I should have been checking the weather last week, because I almost lost some things in a frost. Luckily I decided to check the garden one morning, so I was able to dig the last few radishes. And harvest the fennel. I thought the arugula got killed, but it seems to have recovered, so we’ll be having fresh salad for Thanksgiving. I’m sure the kids will love arugula.<\/p>\n
I’m quite happy with how the fennel turned out this year. It seemed to have a weird growth cycle. First it grew tall stalks with some leaves, and then bloomed. I’ve harvested a bunch of seeds and have been using the leaves in salads, but I was disappointed that like last year, there were no bulbs. Fennel bulbs are the best part of the fennel (or maybe tied with the seeds). I love them raw or roasted.<\/p>\n
A couple weeks ago I got the last of the seeds and cut off the stalks. Then I noticed that the plants had started to put up shorter stalks from…bulbs! <\/p>\n
So when I noticed everything was frozen on Thursday morning, I cut down almost all the fennel. The leaves are in a paper bag, hopefully drying–the icier leaves went into the compost–and the bulbs are either in the freezer or the fridge, depending on whether they felt frozen or not. <\/p>\n
So maybe that’s what fennel usually does, first one tall stalk, then several shorter ones from a bulb. And a freaking long taproot. I guess I’ll find out what happens next year; I suspect it’s dropped a ton of seeds into the garden, since a bunch of seedlings came up this year already. <\/p>\n
Anyone have a favorite fennel recipe you want to share?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I should have been checking the weather last week, because I almost lost some things in a frost. Luckily I decided to check the garden one morning, so I was able to dig the last few radishes. And harvest the … Continue reading