First 2014 "Tasting in the Garden" (originally posted on 26 July 2014)

Where to start...  Adjectives would be wonderful, fabulous, awesome ... and could only become more superlative from there.
About 10 rows were represented in the feast.
We had a lovely flat bean reminiscent of an Italian flat bean but Spanish.  Two different types of chard wraps - one filled with mozzarella cheese, basil and tomatoes and roasted on the grill; one stuffed with rice, sushi style.  We harvested a pineapple tomato and sliced it.  It was large enough that everyone had a good sized and delicious sample.  Although I have tons of collards in my row, I didn't prepare anything from them but luckily someone from another row prepared a most tasty dish.  There was a rhubarb crumble, beet salad, whitefish spread (not from the garden but maybe we could have a pond next year????) served with basil and cherry tomatoes from the garden.  Grilled, smoked sausage, Jalapeno poppers wrapped in bacon.  (Bacon and sausage also not from the garden .... maybe we should just have a farm...) Quinoa salad with mango.  Although the quinoa wasn't from the garden, one row has some nearing harvest and we're all looking forward to tasting some home-grown soon.  Fresh grapes.  And the samplers I made and brought: a feta-herb dip, an unripe stone fruit chutney, and a plum compote.  And dried tomatoes from 2013.  I'm sure I've forgotten something.

It was a veritable feast as well as an amazing demonstration of what can be done with simple garden produce.

A season in summary - 2014

With the cooling weather of autumn, the garden is winding down from our sixth growing season.  Three new households joined the garden this year and, at this time, we are recruiting new members for the 2015 growing season.  If you’re interested, contact us at:  SPGardenInfo@gmail.com.  

We now have a blog which is open to the general public.  Our posts include brief summaries of organic gardening information with links to more detailed information, recipes, and reports of our social Tastings in the Garden, work day efforts, and Potlucks with a dash of business meeting.  Feel free to visit us at:  SPCommunityGarden.blogspot.com.

The weather this year conspired to give us bountiful harvests of fruit, grapes, and a wide variety of vegetables.  The bountiful food also brought bountiful bugs.  Smelly squash bugs are no one’s friend but the lovely turquoise green shield bugs passed through without excessive damage.  The iridescent green scarab beetles, on the other hand, while beautiful, would have happily eaten their way through all our fruit without some diligent attention.  Now is the time to be on the lookout for the grubs that will become those bugs next summer.

The colorful zinnias and sunflowers in the first row add a bright note to the garden and have become a visible reminder of the beauty of a garden for all who walk or drive down Cedar.  Even though the traditional summer vegetable garden is winding down for the fall and winter now, we are planting vegetables that can withstand our relatively mild winters:  now is the time to put out chard, kale, spinach, lettuce, and other greens.  It’s a bit late for winter harvest now (August/September would have been the ideal time to get those plants started) but it’s still possible to get them growing so that they’ll be ready to produce abundantly come spring.  Some of the root vegetables will winter over, especially the slow-maturing ones like parsnips.  And, it’s nearly time to plant garlic.  Truly, the garden year never ends!

In the words of our gardeners

I like being in the garden because I enjoy the connection that comes from growing the food that I eat and that I feed to my family. I like the fact that the food is organic and very local. It has also been a good way to get to know my neighbors.

One of the cornerstones of our garden philosophy is growing organic.  Many’s the time that it is so tempting to bring out the pesticides, especially when the bugs seem to be eating all our produce.  But the time and attention required by an organic garden lead to a connection to land, food, family, and neighbors.

When I was going through chemo for appendiceal cancer, it was wonderful therapy to work in the soil.  I have also learned so much from my gardening neighbors about plants, and soil prep, and composting, and orchards.  It's a great place to learn if you are just starting out like I was 3 years ago.

I enjoy the garden for the friendship and the camaraderie.  I love the beauty of our garden with the colors, textures and delicious results!

Our garden is not all work and food production.  Members often work in their own rows quietly and alone to experience the peace and respite that come from working the soil.  The garden attracts a range of birds and butterflies that are amazing and beautiful.  At the other end of the social spectrum, the garden is also a place for friendly gatherings.  Throughout the summer we have Tastings in the Garden where we meet and share food prepared from the fruits and vegetables we’re harvesting at the moment.  These strictly social afternoons or evenings give us an opportunity to visit without thinking about the business of working a garden, to enjoy the fruits of our labors.

