Gardening Lessons from TV

Jess: Don't you want to know why he wants to plant tomatoes?
Winston: Is it because he wants... tomatoes?
Nick: This is my feeble attempt at a new beginning.

~New Girl, air date 4/24/12

Since starting this blog I’ve been hyper aware of all things garden related so I was excited to see a garden themed plot on one of my favorite shows, New Girl.  Basically lovable loser Nick decides to grow a tomato plant to deal with the fact that all his roommates are in happy relationships of some sort.  While his methods of tomato growing are slightly unorthodox (he spits water onto the plant and builds a super creepy scarecrow to deter the rooftop birds), it’s clear that he does care about this little plant doing well.  This isn’t the first time we’ve seen Nick base at least some of his self esteem on his ability to keep a plant alive.  Any fellow New Girl fans remember the whole Julia/cactus debacle?  I find it very interesting the level of importance he puts on this plant and how he is substituting its success for any other success in his own life.

I think a lot of us backyard gardeners also can get overly invested in the health and success of our plants.  There is something so satisfying about watching a huge plant grow from a tiny seed.  But conversely, if our garden is less than successful, we can get extremely disappointed.  Last summer the tomatoes at my parents' house got blossom end rot (just as gross as it sounds) and at least half of the tomatoes were ruined.  I was so bummed by this setback that I couldn’t really focus on all the other things in the garden that were growing so well.  I think farmers must be used to this kind of thing since they work on such a large scale, but for me it always feels personal. 

This year I’m going to try to be a little more Zen about how things are growing.  We will see how that goes!  

Garden Update: Late April

Inch by inch, row by row
Gonna make this garden grow
~Peter, Paul and Mary

It's been about 3 weeks since I planted my garden and I'm already getting excited by how well it's growing.  Although it is still pretty early (i.e. cold) in the season for gardens in Illinois, I'm very encouraged by how well my little plants are doing.

What growing now: Late April

The biggest change in the garden is that I had to replant my herbs in bigger pots.  I had planned to keep them in this cute little 3 pot planter, but they were already getting too big for it. The parsley especially wasn't doing very well in the small pot.  The leaves kept wilting and turning yellow.  Its doing much better since I moved it to a bigger pot and has a bunch of new leaves coming in.  All of the herbs have been growing well and they seem big and sturdy enough now for me to start harvesting some to cook with.

Parsley

Chives

Orange Mint

Dill

Thyme

You can really tell in this picture of the thyme how my plants have been growing in the direction of the sun.  I have been turning the pots fairly often to try to help them get sun on all sides of the plant.

The strawberry plant has been growing a bunch of new leaves too.  And 2 tiny berries and a flower!  Serious gardeners tell you to remove the first couple berries to help the plant grow stronger and have a bigger yield later, but I haven't been able to bring myself to do it yet.

The lettuce and spinach seem to be doing well.  They still seem very fragile and delicate (actually 'wimpy' is the word I keep using) so I'll be excited when they get stronger and more substantial.

Lettuce

Spinach

The cubanelle pepper plant has been my 'problem child' in the garden so far.  It has been extremely finicky.  It hasn't been growing as fast as all the others and it wilts constantly so I have it water it more often than the rest of the plants.  In the last few days though it has seemed more stable so hopefully it won't give me much more trouble.

Finally, the tomato plant has been growing very well.  It also seems very hardy so far which has been nice.  I don't have to do too much to it and it just keeps getting more leaves.

Black cherry tomato

The tomato plant also is getting these little buds, which I'm pretty sure are going to eventually open up into flowers.

Coming soon...updates on the flowers in the garden!

Earth Day

There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew. 

~Marshall McLuhan Communications theorist, educator, philosopher

Happy Earth Day!

As a garden blogger, I can’t let Earth Day pass unacknowledged.  It’s become very trendy in the past few years to be ‘green’ but I don’t think enough people really think about what it means to them personally.  The fact is everything we do on this planet affects it in some way.  If we decide to only buy organic, then we might spend more gas driving to the Whole Foods than if we just stayed closer to home and bought regular produce.  If we use only cloth diapers to keep disposables out of landfills, then we are using more water to keep then clean.  So I think the best thing we can do is make a difference in small ways that are meaningful to us and not get too caught up in doing things perfectly. 

For me, it’s about not being wasteful.  So in the spirit of not wasting things I’m sharing my ‘recipe’ for slow cooker stock.  This is a great way to use up those odds and ends of vegetables and meats.  It’s not so much  a recipe as a method so feel free to substitute what you have.


