Report From An Opinionated Gardener – November 10
We’re on the slippery slope to Thanksgiving and right around the corner is the New Year. Here on Cape Cod there was a hard freeze last week and on Monday we awoke to a light coating of snow on the ground. You might assume that the vegetable garden is far from anyone’s mind, but think again.
Tonight I was blessed to be able to go to the root cellar and bring some of the Cranberry Red and yellow Carola potatoes we grew this summer up to the kitchen. I sliced them very thinly with a mandolin, added some of our garlic and some ricotta salata (you can use any cheese you have on hand…goat cheese is especially good) and just covered all of this with milk.
After baking until the potatoes were just soft (35 minutes or so) the dish was done. We served this with our thin green beans that were frozen last July and American lamb chops.
As I was preparing this dinner I was thinking about an email I’d just received from Garden Media Group. This press release was about trends in gardening, and they were highlighting Gardening With A Purpose.
More and more people are turning to gardening in order to grow safe, healthy and tasty food. This is just one of the gifts from the garden, of course, but something that I’m especially grateful for as the days grow short and cold.
If you have a cool space to store root crops (we have a room off of the basement) and a freezer, you’ll be able to “harvest” your homegrown vegetables all winter. Whether you’ve grown your own veggies or not, it isn’t too early to start planning for your garden-with-a-purpose for 2011.
Yes, we started off the week with a coating of snow at Poison Ivy Acres...
but the potatoes from Wood Prairie Farm keep the summer in our minds and mouths.
