American Potager

pasta with spinach and feta cheese

    

 

  

    Spinach and Swiss chard are the cool season vegetables that are abundant in the kitchen garden now. Lately I've been mad about spinach and I've been fixing it every which way. On Thursday, my good friend, Rob Lamp shot some footage for a short video we're working on. That day we made Quick Spanokopita which you can find here. I have also been making spinach pizza with garlic and goat cheese. Today, it's Pasta with Spinach and Feta Cheese. 

    The fall asters, late coneflowers and black eyed Susan's have been long gone from my November garden in spite of Indian summer and temperatures in the 70s. So todays fall table arrangement is Swiss chard plopped in a vase. 

Pasta with Spinach and Goat Cheese

5-6 cups fresh spinach

1/3 cup (or so) of extra virgin olive oil

3 cloves fresh garlic, minced

1/2 cup walnuts (optional)

8 oz feta cheese

1 lb of Italian pasta, cooked to al dente and drained

Fresh ground pepper to taste

 

    Coarsely chop the spinach and walnuts. Swirl the olive oil in a large frying over medium high heat. Add the garlic and saute for a few minutes but do not brown. Add the spinach and walnuts and cook and stir just until the spinach is wilted. 

    Add the cooked pasta to the same pan. Crumble up the feta cheese and stir. Serve immediately with a glass of wine and a vase of Swiss chard in the garden.

 

apple pie comfort

    The last few weeks we have been collecting suitcases loaned out to friends, closing old accounts and consolidating belongings so they weigh under fifty pounds. My youngest son will be working in Japan for a year and I have been trying to not interfere with his packing. Last night we savored a family meal with his brothers and favorite foods including a pie with apples from our own trees.

    Today I dropped him off at the airport, followed him with my blurry eyes until he turned the corner to the gate, went home and ate the last piece of apple pie. Served à la mode, of course. Godspeed, Travis.

hedge apples and pomegranates

 

 

 

 

    We gave a baby shower for my daughter and invited close friends and family to the formal tea. The arrangements for the table and at the front door couldn't have been simpler- nor less expensive. Sure, we bought the pomegranates at the grocery store because they don't grow here in central Ohio. Everything else came from the garden.                                                                                      

    Hedge apples come from Osage-orange trees; small, dense trees planted as hedge rows throughout the Midwest. The trees are not particularly attractive and they do have thorns. To some the wrinkled fruits will be a nuisance. To me they produce simple and elegant decorations for the home. The chartreuse fruit is extremely fragrant and a bowlful is heavenly.

american cranberry bush viburnum

    Viburnum trilobum 'Bailey's Compact' is planted right outside my potager picket fence. I am impatiently waiting for these native shrubs to grow into a nice hedge. I am also impatiently waiting for the shrubs to produce berries. I can't quite understand it.... no bright red edible berries.... this season or last. Is the tag wrong? Do I need another American cranberry bush viburnum? Until I get it sorted out I am enjoying the vibrant fall color. My last post was about green walls. This plant creates seasonal red walls for the kitchen garden if you are architecturally or spatially inclined.

a november walk through central park

    These American elms line the grand promenade of Central Park, just as the landscape architects Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux envisioned. These are not the trees planted when the park was designed in 1858. These were planted as saplings in the 1920s to replace the original trees. The form of the trees is so elegant revealed in the bareness of late fall. The dark bark contrasts with the misty gray sky of a late evening. The majestic native American elm (Ulmus americana) was once widely planted but now has declined because of Dutch elm disease.

serendipitous sassafras

    Do you recognize these leaves? Look carefully- you can spot a variety of shapes- single lobe, mitten, and tri-lobed- all on the same tree. Sassafras albidum is a great native tree that brings back childhood memories of walking the woods to find the fragrant root beer bark. I  found this sapling growing in the middle of my garden between the hibiscus and hydrangea. A pleasant surprise that certainly foreshadows some good fortune. I am lucky to find such a tree and will cultivate this sapling in my perennial border, right where it by chance decided to grow.

I hope you transplanted your rosemary.

    Fall chores are always much more fun when the weather is warm and sunny. Here in Ohio we're past that and I still haven't planted my garlic or moved my rosemary indoors. I did plant some ornamental cabbage with pansies, thyme and sage to take me through the cool weather.
    There are still transitional plants growing in my potager... the calendula is still blooming, the flat leaf Italian parsley is still green. The 'Bull's Blood' beets are cool and happy. The 'Bright Lights' and 'Monstruoso' Swiss chard are colorful and thriving. I just harvested some yesterday.... stems and leaves, sliced them, quickly sauted them in Greek olive oil with garlic and fresh parsley and served it all over pasta. That is pretty much the mac and cheese staple here- something from the garden, great olive oil, fresh garlic and Italian pasta- oh and fresh parmesan. Maybe a glass of wine.
    I am experimenting with cloches- I've planted some cool season varieties like mustard, kale and arugula under glass. If the weather doesn't turn too cold too fast, I may have some fall micro greens, even in cloudy zone 5.

it's over and done with

    The basil is tinged with black and tomatoes are rotting. There are a few healthy green tomatoes that have survived the mild frosts and I pick them with every intention of dipping in egg, then bread crumbs and frying until crisp and brown. I tear down bean vines and rip up the woody, still fragrant basil. Everything goes in the compost. The season is over and these cleansing chores are cleansing for the soul as well. It feels empowering; like I am really accomplishing something.