Summer Greens Emerge at the Community Garden

It's a gardener's delight this time of year! Community gardens that were bare two months ago are now rich with greens, vegetables, herbs and sunflowers. I am back from a 2+ week culinary tour of Florence, Tuscany and Rome -- more on that below -- and I am eager to see how the garden fares. I drive to Bible Street Community Garden in Cos Cob, CT, with my almost-five grandniece, Ceci. The dirt road is quiet, and we hear only sounds of turkeys and the rustle of hidden fawns. 

I am thrilled to see my garden plot is flourishing. 

The garden goes green, zucchinis blossom,
lushness takes over. Mini-gardener Ceci has a ball

• Arugula heads fill out, mutant radishes call for picking, fresh scallions grow tall, cucumber vines spread, basil takes hold, zucchinis blossom, and tomatoes and peppers reach skyward. 

• Crouching at the edge of the garden bed (the hill towns of Italy took their toll on my knees), I cull weeds, stake the peppers and cucumbers, place metal spirals around the tomatoes and tie up zucchini so stalks grow upward. 

• This is my first year of zucchini, and they are starting to spread and grow blossoms. One zucchini, about four inches, peeks though the stalks. My first! So proud. 

• This year I mixed seedlings bought from the community garden with seedlings grown at home and seeds sown directly in the plot. The community seedlings -- tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini -- are a foot taller than others and looking mature. Home-grown seedlings are not as tall, but they are healthy and catching up. Seed-planted basil stand tall enough so as not to confused with weeds.

I roughly plot out my plantings

The community garden hosts an array of herbs, lettuces, vegetables and flowers. Some gardeners' have tomatoes already forming (yellow flowers show up on mine, so there's hope). Others have sunflowers shooting up (July is the month for sunflowers), bean towers spitting out tendrils, and dill weed running riot. A few gardeners plant their vegetables in crisp rows, like soldiers. Other gardeners plant vegetables wherever space opens up. I am part of the latter camp: I track the items in a rough layout so I can remember what grows where. 

Using my vegetable bag I collect the first crop of the season. I harvest fresh arugula, scallions, basil and radishes and I savor them with freshly milled olive oil and balsamic vinegar brought back from Ravagni in Anghiari, Italy. Delicious! 

Diane and PJ Morello 
in Talamello in Emilia-Romagna

A final note: Our late-spring trip to Italy was filled with cooking classes, pasta making, bread baking and dessert making. For six days we visited hill towns in Tuscany, Emilia-Romagna and Les Marches. We learned how to make tortellini, stuffed olives (to die for), pizza, wine, prosciutto, gelato, olive oil and truffle paste. Best of all, we met other foodies who enjoy cooking, sipping, tasting and traveling as much as we do. If you want to take a culinary trip like this, check out Rustico Cooking for their Italy culinary trips. Micol and Dino are wonderful chefs and trip arrangers. 

Back to community gardening: How are your gardens doing? What veggies are new in your plots? Which veggies or herbs are starting to flower and mature? What's ready to harvest?

Ciao for now! 

-- Your intrepid garden blogger, Diane Tunick Morello 

The Day I Check Out the Late Harvest at the Community Garden

The temperature drops, the bugs disappear and newly planted hardy greens peek through the garden bed's surface dirt. It's mid-October and the temperature plummets 25 to 30 degrees in the past two days, frost is imminent.

Six pepper plants continue to bear fruit,
late-season arugula covers the garden bed

This morning I visit my garden for the first time in a week. I thrill to see September-planted arugula, fragile as micro greens, covering the garden bed. Green cherry tomatoes cling valiantly to dried vines, and with a wistful look, I chop them down and deposit them in the compost bin. Six peppers, five bell and one poblano, enjoy a growth spurt, even as the waning season produces fruit small enough to be served on a dollhouse dining table.

