with a longer storing Porcelain or Silverwhite in order to be able to have good garlic year around.

Extremes of weather, such as extra cold or dry winters or high temperatures in the early spring can make it a warmer and stronger garlic. It is a wonderful garlic and I highly recommend it for those who love good tasting mild garlic. It is well worth growing and is a fairly early maturing garlic which you can be enjoying while most of the others are still in the ground.

Applegate is a good garlic to grow in warm winter areas.

 

Garlic of the Day - Sonoran

Todays garlic of the day is the classic ...Sonoran
Sonoran harvests VERY early - late spring to early Summer - stores until around November-December.

Sonoran is very early harvesting so you have garlic before anyone else and it grows well in the great American Southwest from Austin/San Antonio all the way to San Diego. If it grows well in the Sonoran Desert, for which it is named, it should grow well for you.
Growing it in conjunction with a longer storing garlic like Ajo Rojo may mean you never run out of good garlic.

Asiatic garlics typically have six to ten cloves per bulb in a circular configuration around a central scape. They're generally large bulbs with fat cloves. The bulb wrappers are firm, tight and vivid with broad, bold purple stripes merging into areas of solid purple. A very strongly colored garlic. The clove covers are a silky golden tan with a rosy aura. It is one of the very first cultivars planted in the fall and the first harvested in the spring around here. The taste puts it in a class almost by itself.

When you first bite into a clove there is a beautiful musky garlic flavor that has just enough pungency (hotness) to let you know it is real garlic but not enough to be offensive so you settle back and enjoy the marvelous flavor. And after a minute or so, the rich garlickiness is replaced with a smooth warm aftertaste that just makes you feel good.

If you are looking for an early season garlic that harvests before any of the others and is great for raw eating and stores about six months from harvest at room temp., this one is for you.

Garlic of the Day - Chesnok Red

todays Garlic of the day is ...... The Chesnok Red
Chesnok Red is yet another one of the garlics from the Republic of Georgia in the former USSR. Chesnok is a standard Purple Stripe and has the typical heavy purple striping that gives this variety its name. They have about as much purple as Rocamboles but the background color of the bulb wrappers is much more whitish, making for a very attractive appearance. Chesnok Red can become a rather large garlic with excellent growing conditions.

The outer bulb wrappers are a little thin & loose, but the more you peel away, the thicker and tighter they get (makes the bulb wrappers easy to peel). Once the cloves are revealed, they are seen to be large and with long thin points and are all milky white with cranberry-colored streaks up the outsides of the cloves whike the edges between the cloves are nearly solid cranberry and the elongated tips rather tannish. Large bulbs will have about a dozen cloves and even the inner ones are of good size. They can run an inch or two up the central scape (false stem) and are not only attractive but make the cloves easy to peel.

They have fewer but larger cloves (average of 8 to 10) arranged in a rather circular pattern. Although large bulbs will have about a dozen cloves and even the inner ones are of good size.

Chesnok Red is a full flavored garlic with a mellow aftertaste that sticks around nicely for a while. Best baking garlic and a great all-around garlic. Some years it can be hotter or milder than usual, but it is always fully garlicky.

Chesnok Red is the sweetest roasting garlic of them all; It doesn't just taste not garlicky, it actually tastes sweet. Garlic ice cream made with roasted Chesnok Red has the taste and crunchiness of butter brickle ice cream - try it, it's fabulous

 

Garlic of the Day - Georgian Fire

Introducing the " Georgian fire "
Grows well in most states even some years in Warm Winter Areas, but will be marginal there in years with early hot summers.
Harvests early-mid summer - stores into spring.

Georgian Fire, like most porcelains is a large and beautiful garlic with rich robust flavor that is strong and has an aftertaste that lingers. The clove covers are a light brown streaked with purple From a growers perspective, it is a large and healthy garlic to grow and appears to be relatively resistant to most of the diseases that can affect garlic. It originated in the Republic of Georgia. 

Unusual Favorites of Year's Past

I like to grow the vegetables that produce well for me, but there are a few things that have made it to my plant for the sheer fun of it list.

1.  Ground Cherry - These easy plants may be bought as starts from Seed Savers, or as seed from a variety of sources.  The fruit look like tiny tomatillos and have a tart pineapple taste.  My kids have both stood as toddlers eating them straight off the vine.  They dry well and cook into cookies nicely too.

2.  Cucuzzi Squash - This is an edible gourd. As with most gourds, plant them far from your home.  The vines are long and prolific.  They bear a lovely baseball bat size gourd that can be eaten when picked young. Even if you look every day, these will sneak up and scare you by not being there one day and being the size of your leg the next.

3.  Burgundy Okra - Lovely and tall, this is a wonderful plant to grace the garden.  These okra are more tender than others and have a wonderful flavor raw or cooked.  Instant ticket to feeling like you are the best gardener out there.  Pretty and huge.

4.  Red Chinese Long Bean - This yard long bean grows quickly and easily.  Tasty in bean salads and numerous other recipes, this bean loves the warm weather and needs a fairly tall trellis.

5.  Cardoon - A relative of the artichoke, these must be started indoors due to the long season that they need.  I rarely actually eat these which is a shame, but I love their exotic look.  It's a bit finicky, but the years they succeed, they provide a lovely accent to the garden.

Garlic of the Day - Amish

Todays Garlic of the day is the Amish ....Harvests early-mid summer - stores through fall into winter.
Amish Rocambole may be an heirloom garlic, who knows? (a garden plant whose lineage can be traced for a 100 years or more) It is a generally a vigorous grower with large foliage that is dark green and results in a pretty good sized bulb. Being a Rocambole garlic, its flavor is very strong, hot and spicy and sticks around for a long time. From a growers perspective, it grows well in cold winter areas, but does poorly in warm winter areas, and usually grows healthy fairly uniform sized bulbs. It has thin bulb wrappers that have a lot of purple and brown .Amish Rocambole usually has anywhere from 8 or 9 easy to peel cloves that are of good size, with no smaller inner cloves. The outer bulb wrappers are thin and flake off easily so it is not a very good storer, but no Rocambole is - through the fall and into winter. Great taste is their claim to fame, not long storage. For those up North who want to grow their own garlic it only takes a year or two to grow all you can eat. It harvests in early summer along with most of the other Rocamboles. Bulbs are usually over 2 1/2 inches in diameter and are of good size are grown primarily for their particularly rich flavor.

Garlic of the Day - Rogue River Red

Todays Garlic of the day is.... Rogue River Red !! 
Rogue River red is an early-mid season harvesting medium-rich flavored and medium pungent softneck Artichoke with straw-colored clove covers and often a lot of purplish color to the bulb wrappers. Excellent all-around garlic that can be braided and stores into mid-winter.

It is good to grow these along with Porcelains or Silverskin garlics so you can have both early season and longer storing kinds. You may not ever run out of good garlic.

Grows very well in most of the USA and can even be grown in warm winter areas quite well.

Welcome to the blog

Thanks for following us!  This is the site of our new blog following the activities of the Carondelet Garden Urban Farm.  Our mission is to grow and share food and the knowledge and skills you need to do the same.

Join us for our free class series and on our project days.  Mark your calender for the upcoming Garlic Fest, and feel free to contact us with any questions.

Please subscribe to our blog and recommend us to friends.  We love garlic, but hopefully we can help you in your journey through growing all kind of food!