Fruity Vinegars For Savory Salads

Posted on August 19, 2024 by Ann Lovejoy
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Add spices, herbs, fruity combos to make your own blend

Bottling The Essence Of Summer

Despite erratic weather, summery crops are filling the kitchen, which today smells like ripe peaches and basil, a delectable combination. One of my favorite summer tasks is turning ripe fruit into savory vinegars to add spunk to salads and a sparkly snap to sauces and marinades. Besides the fabulous peach and basil combo (an experiment that seems VERY promising), I’m also making a few bottles of my favorite tangerine vanilla bean, both with a base of organic cider vinegar.

Though I usually make several dozen bottles for gifts, this year I’m settling on just a few. Family issues are adding up and I’m finding myself needing to back down from my usual (possibly excessive) enthusiasm. Moderation, now there’s an idea worth trying. So is self care, something that requires some creative exploration these days. The usual suggestions aren’t always satisfying, or not for long. When I find myself working puzzles with passionate intensity, it’s time to step away from the table. Walking is still helpful, especially when I’m also listening to birds singing and noting which plants they favor for seeds and bug snacks.

Garden Sharing

Small as my garden is, it’s fascinating to see how many birds and other critters are making themselves at home here. Watching them busily making their own living in the garden, it feels like that’s what a garden is actually for after all. All our human enjoyment is lovely, of course, but my deepest satisfaction now comes from seeing such a wide array of pollinators hard at work all day long. I love seeing birds sipping on nectar and nibbling on lettuce seeds as well as catching spiders and aphids.

About That Vinegar

There aren’t a lot of fancy tricks to making fruit vinegars; for starters,  choose a base vinegar that will let the fruits and herbs shine, cider being my go-to. Use a non-reactive saucepan made of stainless steel or enamel, not copper, cast iron, or aluminum. Let each fruit vinegar batch mellow in a large glass jar for at least a week before the final straining and bottling in smaller sterile containers. Labeling the batch jars with the timing schedule definitely helps ensure a pleasant end result. Store fruit vinegars in a cupboard or the fridge, as warmth and light can cloud them and may encourage funky bacterial growth.

Peach & Basil Vinegar

3 cups organic cider vinegar
1-1/2 cups peeled, chopped peaches
1/4 cup shredded fresh basil

Bring vinegar to a boil in a small saucepan, add peaches, remove from heat and let steep for 20 minutes. Put basil in a half-gallon glass canning jar, pour in hot vinegar and fruit, cover and infuse in the fridge for 7-10 days, tasting daily until it’s just right. Strain through several layers of cheese cloth, muslin or a coffee filter into smaller sterilized bottles and seal. Refrigerate or use within 3 months. Makes about 3 cups.

Nectarine & Vanilla Bean Vinegar

3 cups cider vinegar
2 cups finely chopped ripe nectarines
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise

Bring vinegar to a boil in a small saucepan, add nectarines and vanilla bean, remove from heat and let steep for 20 minutes. Pour it all into a half-gallon glass canning jar, cover and infuse in the fridge for 7-10 days, tasting daily until it’s just right. Strain through several layers of cheese cloth, muslin or a coffee filter into smaller sterilized bottles and seal. Refrigerate or use within 3 months. Makes about 3 cups.

 

 

Posted in Birds In The Garden, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living, Vegan Recipes | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

Magic Mint & Guerilla Gardening

Posted on July 30, 2024 by Ann Lovejoy
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Seedpods are ripening fast

Gathering Tomorrow’s Garden

My grandkids and I love to harvest seeds of all sort of flowers, with the mantra, “pods that rattle are ripe!” Once dried and cleaned, as use the seeds in various mixtures for our guerilla gardening practice. Seeds of sun lovers go in one container, shade lovers in another, while a third is a random go-anywhere mix (especially beloved of very young people. We each take a lump of clay soil, blend in our seeds, then roll little balls suitable for flinging. Our target are unkempt public areas, from street islands and odd parking lot corners to sidewalk tree plots and unmaintained paths. When we go on our rambling walks, we toss a few seed bombs into whatever site seems to need a boost of bloom. So far, we have managed to infiltrate calendulas and California poppies, feverfew and foxglove, oregano and lemon balm into many places in their home town as well as mine. None are invasive, all are pollinator friendly and cheerful self-sowers to boot.

Cretan spearmint in the garden

Steaming With Magic Mint

This summer has been challenging in many ways but one remarkable herb is contributing helpfully to my family’s daily happiness. While I grow several forms of mint, I generally prefer spearmint for its warmth and aromatic sweetness. This year I’ve been experimenting with a new-to-me spearmint native to Crete. WOW, this mint is so amazing! Naturally sweet, spunky without bite, aromatic and fragrant, with a complex flavor profile that lends itself to almost anything culinary, it’s a fantastic addition to the kitchen garden.