After weeks of seeing almost no one at the garden, I hit the jackpot. Maria, Gary and Mj all arrive to assess the late season harvest. We chat about what we can grow and eat at this time of year, what we will do differently next year and which community service jobs are yet to be done. 

• Maria shares several cloves of organic garlic to plant now for next summer. I dig a six-inch furrow and plant the cloves pointy side up. I am optimistic they will survive winter and be ready for me in July 2019.

• Gary shows me his Chinese long beans and gives me a taste of his mustard green. So biting, with a sharpness similar to horseradish. Love it!

• MaryJo, or Mj, tells me about the plans for the newly erected pergola -- climbers, creepers and vines will be planted in containers, grow upward over the posts and spread over the pergola's top, giving us much-needed relief during hot days, community activities and wine parties. I will be grateful for cool respite in the heart of summer. 

• Community service commitments are coming to a close, and many gardeners have barely scratched the surface of their commitments. I have one half hour remaining of the 10 hours to which I committed. Sweeping, weeding and clearing will wrap that up. I eagerly ask more about Maria's food bank team as I weigh whether to stick with the beautification team or try another volunteer assignment next year.

The Bible Street branch of Greenwich Community Gardens is tucked into the back woods of Greenwich in a neighborhood called Cos Cob. In contrast to the densely populated areas of Greenwich, the garden is peaceful, remote, almost hidden. 

Mama turkey cares for her poults. 
Photo source: 365 Days of Birds

Visiting the garden in spring, a herd of deer race past me into the woods, breaking the silence as they crash through brush and trees. In summer I drive slowly up the hidden driveway and find a female turkey resting quietly in the middle of the drive. As I come close, she lifts her huge body, revealing six to eight babies, or poults, beneath her, quickly marching them into the woods -- a woodland version of a woman with crinolined bustle hiding two to three toddlers beneath the skirt. Early morning I see yellow finches flitting across the garden beds, pecking at the seeds on the glorious sunflowers. Every so often deer and fawns peek out to stare before they disappear into their camouflage.

Fellow gardeners, it's been a glorious year, great fun as I learn to be a community gardener. In the next post I will explore plans for 2019. That said, I need to rename my blog. I have graduated from "Diane's First Community Garden." Ideas welcome! 

Ciao now, Diane Tunick Morello

The Day I Put My Community Garden to Bed for the Season

Hey, all, miss me? It's been a month since I last posted. In August I gave my community garden plot a report card (see The Day My Garden Gets a Late Summer Report Card), and just as I did in school, I discouraged myself. Then I remembered: I am a beginner vegetable gardener. It's all good. I re-energized myself and began to envision my 2019 community garden experiment.

On a cool September morning, I visit the garden at 7:30am to harvest tomatoes and peppers and to see what the rains have wrought. The garden is empty, quiet. Chipmunks leap over plots, finches enjoy the remaining sunflower seeds, tomato plants look peaked and lettuces end their growing season. The garden is bidding adieu for 2018.

To my surprise, two globe tomatoes redden in my plot, and I clip them off to ripen at home and protect them from pesky chipmunks. The cherry tomatoes are split and gnarly. I pull out the vines and cut them into bits for the compost bin. My cucumber and patty-pan vines go, too, neither one truly successful. 

Mid-August radishes are red and deformed but still tasty, and arugula planted at the same time starts to pop up. The biggest surprise is the bell and poblano peppers, which enjoy a late-season growth spurt. I leave them be for now so they can grow. Finally, I sow two lines of arugula seed. I hope to see fresh arugula before the first frost hits. As I leave the garden, I walk beneath a trellis filled with purple morning glories, brightening the day. 

This summer of 2018, I hoped to supply all my own vegetables and not to buy vegetables from green markets or from grocery stores. A tall order for a first-year community gardener and perhaps too high a threshold. In 2019 I will reset expectations and focus on my favorite vegetables: globe tomatoes, arugula, radishes, cucumbers. 

Ciao for now!  
-- Diane Tunick Morello