Turnips: Pretty and Taste Good Too:

Check at these turnips.  These turnips are really beautiful. I usually grow these for the greens. The roots came out really great. Tonight The New Farmer made turnips and greens and they were great. One interesting thing about turnips is that in Europe they were used in place of potatoes before potatoes were discovered in the New World. Turnips were the starchy food and you could bake or mash them. These turnips were very sweet and not woody at all.  
I will have enough turnips for a second batch. The Suburban Garden does not have a large quantity of any one thing but great variety.
These are some beet greens and green onions. You have to thin beets. The beets seed is a kernel that has at least 2-4 seeds so they come up thick. This means you need to thin them so there is room for the beet root to form but you can eat the greens; which is great.

I have 2.105KG to add to the total  which brings us up to 17.977KG

Spring is here new farmer is happy to say!!!

We worked hard today to get things in the ground. The nights are staying warm so things are really putting out. We planted sets and seeds. Things are looking good. Planted sun flowers also. We are having turnips and salad from the garden for Easter dinner tomorrow. The new farmer will work a couple of mornings to finish the mulching this week. We will be eating sugar snap peas and fava beans in a week. Yum Yum. There are two pictures, one shows the farmer in front of the sugar snaps and one where we have more sugar snaps and potatos and onion. Until next time.

Spring April 15th and the Last Danger of Frost

The Farmer has been busy both with planting but with necessary work that keeps him away from the computer so the posts have been delayed.  This weekend is the first one past April 15th which is the assured last day for a frost. We have had some very warm days but still for tomatoes and other warm loving plants you need night time temps in the 60's and sometimes it has been down as low as 44 degrees. The first picture is the culinary sage in bloom. This plant is of the family Salvia which we often think of as flowers but they are all related to the sage cooking herb.

The photograph above is of the turnips which will be harvested this week. The small weedy plants below them are parsnips, which will not be ready until after the frost in the fall. I wouldn't normally want to give up space for such a long time but this is for the fun of a new plant.
Here you can see the potatoes.  I had tried several times to start them from regular potatoes that I bought at the market but they did not come up. Often they may be sprayed with something to keep them from sprouting for longer shelf life. I found some seed potatoes that seemed to be too far gone but bought them and they look like they are all coming up. The new Farmer and I mounded them up with soil on the stems to increase the yield.
The Botanical Garden had their annual plant sale. I did buy a mint plant and I have put it in a Grecian Style Urn since I was hope to try some Greek recipes this year. Also for mint iced tea.

Here we have the sugar snaps and fava beans that are now in bloom and I am waiting to harvest the pods. Maybe this week?
This is another view of the sage in the herb garden.

2.406 KG  made up of spinach, lettuce and other varieties which adds up to 15.872 KG for the year

Progress Report

Not much progress to report on the planting front. We did not plant last week=end but I hope we can this coming week=end.

Lots to talk about on the growing front though. We have sugar snap peas that are just starting to bloom, Yum- Yum. Fava beans are looking good too. The potato's and onions are also peeking their heads out. Some Sun flowers from last years seeds are volunteering and are pretty big all ready. You will see some of them in the rear of the picture of the potato's and onions.

See you next time

Update on our garden.

We worked some in the garden yesterday, still to early to plant stuff that can't stand frost. It is hard to wait when the weather is so nice. Terry had snow on Friday in Tenn. The 15th of April is not far away. We are eating all kind of greens from the garden and they make wonderful salads. Here is a picture of a salad the farmer make with the greens and then he pull radishes up whole, it was sooo good. Our sugar snap peas are doing well and the blueberries are blooming. There is so many beautiful trees and flowers blooming all over. I love spring