On the upside, not running for the vice presidency frees me up to do some harvesting and cooking and writing. Along these lines, we had some great food over the past few days, all of it organic and grown under our watchful eyes. This weekend, Dennis and I consumed:
- Thin slices of eggplant brushed lightly with olive oil, sprinkled with sea salt, and seared over hot coals.
- A mixture of Italian parsley, lemon basil and oregano pureed with meyer lemon juice and oil and poured, as a marinade, over chicken legs about to be grilled.
- Sweet cherry tomatoes and a jalapeno or two sauteed together with a piece of sole and then wrapped in corn tortillas for fish tacos with a little kick.
- Tiny concord grapes, well chilled to enhance their sweet-tart balance.
You can see from this list that the garden was broadening and transitioning this week. We are finally moving away from our over abundance of red tomatoes toward a more purple bounty, evidenced in the eggplants and the grapes. Since the tomatoes vines have been undeniably (and mercifully) winding down, I secured my husband's (reluctant) agreement that they could go.
The moment that Dennis signed onto this plan, I gleefully shot off an e-mail to the landscaper, telling him to bring his crew back to our house ASAP to finish our project, work that this season's prolific tomato plants had literally obstructed. Once the tomatoes are finally put to rest, the landscaper will install some raised planting beds and a square patch of sod. The new beds will be great for all kinds of food and flowers, including next summer's tomatoes. As for the sod, the dog has been yearning for a small patch of grass to call her own. How can I deny her that?
It's no secret that I'm not a gardener, and I'm out on a limb with much of this. Along with a few successes, I've had to cope with plant death, too. Yesterday, I pulled out the sage plants that had withered. I've also realized that I absolutely must pay more attention to the lavender. I know that lavender thrives in Provence where the summers can be really hot, but this dainty French import has been threatening to expire from too much California sun. It seems to be calling out for extra hydration. Perhaps it wants an Evian.
Mostly, this gardening experiment has been proceeding through trial and error, but there's room for optimism. If the past weekend was any indication, home-grown produce will continue to make its way to my table. Now my question is whether raising backyard edibles somehow negates the environmental costs of the three Australian oranges presently cooling their skins in my refrigerator. I suppose I should abstain from the distantly grown, but we all have our indulgences, n'est pas?
