Fenton Friday: Lettuce for Days

This week was a hot one! Record temps of 96 degrees followed by a big drop in temps and finally some blessed rains. It is supposed to rain even more over the next several days and I'm thrilled.

I harvested Asparagus, Cilantro, and various Lettuces (pictured above). This was my last Asparagus harvest and I'll let the spear grow up now and collect energy for the rest of the growing season. 

Someone left some Romaine Lettuce seedlings for free at our garden gates, so I took 4 and planted them ain a pot where the Peas failed to grow (or were eaten by baby bunnies). I put a covercloth over them, so hope that protects them.

The Blackberries are starting to color up and the Strawberries are setting fruits -- though I think I may have lost a few already to rabbits or squirrels.

The Dill seedlings are really taking off and I need to thin them out again -- anyone need any?

The Garlic is just starting to for its scapes, but the plants are also starting to turn yellow. I fear they may need to be dig early and may not have much of a harvest this year.

After weeks of no sign of the Dahlia plants returning, this week I noticed one plant was back and putting on some good growth so they were not a total loss to the harsh winter afterall. 

Gardening friend Tony S. dropped off some coffee grounds and we had a nice compost delivery from the county parks folk. I plan to amend the beds with those after the rains clear and before we plant our Tomato and Pepper seedlings in a few weeks.

In the pollinator strip, I weeded a bit and planted Marigolds and Zinnias (donated by the local Ace Hardware) as well as Mrs. Burn's Lemon Basil (donated by the Silver Spring Garden Club). I also put in the label signage for the returning Milkweed, Mountain Mint, and Sunchokes. Brazilian Verbena, Borage, and Calendula that reseeded there is also returning.

What are you growing and harvesting in your garden this week?

About Fenton Friday: Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house in zone 7 Mid-Atlantic MD/DC border. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 15th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.) See past posts about our edible garden by putting "Fenton"  into the Search box above (at the top, left on this blog).

Fenton Friday: Salad Green Success

By Hojung Ryu

As an intern for Washington Gardener Magazine, I planted a spring mix and salad bowl mix of salad greens from seed in the community garden plot with my editor Kathy and my co-intern Dorvall. We observed and checked on the plants every week on Thursday for 8 weeks, from the first week of March to the last week of May.

After I harvested the plants, I rinsed and prepared them for lunch. The salad bowl mix was grown to its full size and was very leafy, so it was perfect so a good bowl of salad. I made a salad (shown above) with tomatoes, prosciutto, carrots, cheese, topped with avocado green goddess dressing.

For the spring mix, it did not grow as tall yet as the salad bowl mix, so I used it as a topping for my avocado bagel with prosciutto and scrambled eggs (shown at right). It felt rewarding to grow my own food and both plates tasted amazing! I loved this experience and it inspired me to grow and harvest my own food more. Thank you, Kathy, for this exceptional experience!

What are you growing and eating this week from your edible garden?

About Fenton Friday: Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house in zone 7 Mid-Atlantic MD/DC border. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 11th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.) See past posts about our edible garden by putting "Fenton" into the Search box above.

Join us in celebrating -- 2022 Year of the Salad Greens! #yearofthesaladgreens and May is National Salad Month!

This post is part of the #GardenBloggersChallenge sponsored by Gardencomm for the month of May. You are invited to join in and can see more details at gardencomm.org

Fenton Friday: Grow Your Own Salad

Guest Post by Melena DiNenna

While interning at Washington Gardener this fall, I grew cutting lettuce (Lactuca sativa), also called cut-and-come-again lettuce, in the community garden. This was my first time tending to an edible plant, so it’s been an interesting learning experience. I was lucky to get seeds that were very fresh and new, so I didn’t need to plant a whole lot to get an abundance of lettuce. 

