The pretty weather that we have been having has given everybody spring fever. People can’t wait to start planting gardens and filling their flowerpots with pretty flowers. I know that it really has us in the mood to get those little green plants into the garden spot that has already been broken up just waiting for the little green sprouts to settle into little holes dug into the rich garden dirt.
Every year we always say, “We aren’t going to plant a garden this year.” Then, every year Roy plows the soft ground with one of his big John Deere tractors and waits for the grass to die and begins the planting and growing process all over once again. I think his logic behind this has been ingrained into his genes because he grew up in the Ethel/New Hope area. His family always had a big garden that harvested out their vegetables for the entire winter. He has just always had the need to provide this tradition. Everyone keeps asking him why he goes to all this trouble every year when we have several large produce markets in the grocery stores, we have. It’s just something about growing this himself that he enjoys. He has a special “formula” that he uses that he drops into each hole dug before adding the plant. It’s a secret concoction learned from another good gardener and very few have his secret recipe. I will admit, he grows some big beautiful, tasty tomatoes.
Growing up, my family always had a big garden in a little spot behind our house. The houses on either side had one as well and it butted up to ours on each side. We always shared whatever one made in plenty that the others lacked. One thing that I so despised about that garden was picking peas, and I really hated shelling them. That’s why if we plant peas, it’s his job to pick and my job to carry them to the Co-op to have them shelled. But I have forbidden him from planting any corn this year. Nothing is more trouble than his laying 300 ears of corn on a sheet in my den floor for me to process the following morning. Cleaning the silks and cutting off the cob is a job I refuse to do this year. Sunflower has some delicious frozen corn in the freezer, and I will cook as much as he wants. It’s my husband’s job to plant and pick all the harvest and my job starts as soon as it makes it to my back door, to be cooked or processed for the winter.
I tell him every year that this is how he holds on to his in inherited roots that was passed along through the family of farmers that he came from. I just know that come June and July I will be so thankful that he had the tenacity to become a truck farmer one more time.
One of my favorite things I love to cook from vegetables is pan roasted with spices. Cut up all vegetables into big chunks. 2 yellow squash, 2 zucchini, 1 bell pepper, 1 red onion, ½ head of cabbage (in chunks), 2 -3 red potatoes, unpeeled. Place in a large bowl and mix with ¼ cup olive oil, 4 T. melted butter, 3 minced garlic cloves, 2 T. Greek seasoning, salt and pepper to taste. Spread out on a large sheet pan lined with parchment paper and bake 375* for 45 minutes.