So far, I’ve used this absolutely delicious herb in fruit salads, in iced or hot tea, in sorbet, and as part of a spunky fresh herb mix for fresh tomatoes. Mince together some Cretan spearmint, oregano, lemon balm, thyme, and fennel foliage and sprinkle it over sliced tomatoes; wow, right? Who needs salt?

Spearmint Sorbet

1 quart water
1 cup cane sugar
1/2 cup fresh minced spearmint
1 cup coconut milk (optional)
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
Fresh mint sprigs

Combine water and sugar in a small saucepan, bring to a simmer and stir until sugar is dissolved. Add mint, cover pan and let steep 10 minutes, then strain (a tea strainer works great) and add coconut milk if using and vanilla. Chill, then freeze in an ice cream maker. Scoop into a glass container and freeze until firm, then serve, garnished with mint sprigs. Serves 4-6.

Breath Mint Magic

This Cretan spearmint also offers a wonderful way to promote better breathing, simply by steeping some in steaming water. I recently woke up with what’s called an allergic shiner, a black eye that shows up like a dark band that curves between the nose and the eye (usually just on one side) due to pressure on sinus cavities. Weirdly, the exact same thing happened last year right about this time, making me suspect that something special is shedding pollen right now. Or maybe it’s just the culmination of grass pollen season overlapping with the beginning of ragweed season?

In any case, the answer is to breathe in steam. “For ten minutes with a towel over your head; three songs worth,” says my dear clever kind doctor. She said adding herbs was fine so I put in a sprig of rosemary and a few snippets of Cretan mint. It smelled so amazing that after I was done breathing in the beneficent steam, I strained the mixture and drank it hot. Soothing, refreshing and utterly delicious; it’s my new morning pick-me-up. Onward, right?

Good fresh or dried!

Posted in Care & Feeding, Cooking With Kids, Crafting With Children, Edible Flowers, Gardening With Children, Hardy Herbs, Health & Wellbeing, Pollination Gardens, Pollinators | Tagged , , , | 6 Comments

Gardening Through The Years

Posted on June 24, 2024 by Ann Lovejoy
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Poppies are simply gorgeous

Growing (Older) With The Garden

Recently I’ve been visiting (in person and virtually) gardens of friends who have been gardening in the same place for many years. Seeing any gardens develop from exciting potential to abundant maturity is delightful, but especially so when we’ve had a hand in the process. Whether it’s offering ideas and lists, helping to edit over time, or crawling around under lethally armed shrubs, bravely bleeding yet persisting (!) until the daunting task is done, joining the gardener in the endeavor also joins us to the garden. Last night, strolling a large, complex garden with its amazing mom, we shared powerful memories of long gone plants, of designs coming into fruition and designs gone astray, of plants battling for dominance and plants that refused to be uprooted. Working in a garden, however fitfully, creates a relationship with both plants and people that can endure for decades.

Of course, it doesn’t always work that way; years after doing a consultation I often recall much more about the garden than about the gardener. I’m afraid people don’t find it flattering that I remember exactly how huge firs or the septic field dictated that garden design but fail to recall the gardener’s name. I’m curious whether other gardeners develop this kind of lasting connection with place and plants, one that remains strong over years of separation. Seeing a garden after a lapse of time, are most of us able to envision the way it was and also see how those early roots have grown into something different?

Keeping It Real

I used to assume that all gardeners are both visually oriented and also feel kinship with their plants. It’s always fascinating to work with someone who doesn’t process that way. Quite often they are people who prefer to grow edibles in neat rows and whose souls are soothed by a uniformity and tidiness that makes my toes twitch. No surprise there? My favorite gardens all have at least a touch of the wild, and most truly celebrate the magnificent abundance of plants, letting them develop their natural forms wherever possible. Naturally, that means we must be especially wise and far sighted when we place and plant them. We all mean to do that, but the seductive lure of the multitude of marvelous plants can make wisdom and discretion take a back seat to desire.

When we are young and tireless, that creates a wonderful dance of planting and transplanting, editing and squeezing just one more charmer into a vignette that cries out for just that touch of chartreuse (if green is the basic black of the garden, chartreuse is the string of pearls). However, as we ourselves mature, age begins to play an ever-larger role. Many of us are leaving large houses and great gardens behind and learning to live small, and many of us are loving the change. A dear friend who had a huge and complex garden in Alaska for many years recently relocated to a modest home in Ohio with a very small garden. As we swap pictures of our tiny spaces, we both display astonishing maturity of insight:

LB: (sending image of tiny side garden afloat in sweet peas)

Me: (sending an image of my tiny front garden full of sweet peas)

LB: It’s beautiful. That is all a person needs. Why did we feel like we had to have one million and eleven plants?

Me: Yes, when I think of the obsessive years when I had to grow every single species or form of peony or iris or primrose or whatever, I marvel at the energy and devotion that required.

