Linguine with Olive Oil, Green Onions, Fresh Dill & Tuna...and cherries galore

Thank goodness for canned tuna! Both The Calm One and I have been fighting nasty colds. Our valiant battle has put us in a state of suspended animation though still capable of being hungry. That's when the shiny, little tin of tasty fish, gleaming its presence from a cupboard which is looking less stocked as time goes on and the crumpled Kleenex pile up, said in that influential tone tuna is known to have, choose ME to put in your pasta! 

This past February, I planted onion sets close together, one or two inches apart, so I could harvest scallions (green/spring onions) starting around April which I have being doing with a marked air of delight. Pulling them this young not only gives us some greens but also allows the others to mature into fat onions. Happily a few dill seedlings volunteered from last year's planting, so some of their tiny, feathery fronds were also picked. While the linguine is cooking, lightly saute chopped scallions and fresh dill in some olive oil for a minute.

Add the drained tuna and some of the pasta cooking water. Break up the fish with a wooden spoon. Simmer for a minute or two, while stirring here and there.

Toss in the slightly underdone pasta, letting it finish cooking while the sauce thickens, about a minute or two.

Serve immediately and season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper. Nourishing and tasty fare for sure, but also its fresh greenness cheered this mostly house-bound gardener, reminding me of the bounty waiting outdoors.

Le ceresier chez Monsieur and Madame M is gloriously burdened with so much fruit that generous donations of its plenty have been made to nearby households, including chez nous.

Make a wish for a vie en rose!

Our capacious yellowware batter bowl was perfect to accommodate the juicy, sweet abundance.

In addition, The Calm One and I were recently invited to have our way with this laden-down tree.

Left side of bowl!

On the allotted day, The Calm One ventured forth on his own as I was still cloué au lit (nailed to the bed). So far what he has picked we are enjoying just as is, but who knows, a claufoutis may be in our future.

Right side of bowl!

My cold being the tenacious kind that occurs in the spring has allowed me the energy to get just the peppers transplanted. The melons, cucumbers, winter squash, among the remaining re-potted seedlings, are suffering the most despite being in larger containers. I apologise each time I hobble onto the patio, saying in a soothing voice, my little ones, you will soon spread your roots.

The garden about a week ago when it still had a full-time gardener!

À la prochaine!

Another Quick Pasta Recipe...and an unexpected pokeweed eradication method

Tagliatelle sauced with some cream, tomato paste, thyme, and garlic is quite delicious especially topped with freshly grated Parmesan cheese.

While the pasta is cooking, prepare the sauce. For one large serving, I lightly covered the bottom of a medium fry pan with cream, adding a minced garlic clove, a large pinch of fresh thyme, and two tablespoons of tomato paste.

Add several tablespoons of pasta cooking water and stir well.

Drain slightly underdone pasta and put in the pan. Gently cook and stir until sauce is thick and the tagliatelle is thoroughly coated which will take a minute or two. Season with salt and freshly milled black pepper.

The pasta finishes its cooking in the sauce

Serve immediately, layer on the Parmesan cheese, and garnish with a thyme sprig.

The subtitle of this post easily could have been how the tree of heaven has become the tree of hell or perhaps even hounded by a foul-smelling weed tree from America to France.  This tree was the only spot of green in the concrete yard of my childhood New York City home. A born gardener without any plot to garden, I would hang out by that impossible tree, impossible because its ten-feet length grew out of an inch-wide cement crack. Therefore, its unusual 'fragrance' of rotting cashews was locked into my olfactory memory and was the reason why I was able to identify it finally after all these decades. This species is the one featured in the novel A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Looking on the bright side, they have laid to rest the poisonous and equally nearly impossible-to-eradicate pokeweed.

This one is about twelve feet tall

The two trees, both males as shown by their flat, white flower caps, are growing in our garden's wild area -- they have grown about four feet in a couple of months, a growth rate allowing them to reach forest canopies which leaves their competitors in the dust. How to get rid of them? I am going to lower their height so they get hardly any light which means I will need to trespass into the starling sanctuary, that is, the mass of brambles, to chop down the usurpers to suitable stumps or else we soon will be looking at a ninety-foot-tall grove which smells like a ripe compost pile. Since they not only spread by seed but also by re-sprouting roots when they are cut, this may happen anyway!

One of the two can be seen on the right, sticking up from the brambles

The peonies which I cut when they were nice fat buds are now fully opened.

That green blur in the lower right is a bit of fennel

The fennel makes a lovely flower arranging ingredient, not only because of its feathery form but also because of its pleasing, fresh scent. If I don't keep trimming it back it will grow to a towering eight feet.

The early season tomatoes are beautiful, husky plants that are giving out their first flower trusses.

There's a tiny, green tomato hidden by the yellow flower

These plants are now staked

The twenty-five late season seed potatoes are finally planted! I just barely got them done in time. These are storage potatoes and need about five months to develop which means a harvest is possible about mid-October, hopefully before any frost arrives.

The twenty five bring the grand total of all potatoes planted to seventy-five!

Perennial geraniums are lovely ground covers.

These pink ones are giving sedum, red dianthus, and abelia some serious space competition. They are about two years old and looking ready for division. Good news! There are pronounced weedy areas that need to be overrun with these beauties.

I have just a couple of days to get the remaining transplants -- melon, cucumbers, butternut squash, peppers, lovage, zinnas -- in the ground. The Calm One though only seen in the garden by appointment will help out in other ways like making lunch. His culinary repertoire may be limited to a few items, but he makes those dishes very well. The best cheese omelettes I have ever had are his as they are always tender and never rubbery since he patiently cooks it for nearly ten minutes over low heat, all the while gently lifting up the edges to let the still liquid bits spill underneath while the grated cheese melts. He then easily folds the omelette in thirds as he is flipping it onto a plate. I suspect bicep power is behind such skillful manipulation of the very heavy, cast-iron skillet.

