As you can probably guess, I’m obsessed with gardening at the moment. I’ve been enjoying my flower garden for the last month so now I turned my attention to my edible garden. I like the convenience of growing and cooking with fresh herbs. They grow with little care and attention. However, I’ve neglected them for the last year and I needed a herb garden makeover. The rosemary, oregano, and lemon thyme were repotted to plastic containers and moved to the corner alongside my beloved meyer lemon tree. The pineapple sage was saved from the chopping block and repotted since I couldn’t part with the sweet scent of its leaves. Plus during the summer, it has lots of little red flowers. I added a small cilantro plant and some chives. This year, I am also trying my hand at growing jalapeño peppers and two varieties of tomatoes – Sweet 100s and Yellow Pears. If everything goes well, I should be able to start harvesting tomatoes in late July through the fall.
Could this be the beginning of my own locavore movement? At least, I have the makings of some fresh organic salsa with the jalapeños, cilantro, and tomatoes.
Meyer Lemon
I’ve had this meyer lemon tree for about 5 years. The first couple of years, it produced about 10-15 lemons total. Once I started to apply some citrus food, it was happy and started to produce more and more fruit. I’ve harvested about 75 lemons from each of the past few growing seasons. I juice the lemons and store them in one-cup increments in a ziploc bag in the freezer. It’s never been easier to make lemon curd and lemon bars.
Jalapeño Peppers
I planted a six-pack flat of jalapeño peppers I bought at Lowe’s for $1.98. I wasn’t sure how this endeavor would turn out as the tall, gangly seedlings were barely able to stand on its own. Now, four weeks later, I can see some buds forming. I hope it develops into actual edible peppers.
Tomato
It looks a little silly to put a big huge cage over two little itty bitty tomato plants, but hopefully they’ll just shoot up and bear little clusters of edible fruit in a couple of months. It’s so exciting to grow my own tomatoes instead of buying mealy tasteless ones from the grocery store. I read online that growing basil next to tomatoes makes it taste better, although it was unclear if the article was referring to the tomatoes or the basil. I think I need to make another trip to Lowe’s for basil.
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Vietnamese Spring Rolls are essentially are bundles of salad wrapped in rice paper. They are very versatile and may be made with whatever fresh ingredients you have on hand. It takes a little bit of time to prepare all the ingredients and a little practice to wrap, but the resulting spring rolls are certainly worth the time and effort. Make these for your family or serve them at your next party and they are guaranteed to be a crowd pleaser.
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