First there was garlic. Then came the tomatoes.

I digress into the garden...

I’m very much an amateur gardener - perennial flowers and vegetables mostly. I’m in no way an expert. The point of the exercise, I think, is that I’m out in the yard most days just poking around and doing what needs to be done. If I have a question about anything garden-related I ask our much more experienced neighbors (with their incredible gardens), or I can google it. I suppose the how-to and what-to knowledge accumulates, albeit slowly, and things become intuitive after awhile. I don’t take it too seriously, though. I just enjoy it. That’s the point, right?

I’m the cook in the house. Come around five or six o’clock, it’s my daily ritual to get into the kitchen and figure out what dinner will be. Sometimes it’s premeditated, other times I just round up leftovers and make something out of that. One thing I know is that we go through a lot of garlic. A surprising amount. Good garlic is expensive, too! When I discovered how easy it is to grow garlic, we never bought another bulb.

Garlic and canned tomatoes in the pantry

The hardest thing about growing garlic is planting it in the fall. But even that is simple. 1) In December, hoe a row of dirt and stick a clove about two inches down (pointy end up). Come April when the snow melts, little green shoots will be there, waiting for the sun. 2) In June when the curly green scapes pop up, cut and eat those. Then, 3) in July when the leaves turn (mostly) brown, gently pull them out of the ground, tie ‘em up in a cool, dry place to cure for about six weeks and voila, garlic!

Tomatoes were the other revelation. They take a bit more attention, but it’s worth it. We’ve got store-bought cans of tomatoes in the pantry that we haven’t touched for over a year, because if there’s a quart of homemade to be found, they’re going to be so much better. Homemade is lighter, sweeter, and fresher tasting. Like Greg Brown’s song, Canned Goods, “Taste a little of the summer / my Grandma’s put it all in jars.” It’s true. In the dark of the winter, when we most need reminding of how sweet summer in Vermont is, all we have to do is open a jar of tomatoes and it’s right there.

I was thinking about training as a cook back in my twenties. Working for a fancy Italian restaurant I learned a complicated recipe to make marinara sauce. The onions had to be slowly caramelized, then the herbs, the paste, sugar and wine were added in sequence just so to create that special flavor. Years later, I understand that all that technique was just an attempt to recreate the sublime flavor of what a simple fresh sauce tastes like.

A new batch of canned tomatoes

What’s next? I’m still trying to grow a robust bed of onions… and I’m still working on how to make a consistent batch of hard cider. Fall is coming so it’s time to try again.

What are you growing?

OK, back to the music and community next week.  Thanks for reading…

- Dana