He also does not spare the cheese!

When I am particularly frazzled by a demanding gardening schedule, The Calm One is wont to surprise me with a pain au chocolat noisette from a nearby boulanger. I feel immensely energised after eating one of those puffy, dusted-with-icing-sugar, filled-with-dark-chocolate-and-hazelnut-butter wonders. Who wouldn't?

À la prochaine!

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How to plant potatoes

The First Strawberries of the Season...and peonies & more roses!

It's looking like the strawberry harvest will not be as abundant as last year's, but still what a treat to have gariguettes straight from the garden and crowned with freshly whipped, sugared cream or as it's called here, crème chantilly.

To prevent the berries from getting waterlogged when washing them, rinse them before you remove the stem.

Gariquettes have the most fantastic taste and gorgeous fragrance. In addition, their 'belly button' is an outie so slicing off that end is an easy task.

The Calm One who is the official whipper of cream chez nous saved me some for topping my hot cocoa later on in the day. Though the seventy-five seed potatoes and twenty-eight tomatoes are in the ground, the melon, pepper, winter squash, cucumber, zinnia, and black-eyed Susan vine transplants not only still need to be done but done within the next week along with outdoor sowing of green beans, carrots, and beets. So I have been hitting the hot cocoa hard. You know, for stamina. Those spring winds can be quite nippy.

Peonies usually don't do that well in our garden because of the heat and lack of rain, but with this constant moisture they are luxuriant.

This variety has a fragrance reminiscent of both lilacs and roses.

The lavender in the foreground is showing a hint of colour

For cut flowers, I choose buds just beginning to open.

These were picked during a rainy twilight

The next morning, they were put into a vase and accented with fennel. Though I use this herb for pickling, I am beginning to think that its best application is in flower arranging.

They eventually will unfold their petals in the captivating way that peonies have.

The only yellow rose in our garden is Golden Showers, a climber that puts out tremendous clusters of blooms.

The purple-pink background is a mass of soapwort

The Queen Elizabeth hedge rose is reaching for the sky...

...while the calla lilies are increasing in number at its base.

A bourbon rose, Ferdinand Pichard, is just starting its first flush of blooming.

A single petaled white rose, though not a repeat bloomer, is stunning in simplicity of flower form and graceful, arching branches.

White roses amply sandwiched between glads and red roses.

A rugosa, semi-double rose, which is also not a repeat bloomer, is gorgeous because of colour changes -- the deep orange buds open into coral flowers which than fade to pink.  All the while, yellow warms the centre.

Falstaff, a David Austin climber, is finishing up its first blossoming session.

Crossroad: purple culinary sage, sweet violets, ivy, Falstaff rose, pink and white Dianthus

À la prochaine!

Pasta with an Asian Touch...and the flowery spring garden

It's been awhile since I have discovered tagliatelle goes well with red pepper flakes, garlic, and ginger. This time, however, I added pea shoots, soy sauce, and omelette strips.

Soy sauce imparts a lovely golden colour

While the pasta--throw in the shoots after five minutes--is cooking, make a thin omelette with one or two large eggs. When it is set, flip over and brown that side. Remove to a cutting surface and let cool a bit. Slice into long, one-inch-wide sections and reserve.  Mince pepper flakes, garlic, and ginger and saute them lightly in a little oil in the omelette pan. Add a few tablespoons of the pasta cooking water. Toss the tagliatelle, shoots, and egg with the garlic, red pepper, and ginger in the skillet. Sprinkle, or in my case, slosh with soy sauce and stir well.

The flower garden is coming into being with such ease -- mostly pink there, red here, and white over there but also with a splash of blue and a glint of gold.

Cottage pinks are good for hiding the knobby knees of rose bushes

Roses are continuing to astound. The seven Queen Elizabeth hedge roses are in the middle of their first blooming flush. We should get several such flurries of pinkness until autumn.

I suspect this glowing, deeply coral-coloured rose is Tropicana.

The repeat-flowering bourbon rose, Ferdinand Pichard, is a robust bush with clusters of fragrant, white-and-red striped blooms.

The cute bud on the right can't wait to embrace maturity

Cottage pinks (Dianthus plumarius) rank way high on my favourite flower list. They are not named for the colour pink but for their distinctive edging, as if a pinking shears had its way with them.

A double blossom variety with a red center and petals flushed light pink

Sweetness cottage pinks will flower all through the summer and autumn. Like many varieties of this species, they are easy, evergreen, and rewarding perennials, that is to say, they will give many, many, many, fragrant flowers that come back again and again and again. However, these are the only variety that will put on a summer display from seed planted in late winter. With all the others, the propagation can be done more easily via cuttings from a few nursery plants. 

The messy split calyx of Mrs. Sinkins cottage pinks is more than compensated by its fabulous fragrance.

Miniature glads chez nous prefer to volunteer in already densely planted beds, especially of the iris and lavender persuasion.

Behind the gladiolus are early season potatoes

Though I sowed soapwort last spring and transplanted them just this past autumn, they are already generously covering not only the ground but their own foliage with pink flowers.

A soapy liquid can be made by boiling crushed leaves and roots in water

Herbs like thyme and sage (below photo) contribute to the flower show by happily presenting some blues now that the irises, bluebells, and lilacs are no more.

Can you spot the small beetle-like insect?

It is always a thrill when the fruit-bearing stock of our garden show their abundance of flowers/immature fruit.

Grapes!

The green fuzzy ovoid is a peach-to-be.

A soft wave of white petals is harbouring the developing blackberry.

À la prochaine!