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Garden Activities

Pruning fruit trees & grape vines - trimming up the herbs. Garden planning & seed shopping season!

Raking up leaves around the trees - no use letting them go to waste on the grass!

Planting a few extra garlic cloves in pots. They make nice gifts!

What’s Happenin’ in the Kitchen?

Kale, kale, and more kale! Combined with garlic, of course! With chicken, cauliflower, over pasta, in stir-fries…you name it. Kale rules!

Homemade bone-broth soup with ham, beans, carrots, onions, kale - a chilly day - perfect for hot soup!

More dried apples & gingerbread w/molasses & fresh chopped ginger - yum!

Pumpkin custard with whipped raw cream…yum! Thank you Dungeness Valley Creamery!

Homegrown potato-leek soup w/shallots :P I Love soup weather!

MORE dog biscuits! "Woof!"

Drying apples

What I’m Reading

Creating a Forest Garden - $49.95
Retail Price: $59.95
(You Save: $10.00)
from: Chelsea Green Publishing
An amazing book! Click the link above to buy from Chelsea Green - or go to the Bookstore for a quick link to Amazon.

Chelsea Green Publishing

Chelsea Green Publishing - the leading publisher of sustainable living books since 1985.

Weather – What’s Going On Out There?

Such a warm streak over the past few days! Great for getting the grapes and fruit trees pruned!

Garlic Under Snow

Snowstorm in the PNW! The garlic is under a blanket. Here’s a good recipe for a simple high-energy food mix for the birds.

Garlic is UP! and Much about Mulch

Garlic is up and growing strong! This year, we did not apply mulch to the garlic beds. Mulch is the new mantra for a lot of people – we say, that depends…

How to Plant Garlic Bulbils

Here’s how I recently planted garlic bulbils – those little seed-like clusters in the scapes. Planting scapes is a great way to increase your crop at a low price. Can you still plant them? Yes, I think so, but you may want to wait for the snow to melt if you’re on the Olympic Peninsula! I am sure there will be warmer days ahead if you still need to get them in the ground.

Time Again to Plant Garlic

Frost is on the pumpkin and it’s time to plant garlic! I am going back to basics this year – keeping it simple. This post is all about planting garlic: planning, building beds, enriching the soil, planting, and mulching.

Artichoke Beauty and the Art of Aioli

We have artichokes! Celebrate by making your own aioli – basically garlic, lemon juice, egg yolks, and olive oil blended together in a smooth mass – to transport yourself into some other realm. It is a night and day difference from the stuff you buy in a jar called mayonnaise. Artichokes – extraordinary thistle that they are – are the perfect partner to this excursion into a gastronomic swoon.

Every Soil Tells a Story

We delve deeper into the whys of a poor garlic crop this year, and although I highly suspect it was a combination of a long wet winter and spring, incessant strong winds, and too thick a mulch, I thought it might be a good idea to buy an NPK soil-test kit and see what the soil could tell me.

The Good, the Bad, and the Downright Ugly

Think your garlic crop is a disaster? Look again. There might be something worth saving.

St. James Infirmary (Ode-to-Garlic) Blues

A sad farewell to my garlic crop, which did not do well this year. And a thank you to all the frogs that spontaneously joined me in my song.

When All Else Fails, Buy Plants

A little retail therapy helped offset the dreary weather and having to face a very poor garlic crop. Sad day. Looking for some bright spots amidst a lot of bulbs that rotted in the ground. Looking for reasons why. Even after over 30 years of growing this stuff, gardening is always such a learning process, huh.

Scapes, Scallions, and the Scarcity of Spring

In this post, I confess to having a serious case of scape envy, based on reports I am getting from others whose garlic plants are already producing those delectable scapes. Want to know the difference between scapes, scallions, and “green garlic” and how elephant garlic fits in to this picture? I’ll try to unravel some of that for you. And if you’re wondering what to do with your scapes, stay tuned for my upcoming cookbook!