Slow Cooker Stock

• Start by adding 5-6 cups of water to a slow cooker
• Then add any odds and ends from vegetables, any leftover herbs, shrimp shells, chicken bones, Thanksgiving turkey carcass… basically whatever you have.  I keep a bag in my freezer and when I’m finished chopping vegetables or herbs and just have the ends of carrots or onions or whatever left I toss them in the bag.  When the bag is full, I make stock.
• Add salt if you like.  This is totally optional.
• Cook on low for about 6-8 hours.  Strain into quart jars (makes about 2 quarts) and use within a few days or freeze.

Space Saving

Well, now that he's finished one building, he'll go write four books about it.
~Frank Lloyd Wright

I’m having a minor space problem on my balcony.  The problem is that I want to keep buying plants, but I only have so much space to put them.  Only the very front edge of the balcony gets any sun so all my herbs and vegetables have to stay there.  And I share it with my neighbors so they get half of the only sunny spot I can plant in.  And while they have commented that my plants look nice, I doubt they enjoy them enough to want to give up any of their space to feed my plant addiction!

However, I have come up with a solution to cram more plants into a small space.  And as a bonus, its super easy.  Can you guess what it is?

Before

After

Stacked planters!  So simple, I don’t know why I didn’t think of this earlier.  All I did was take 2 planters of different sizes, fill the bottom planter with dirt, and then stack the smaller one on top.

Here is a combo thyme, lavender and dill (another new garden addition) planter…

And this one looks empty, but it is actually planted with flower seeds that haven’t come up yet.

The really cool thing about this project is that it can be customized to match any décor or taste.  I kept it simple with the same planters I used everywhere else, but there are so many other possibilities.  You could keep it classic with basic terra cotta pots.  Or go modern with sleek black or dark gray square planters.  Or look for mismatched or vintage pots if you are into the shabby chic look. 

You can also customize the number of pots you use to work with whatever your needs are.  If you did 3 or more stacked pots, you could probably fit an entire herb garden in the space of one planter.  I wouldn’t use real terra cotta for that one though because it would get super heavy!

P.S. If you are looking for vintage stuff check out my friend Audrey at The Hepburn House.  She specialized in vintage items and 'found treasures'
http://hepburnhouseblog.blogspot.com/

Questionable Gardening Decisions...Giving into temptation

I can resist everything except temptation.

~Oscar Wilde

So…I bought a new plant yesterday.  I wasn’t planning to at all.  I was only in the garden department to get more potting soil and maybe a few more herbs.  But as I walked to the back of the store I passed by a display of hydrangeas and I knew I was in trouble.  See hydrangeas are one of my favorite flowers, but I’ve never been able to keep them alive and blooming for more than a couple weeks.  And I seriously doubt that I get enough sun on my balcony to grow them now.  But did that stop me?  Nope.  I had that sucker paid for, home and planted within the hour. 

So now I’m hoping that I will at least get a few weeks of blooms before it decides to “kick the bucket” (or more accurately “kick the planter”).  

So pretty...

My precious

New addition to the garden...Lavender

Lavender's blue, dilly dilly, lavender's green,

When I am king, dilly dilly, you shall be queen

~English Folk Song

One of the advantages of finally having my own garden is that I can plant some more unusual plants that never seem to make the cut to be included in my parent's garden.  Lavender is one of those plants.  I've always wanted to try growing it, but my dad can't stand any 'stinky stuff' in the garden so I've never been able to.

Here is what it looks like now:

So mostly leaves at this point, but I found a few tiny buds already.

Even though it isn't flowering yet it still smells amazing.  I didn't realize that the entire plant is fragrant and not just the flowers so that was a very nice surprise!

I'm really looking forward to the recipes and crafts I can create using this lavender.  I hope my friends like lavender sachets...

New addition to the garden...Spinach and Lettuce!

I'm strong to the finich
Cause I eats me spinach.
~Popeye the Sailor Man

About a week and a half ago I planted spinach and lettuce seeds and I just noticed today that they have begun to come up.  We have had some cold days lately and I wasn't sure if it would be warm enough for them to sprout so I was happy to see them doing ok.  I've never grown either of these from seeds before so I don't quite know what to expect.  I only planted in half of the planter because my plan is to plant in the other half in another week or so to try to stagger them a bit.  I like salad, but I'm not sure how much I could eat if it was all ready to pick at once. 

2 tiny spinach plants

Lettuce.  I might have gotten a bit carried away with how many seeds I planted, but they are so tiny and hard to see!

Attack of the Killer Mint

I think you should send us the biggest transport plane you have, and take this thing to the Arctic or somewhere and drop it where it will never thaw.
~The Blob, 1958 version

While this is the first year I am gardening on my balcony (mostly because this is the first year I’ve had a balcony), I am not entirely new to the whole garden experience.  I’ve shared a medium sized garden with my parents at their house for the past few years.  My favorite area is the herb garden.  In the past few years I have tried (unsuccessfully) to grow mint in a container.  I envisioned an endless supply of mojitos to enjoy all summer.  However, we have never had luck growing mint (or really any herbs) in containers so last year we made the bold and potentially foolhardy decision to grow the mint directly in the ground.  If you have never grown mint before you might not know that it is extremely invasive.  Invasive being a nice way of saying that it will take over the entire garden if you turn your back for 5 minutes.  Fortunately we were able to keep it mostly in check last summer.

