This week, between the rain drops, I wandered around the back yard and started thinking about our summer garden. I am ill-equipped for the heavy labor involved in actual gardening – like digging holes – in the sunshine. Heavens to Betsy! That’s why having a modest raised garden bed is enough of a project for me. I can dig small holes, and poke small plants into them. Weeding? Well, maybe this year I will be more responsible when the daily weeding should commence. I am aware of my limits. I should just plant a few tomato plants, and maybe a handful of basil plants, in pots. No staked rows of heirloom tomato plants, with thoughts of burbling pots of fragrant spaghetti sauce. There is no gardening staff to bustle around anticipating my every whim, doing my work for me, however much I would like to will them into being. I’m sure you are familiar with your own shortfalls.
It’s too late, already, to plant peas. I needed to have done that work in a cold frame weeks ago. Peas just seem so springlike and green, as they change colors when cooked: they start off a nice medium Girl Scout uniform green, and after the briefest of moments spent in steam they are suddenly jewel-like, and chartreuse, and irresistible. I will have to wander through the grocery store and hope to stumble over a cache of fresh peas. Or maybe the farmers’ market will have a seasonal surprise for me this weekend!
The rains this week, while excellent for the burgeoning hydrangeas and the thirsty, unfashionable lawn, have flattened the daffodils and threatened the tulips as yet undiscovered by the deer visiting at night. (The deer did find the few tulips nestled among the pansies in the urns on the front porch, and nibbled them to nubbins. You’re welcome.) It feels like everything has bloomed early. Some of the azaleas have begun to pink up, modestly, around the edges. Forsythia bushes have burst into full flame in the hedge next door.
I’m thinking of light spring-y recipes while I am plotting the weeding and mulching. Winter feels finished, and I am longing for lighter, fresher meals. No more meatloaf. No more chicken pot pie. Bring on the pasta primavera, with new peas and garden-fresh farmers’ market tomatoes, please. Lemon Primavera
Our friends at Food52 have a delicious spring salad that is loaded with fresh asparagus as well as peas. This will put a spring in your step and you go out to mulch your raised garden bed: Peas and Asparagus Salad
This is more interesting than a salad plate of wilting iceberg lettuce. It is redolent with springtime: Fresh Peas
This transcendent pea compound butter is good on toast, or spread on cooked meats: Compound Butter
I think this Guac recipe will make for a very nice appetizer on the back porch this weekend as we venture out for our first cocktail hour of the new season. (Don’t forget to Spring Ahead Saturday night!) Something light and crunchy, to go with a small glass of rosé Prosecco.
Green Pea Guacamole
If you feel you must cook peas:
Buttered Green Sugar Snap Peas
1 pound sugar snap peas
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon shredded fresh mint
Pluck off and discard the string from each pea pod.
Bring salted water to boil; there should be enough to cover peas when added. Add peas. When water returns to a boil, cook about 3 minutes. Do not overcook. Drain.
Return peas to saucepan. Add pepper, salt, butter and mint. Stir to blend until the pieces are well coated and hot. Serve immediately.
You should try their sweet deliciousness raw:
7 Ways to Eat Sugar Snap Peas
And more Sugar Snap Peas
“They sowed the duller vegetables first, and a pleasant feeling of righteous fatigue stole over them as they addressed themselves to the peas.”
― E.M. Forster