This year we've been saving seeds to help the Bosque Seed Collective develop hyper-local varieties such as beans, tomatoes, arugula, and chard.  I hadn't realized the challenge that comes from having to grow them longer than you would normally. Seeds are expensive because they take work and extra space to grow!

The garden is an evolving experience and members make suggestions for new projects each year.  This year we started a community herb row with favorites such as tarragon, basil, parsley, onion and garlic chives, thyme, oregano, and rosemary.  We also participated in the Bosque Seed Collective project and contributed collard, arugula, and bean seed,s among others, to the effort.  Some of the collards have been planted by our members for a fall/winter harvest and are rapidly growing now.

And, in conclusion, the following quote from one of our founding gardeners really summarizes all that is good about our garden:

4 Reasons Why I Really Love Being a Member of the Spruce Park Neighborhood Garden  

1  The community it has built

2  The gardening knowledge that has been shared

3  The 2 block walk down an alley to the garden where I savor its beauty and then 

     see what it offers for that evening's dinner

4  The occasional evening group tastings around the garden picnic table where members offer delicious dishes made from garden produce:  melon lassi, roasted Roma tomatoes, stuffed peppers, parsnip fries, salsas, casseroles, gazpacho, plum cobbler, ice cream...oh my!

Tasting in the Garden: Focus on Tomatoes!

Sunday evening we met in the garden for a Tasting showcasing our tomatoes and continuing to experience and taste our melons.  So much bounty and generosity from nature, from our gardeners, and from the man who provides our tomato plants to us each spring... Bob.  His wife confided that he plays classical music for them and touches each plant every day while he is nurturing them in preparation for planting in the garden.  I don't think I have ever seen healthier tomato plants anywhere and now I know the secret to providing strong young plants for gardeners.  Perhaps we should consider a stereo system for the garden????

But the food...  where all the energy in our plants ends up.  It was spectacular as always.  What a wonderful group of cooks we have in our community.  Starting from one end of the groaning table to the other we had:  stuffed tomatoes, dried tomatoes on mozzarella toasts, the gracefully aging unripened nectarine chutney and Santa Rosa plum compote, a medley of tomatoes, peaches, peppers, and who knows what else (cook's secret!) in a salsa/chutney, melons freshly harvested from the garden, oven roasted parsnip 'fries', a gratin of potatoes with kale (for recipe, click HERE), oven roasted Roma tomatoes, fresh cherry tomatoes with roasted Shishito peppers, savory tomato pie, blue Italian plum cobbler, fresh pesto and baguette, a sweet tomato sorbet that didn't harden (for recipe, click HERE - but either the tomatoes need to cook down a bit more or someone ... that would be me... didn't leave the ice cream maker freezer base in the freezer long enough), and melon lassi (recipe link available through the melon blog post).

I could probably go on for pages about the specific taste delights of each recipe but instead I'll simply remind you that a picture is worth a thousand words so here is a novella.

Yellow tomatoes cooking down for the sorbet

Stuffed tomatoes & dried tomatoes on mozzarella toast.

Oven-roasted parsnip 'fries' and fresh melon

Fresh tomatoes with Shishito peppers;
oven-roasted Romas

Potato and kale gratin

Blue Italian plum cobbler 

Pesto made from garden basil 

A late breaking addition, we harvested one of our ripening pomegranates.  In a way, those bitter sweet seeds summarize what's best about our Tastings.  Not only do we enjoy the fruits of our labor through the dishes we prepare at home but we also often turn directly to the garden and harvest something to eat fresh, in the moment.  Sometimes it's a freshly concocted salsa.  Sometimes it's fruit warm from the summer sun on the trees.  And sometimes it's one of our abundant and ever-volunteering melons.  But, I still haven't talked anyone into trying some of our ever-present bugs...


Although the days are getting cooler and the plants are yielding their last for this season, our Tastings will transmute into the winter potlucks of our business meetings.  The socializing and the enjoyment of good food that make our garden a community garden will continue year round, as always.

Links last checked on 29 September 2014.