Each week, we’d go into the garden and tend to our plants. A couple of times we’d get a rainy day, so we’d leave them be that week. Over time we started to weed around the plants, too. I also grew arugula at the same time, which didn’t grow as much as the lettuce. At one point, I even had to plant more arugula seeds since we couldn’t see any seedlings. However, the cutting lettuce grew very well and steadily. In late September and again in early November, I harvested it, giving me enough lettuce to make a delicious salad that week. 

What I love about salad is it doesn’t need to be complicated—sometimes it’s just a matter of throwing together what you have in your kitchen. I washed and patted the lettuce dry and put it into a bowl. I included some leftover cherry tomatoes we had picked from the garden throughout the fall as well. I also threw in some walnuts— my favorite addition to a salad—and topped with balsamic vinaigrette. The lettuce was crunchy and the salad made for a great afternoon snack!

This was just a great experience learning how to care for a lettuce plant. It was so fun watching the process from growing as a seedling to making a great salad ingredient. I hope I get the opportunity in the future to plant some more!

About the Author: Melena DiNenna is a journalism student at the University of Maryland, College Park, with minors in Spanish and sustainability studies. She is from Salisbury, MD, and is interning this fall with Washington Gardener.

About Fenton Friday: Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house in zone 7 Mid-Atlantic MD/DC border. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 8th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.) See past posts about our edible garden by putting "Fenton" into the Search box above.

Fenton Friday: Garden Fresh Salads Galore

By Nicole Noechel 

I’ve lived in small dorms and apartments for the past four years, so I haven’t had much space to grow my own plants. I tried growing a cherry tomato plant my freshman year, but it began to die in my dorm, and I had to give it to my dad to grow in his garden. 

This semester, having space to grow my own lettuce in the Fenton Street Community Garden has been really fulfilling. Eating a salad with fresh ingredients, including my lettuce and tomatoes and peppers that Kathy Jentz, editor of Washington Gardener, kindly let me take home, makes it taste so much better. 

I planted the Lettuce Leaf 'Salad Bowl Blend' seeds from Botanical Interests in early September. I divided some between two pots that we left in Kathy’s backyard and sprinkled the rest in the community garden plot. I planted way too many seeds in the garden, not knowing how many were left in the packet, and I had to take some out so the crop wouldn’t become too crowded. 

As soon as the potted seeds sprouted, squirrels (or maybe rabbits?) began to dig up and eat them. Not wanting all of my lettuce to suffer the same fate, we covered my garden crop with a cover cloth to keep pests out. It worked well—my lettuce was still able to get the sunlight it needed, but it was safe from rabbits, squirrels, and bugs. 

I visited the garden in early October, and my lettuce was looking great. It still wasn’t ready to be harvested, but it was much taller than the pictures of seedlings that Kathy had sent me a couple weeks earlier. I pulled out any weeds, watered it, and covered it up again, excited to take some home with me the next time I visited the garden. 

By October 20, the lettuce was ready to be harvested. I carefully cut the leaves from the stems, making sure not to uproot any plants so they could continue to grow. I took my lettuce home with me and made some tasty Caesar salads, my favorite kind. I harvested another batch of lettuce a few days ago, on November 17th, and have been making salads with that as well. 

I didn’t think that growing lettuce would be so straightforward and easy, but with Kathy’s help and expertise, it has been a blast! I would definitely like to grow my own food when I move out of my apartment—especially fresh tomatoes, which I’ve enjoyed picking and eating from Kathy’s garden plot throughout the semester. I’ve learned a lot about gardening this semester, like the best ways to water fragile plants and how to cover crops to keep them from being eaten, so I will take those lessons and apply them to my gardening efforts in the future. 

About the Author: Nicole Noechel is a senior multiplatform journalism major and history minor at the University of Maryland. She is interning this fall semester with Washington Gardener.

About Fenton Friday: Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house in zone 7 Mid-Atlantic MD/DC border. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 8th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.) See past posts about our edible garden by putting "Fenton" into the Search box above.

Fenton Friday: Salad Days!