However, last weekend I went to look at the planters because my mom told me quite casually that “the mint came back this year” and I noticed that we had a situation happening.

Mint explosion!

More mint...Yikes!

I had no idea that it would not only survive the winter, but would have taken over so much by the middle of April.  So needless to say, even after pulling a lot of the more scraggly looking runners out, I had quite a lot of mint to use up.

Since I think my liver would have an issue with me drinking enough mojitos to use all this mint, I decided to make ice cream.

Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream (Adapted from Martha Stewart’s recipe for Fresh Spearmint Ice Cream)

Ingredients

   1 cup packed fresh mint (next time I’ll add more mint as it wasn't quite minty enough for me)

   1 cup whole milk

   2 cups heavy cream

   2 large eggs

   3/4 cup sugar

   Pinch salt

   About a cup mini chocolate chips

Directions

   1.     Prepare an ice-water bath. Cook mint in a small saucepan of boiling water until bright green, about 1 minute. Using a slotted spoon, transfer mint to ice-water bath. When cool, drain, and squeeze out excess water.

   2.     Puree mint and milk in a blender until mint is finely chopped. Transfer to a medium saucepan, add cream, and bring to a simmer over medium heat.

   3.     Meanwhile, whisk together eggs and sugar in a medium bowl.

   4.     Gradually whisk 1/3 of the cream mixture into the egg mixture, then pour egg-cream mixture into the saucepan with the remaining cream mixture. Add salt.  Set over medium heat, and cook, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until thick enough to coat the back of the spoon, about 8 minutes. (Do not let the mixture come to a simmer.)

   5.     Strain through a fine sieve into a heatproof bowl, pressing on mint to extract liquid. Set bowl in ice-water bath. Let cool completely, stirring occasionally. Freeze in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions. Add in chocolate chips in the last 5 minutes of churning time.  Transfer to an airtight container, and freeze until firm.  

Lilacs

With every leaf a miracle . . . and from this bush in the door-yard,  With delicate-colour'd blossoms, and heart-shaped leaves of rich green.  A sprig with its flower, I break.
~Walt Whitman, When Lilacs Last in the Door-Yard Bloom'd  (III, Leaves of Grass)

There are few flowers that remind me more strongly of Spring than lilacs so I was happy to see them still in bloom at my parents' house when I visited them for Easter.  I cut some down and used them to make this simple casual arrangement.  Now my apartment looks like Spring and smells amazing.

I was planning on just using the lilacs, but when I noticed that the purple tulips were blooming I decided to throw some of them in there too.  I love the way the different shades of purple look together.

I added a little bleach and 7-up to the water to make my own flower preservative.  Cut flowers from the garden don’t always last as long as flowers purchased from a florist, but I’ve had good luck with this technique.  For flowers with tough woody stems (like lilacs) I also cut a vertical slit in the end of the stem to help let in more water.

Frost

Last night, there came a frost, which has done great damage to my garden.... It is sad that Nature will play such tricks on us poor mortals, inviting us with sunny smiles to confide in her, and then, when we are entirely within her power, striking us to the heart. 
~Nathaniel Hawthorne, The American Notebooks

One of the joys of April in Illinois is the constantly changing weather.  Two weeks ago the weather was warm and sunny, but today it is windy with a freeze warning in effect for tonight.  My balcony has a deep overhang so my plants are mostly protected from the frost, but I’m covering them just to be safe.

 My balcony looks a little ghetto with all these plastic bags covering it

Welcome to my garden!

This blog is meant to document my attempts to grow flowers, herbs and vegetables on my apartment balcony.  As an early 30-something who is a little bit of a hippie and a lot of a yuppie, the idea of growing my own produce and flowers to use in cooking and decorating appeals to me.  I've always watched Martha Stewart or Ina Garten (The Barefoot Contessa) stroll through their vast backyard gardens with a vague sense of lust.  I love the idea of running out to my yard to pick fresh herbs to finish a dish or to cut some flowers to decorate the table.  Unfortunately, I'm in a small-ish apartment in the far western suburbs of Chicago.  And instead of an expansive plot of land, I have a tiny shady shared balcony.  Still I'm attempting to start a garden. I have no idea how well it will go, but I'm excited to try!






What's growing now: Mid-April

Chives, Thyme and Parsley



Cubanelle Pepper



Black Cherry Tomato

Orange Mint



Strawberry



I got these plastic pots at Target.  I love how they add some color to the boring brown balcony.