I’m so excited, the new kale seeds are sprouting, the snow pea sprouts are a little taller, the rhubarb is going crazy and I bought my last tomato start and now the green house  is close to full. I still need to plant basil, and soon the squash sprouts will need to be transplanted.

I know some of you are saying “why go to all the work of gardening” and some days I ask myself that same question.  Especially when I came outside the other evening to water the garden only to discover we had been visited attacked by an unwanted guest, make that plural, guests.  Raccoons in their stealthy little ways decided my greenhouse and freshly planted potatoes in the garden were fair game. I was shocked, and offended, it was like a thief had broken into my house and ransacked it.  Okay,  so that might be a little extreme but after all that work of preparing the soil and planting, only to see my tender tomato plants tossed here and there, the parsley starts just thrown around.  Dirt scattered in many places it didn’t belong.  Seed potatoes extracted yanked from the cozy soil and pitched aside.  Please understand my drama:)

Evidently this masked face furry thief wasn’t as interested in my vegetable starts as he was the scent of the Dr. Earth fertilizer I had used.  Since it is fish based, just the scent of it, of which I can’t smell, must have attracted him and a sibling or two.  Wonder if he was disappointed when at the bottom of his digging he didn’t find nice fresh fish hiding under my tomato plant?  Needless to say I will be doing a better job at making sure the doors  to the greenhouse are closed at night.

I garden for many reasons, its cheap therapy.  I mean can you go to the grocery store and get the same results of fresh air, sunshine, and exercise, well maybe if you count walking to and from your car and up and down the grocery aisles.

It’s rewarding to go out to my garden and pick this chard which had wintered over and went crazy at the first month with some sunshine.  Chard is a cool weather crop and besides being beautiful with its vibrant pink stems (of which are also loaded with nutrients) it is versatile in its uses. In smoothies,  and salads, as a side dish.

 One of my favorite ways to use my chard is to make Mediterranean Chard, from The Whole Life Nutrition cookbook.

It has got to be my favorite cookbook, I call it my cookbook bible.  Tom and Ali over at Nourishing meals have written a wealth of recipes in this cookbook, it’s also a valuable reference tool with all the added nutrition information they have added to it.

Adapted from The Whole Life Nutrition Cookbook

 

Tags:  chard kalamata olives pinenuts