More Signs of Spring

The promise of a new gardening year is always exciting, and seeing your perennials fill out and new seeds sprout in the beds reminds you why you spend all that time pulling weeds and tending your aching back. For me, some of the first things I enjoy out of the garden (along with the last of the bolting winter greens) are our herbs. The tulips are lovely, and the smell of the evergreen clematis flowers lasted for weeks, but I'm really about growing what I can eat.

In our climate zone chives, celery leaf, sage, rosemary, parsley, oregano and thyme will overwinter handily. We use them regularly to accompany many dishes, and sometimes even get a mid-winter harvest if there's a warm spell. Adrian's celery allergy does not extend to the leaf variety, so we grow it for fresh use, and save the generous heads for their seeds to use in cooking and to plant in the garden as well. I also grow lovage, sweet cicely, lemon and lime balm, lavender, bronze fennel (for seed and to attract beneficial insects), sorrel and I'm sure some other plants that I'm forgetting at the moment. I seed annuals like cilantro and basil both in seed trays and directly, to cover my bases, and dig up and re-plant herb volunteers from my borders when I need to fill empty spaces.

Today we were able to enjoy home-made egg salad for our lunch, made with a generous helping of those herbs (celery leaf, both fresh and seed, chives, parsley, and oregano fill out a salad made with backyard eggs).

 

 

And tonight with dinner, we'll be having something else that's a sure sign of spring - rhubarb.

 

 

 

After sharing a few stalks with my neighbour to celebrate the harvest, I threw together a pan of Rhubarb Blondies, with the addition of homemade apple butter to make up for missing eggs - I used all our eggs making the salad, and then found only one fresh-laid egg in the nesting box for my baking - not that I'm blaming the chickens for my lack of forethought.

 

 

 

This will taste heavenly after a few hours of yard work, hauling mulch and moving the chicken tractor back onto the grass. It's time to clear our hoop house space for tomato planting preparation, and the chickens don't need the wind protection or heated  waterer and heat lamp any more.