Today at the community garden plot, we harvested lots of Spinach and Arugula. Then we made a big salad for lunch. This serves 2 people if it is a main dish or 4-6 people as a side dish. Here is the recipe we used:

Salad ingredients:

• 5-10 ounces arugula (homegrown or organic, when possible)

• 5-10 ounces young spinach leaves (homegrown or organic, when possible)

• 2 small apples - cored and cut into small cubes

• bleu cheese (or goat cheese) crumbles

• 2 Tbsp dried cranberries

• 1/2 cup raw pecans or walnuts - chopped

Dressing ingredients:

• 1 large lemon, juiced ( about 3 Tbsp)

• 3 Tbsp local honey

• 3 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Clean and dry the salad greens. Prep the other salad ingredients. Then mix the dressing in a mason jar. Combine salad ingredients in a large bowl. Pour on dressing and mix well. Enjoy!

Adapted from: https://minimalistbaker.com/apple-pecan-arugula-salad/

We also harvested Cilantro and my little kitty, Versace, snarfed up the piece I gave him. He loves the stuff.

This was a very wet week for us, so we weeded a bit and I also grabbed a handful of Asparagus. In the rest of the plot, the Garlic and Strawberries actually seem a couple of weeks ahead of schedule. The Lettuce mix and Carrot seedlings are finally popping up. Radishes, Peas, and Cauliflower are coming along nicely.

I hope to be able to plant my annual cutting flowers in the next week or so.

How is your vegetable garden growing this week?

About Fenton Friday: 
Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 6th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.)\

Fenton Friday: Salad Days Return!

I was able to provide a big salad for my family Memorial Day picnic -- all the greens, carrots, radishes, and Sugarsnap peas came from my community garden plot. We had enough for six people and lots leftover as well. My sister-in-law and younger niece are big salad-eaters so they will start eating it (undressed!) as we prepare the rest of the meal. I'm not as fond of straight greens, I need a big dollop of some kind of dressing - usually a creamy one like Ranch - to make the leaves go down.

Also this week, my summer interns started. Here is a picture of them picking strawberries in the hot sun. (Don't worry, we were not out there for long!) We brought them in and made fresh strawberry shortcakes and ate them right up. I'll be sharing an introductory blog of the new interns this Monday.

Meanwhile, the annoying weather-pattern continues of summer-like high temps and storms passing us right by, so I'm spending most of my gardening hours just watering to keep new plants alive. We are due for a cool break this Sunday-Monday and I hope that is accompanied by much-needed rain!

How is your edible garden growing this week?

About Fenton Friday:
Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 4th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.)

Fenton Friday: Salad Days... Again

We had a few very warm days and then several days of rain this week. My spinach is already bolting, but what is really weird is that my spinach seeds and my cilantro seeds are coming up in the same row (pictured here). I think one of the seeds "merged" into the other during one of the 3+ inch rain storms we had earlier this season. So now I'm having to carefully pluck out the spinach leaves out from among the more fast-growing cilantro as I have found the two greens definitely do NOT go together taste-wise.

Elsewhere in my community garden plot, I have harvested two quarts of strawberries and 50+ radishes. In a fit of optimism, I re-seeded one row of radish with 'Cherry Belle' seeds. I'm not sure we will have many more cool days ahead for these to mature properly, but I thought why not take the chance?

I have also given away a few newspaper sleeves full of salad greens and eaten a few salads for dinner myself. Shockingly, I have found out that I have a real passion for Arugula. There is something so addictive about that sharp, full, nutty flavor. I did not have that many seeds of it planted, so I only use a little bit at a time on each salad, but it sure does give it a nice kick!

I managed to plant a few tomatoes and weed out most of the tiny crabgrass invasion that threatens to take over my plot. I also started a container of nasturtium seeds and a row of lisianthus flowers. There are still several tomato, pepper, and herb plants to go in next week as well as a number of things I want to start from seed - okra, melon, etc.

So how is your plot growing?