Stopping to Smell the Flowers

I took some slow time today, just worn out from a week of hard-at-it work. It's been good to get projects finished and moved into booths but now I'm ready for a little downtime.

So I took another garden walk with my camera. It's interesting how the plants come and go, how the landscape has changed over time. Once I had many more flowerbeds than I now have but full-time work and working on my Masters at the same time took a toll on them. I had to scale back and perhaps that was a good thing because what remains is easy to care for.

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Creasey Greens

It's the season for creasy greens in our area, and that means delicious fresh greens, the first of the season, have been gracing our table.

As we were driving home Sunday afternoon, I spotted a large patch on the side of the road in Calhoun County. you know what I said--"Turn around!" Larry was willing because he likes greens as well or better than I do.

We parked on the side of the road by a little creek, and Larry was soon picking greens. I was too, although what I was picking wasn't creasy greens, it was daylily shoots. I am sure that people passing by laughed at me and thought I was picking the lilies thinking that they were ramps. But I knew what I wanted--the juicy, tasty young shoots taste marvelous in a salad. The tubers are also supposed to be edible but I have never tried them. I like the young shoots and leaves chopped up in salads, and the flowers batter-dipped and fried; I have also heard that the flower buds can be eaten and I plan to try them this summer.

Larry picked for quite a while, and he said there were plenty of greens left when he was finished. It's always a good thing to leave enough of a wild plant to re-seed and re-populate an area for the coming years.

Creasy greens generally prefer damp, rich places to grow so this hillside seems odd in a way. But they are prolific and will grow pretty much anywhere, even in poor soil. In 15 minutes Larry had filled his bag.

Dark green, rich in nutrients and with a flavor like spinach, creasy greens are a real springtime bargain.

We knew we needed to clean the greens as soon as we got home to preserve the best of their flavor and nutrients. Larry washed them and I cut off the bottom of the clusters (too much dirt hides in there) and checked to be sure all grass, leaves and debris were removed. Then I put them into a pot of boiling water for about a minute (long enough to wilt them thoroughly), drained, rinsed with cold water and bagged them up for the freezer.

We ended up with 4 packages that are just the right size for the two of us for a meal.

 

And of course we kept out enough to have for our supper that evening. Creasy greens and scrambled eggs--a perfect springtime meal. A lot of people like to drizzle bacon grease on their greens, and that's good but bacon grease just isn't on our diet these days.

 

I hope we can get out and pick some more of this delicious free food before they get too big and get bitter. Although when the flower buds form, those can be cooked and eaten like broccoli, so there's a "second season" coming for anyone who wants to give them a try.

Blackberries, Raspberries, Daylilies and Elderbloom

Random thoughts tonight:

According to my neighbors, the blackberries should be a good harvest this year. It did not rain on June 1 or June 2. Opinions differ as to which date is the one that determines whether the berries will be plentiful, but since it didn't rain on either day, I think we're safe.


Assuming, of course, that we get some rain in the next two months. This is the driest spring I can remember since the early 1980's when we grew tobacco.


I found the first ripe wild raspberry yesterday on the canes along our driveway. Just one, but there are several red ones. They're very small this year because of the lack of rain.



The elderberries are in full bloom, and I'm noting the location of accessible bushes. Last year the birds beat me to them but this year I am determined to get some for jelly. Local folks say that cows' milk production drops when the elderberries bloom and I know that it was true when we owned cows. Probably it was something else that they ate that made their milk drop, and the flowers just happened to bloom at that time.

I remember making elderberry bloom fritters. We had more elderberry plants around here then and didn't mind using the flowers instead of the berries. We made elderberry flower wine too and it was one of my favorites. The recipe was in an old paperback book that used simple ingredients and equipment. We liked it best mixed with the tart blackberry wine. The combination created a jewel-like red that was a hit with anyone who tried it. That was 25 years ago, but I can still recall the zing of that wine.

Daylily are blooming now and their flowers are good for fritters too, but my favorite way to fix them is to batter dip and fry individual petals, then dip in salsa.

I'm hoping for good berries this year. I need to make more jam because when our sons come home, they usually take a few jars home with them. Maybe I'll be able to mail some to Iraq, if I use plenty of bubble wrap. But I'll be sure to keep a few jars here for the welcome home breakfast.