Mature, right? These days I’m truly content with my small space, the generosity of the plants, and the little birds that love my garden. Having fewer flowers means I look at each one more closely, as I used to do when I first fell in love with a poppy as a child. Less work to do, more time to take delight. Onward, right?

Small is beautiful (and a loteasier to deal with)

Posted in Annual Color, Birds In The Garden, Garden Design, Health & Wellbeing, Plant Diversity, Plant Partnerships, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 9 Comments

Doing What We Love And Making It Count

Posted on June 3, 2024 by Ann Lovejoy
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Life is better when we can love what we do

Spending Our Energy Wisely

Ah, June, the month of the monsoon? Wait, what? Crazy weather seems to be the norm everywhere these days; who expects an atmospheric river rain event and howling winds in June? Given the drought situation we’ve been in for years now, I’m actually quite grateful for the rain and will welcome as much more as we may be granted. Still, it was a daunting night, with a continual rattle and thump of fir cones on the roof and gusty shrieks that sounded like lost souls. Despite a power outage due to blown down trees, the only casualty here was the overnight loss of all my peony blossoms, which were torn to bright shreds by the tempest.

Peony blooms are so fleeting at best, and given my extremely limited garden space, I’m considering replacing the elderly plant I inherited with the house. After all, it’s not one I would have chosen (I prefer single peonies, and this one is a deep red double that bees have a hard time getting to the heart of). Given the truly awful subsoil on this little lot, I’m thinking another trough or large container will be a better choice than trying to coax a new plant to thrive in such ridiculous dirt. Besides, the peony is smack against the house wall, a place where no plant belongs, and a large container will both allow air space between foliage and wall and prevent seepage from watering to get into the crawl space. Years ago, I would have spent many laborious hours (and years) trying to amend this subsoil (the lots here were all scraped clear back in the 60s). These days, I’m more aware of my limited energy and more clear about what I want to spend it on.

Micro Activism Makes A Difference

Many years ago, when I wrote for the Seattle Weekly, it was suggested that I could develop a Seattle Black Finger Award to call out terrible pruning and bad planting throughout the city. When I said that I much preferred to promote positively, the idea was dropped (after some push back) but it helped me clarify my own tendencies. I’m thinking a lot about where I want to invest my energy these days, not only in terms of soil amending but in amending—or trying to amend—so many ecological and social issues that I’ve lost track. To keep myself from spinning out, I’ve been reading a truly helpful, wise, and sane little handbook called Micro Activism; How You Can Make A Difference In The World (Without A Bullhorn), by Omkari L. Williams. The author leads activism workshops and trainings and is the host of a podcast called Stepping Into Truth where she interviews activists from all walks of life. The book is short and concise, yet though I’ve read it through once, the second reading still offers a lot to ponder.

Today’s ponder is a section on figuring out what we stand for; the author suggests making a list of every cause we care about. If you’re like me, that list is huge and might feel as daunting as a power outage (especially for those of us running on low wattage these days). After making that list, Omkari says to pick one, or at most two issues and set the rest aside for others to tackle. I’ve said this myself many times over the years yet I keep getting sucked in to various issues despite my good intentions. However, when I start grouping issues under sub headings, it’s clear that supporting and defending the natural world/environment has been and remains my top concern. A close runner-up is supporting and defending the Queer community, also a long time concern.

Go Forth In Joy

One of my favorite sections of the book asks the reader to create a statement about an issue that you are strongly against (her example is “I am against child abuse.”). Now craft a positive version (hers is “I am for all children living lives of security and joy.”) She then asks which statement feels more motivating in your body, not just intellectually but in your heart and gut. For me, stating that I am for healing, healthy environments all around the world brings a strong feeling of positive energy and willingness to continue the work. Similarly, saying that I am for all people living safe and joyful lives feels good, but adding that I stand for safe, joyful Queer lives feels more motivating.

Yes, I also care deeply about safe, joyful BIPOC lives and Elder lives and women’s lives and that’s also strongly motivating, but having so many beloved Queer family members and friends in my daily life who experience various gut wrenching, heart breaking kinds of harm just brings that part of the Beloved Community home to my heart in a very powerful, direct way. Ack! With so much to do, who can choose? The author points out that with 8 billion people on the planet, many others are already working skillfully and hard on every single issue we can come up with. Nobody can do it all and many of us can barely manage to deal with what we’re dealt. So here I go, stumbling forward once again, knowing I am not alone, I don’t have to fix anything/everything, and that my best move is to reach out and connect with others on this path. Together we can do far more than any of us can do alone, even if all we can do seems small. Onward, right?

Posted in Care & Feeding, Climate Change, Garden Design, Health & Wellbeing, Plant Diversity, Pollination Gardens, Social Justice, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living | Tagged , , | 2 Comments