“March 9th both beds of peas up! March 23rd sowed 2 rows of celery 9 inches apart, sowed 2 rows of Spanish onions and 2 of lettuce.” — Thomas Jefferson, 1767
It is no surprise that our Founding Gardener got giddy and detailed with the advent of spring, when the inspiration and the reality of the annual vegetable garden is ultimately constrained only by imagination and labor. Each January, mulling over the vast pantheon of vegetable planting possibilities — from artichokes to broccoli, cabbages to corn, all the way down the alphabet until reaching everyone’s favorite vegetable to gift (in quantity), the overproductive zucchini — I know in my heart that something must give. In the final accounting, after all, there are only so many dinners one can eat, so many stolen mornings to attend to the weeding, only so much space to devote.
This tendency toward overshoot, of course, may be evolutionary, that our eyes are truly bigger than our stomach. Fortunate for us, we raise hogs. These fellow gourmands have our back; they are all too ready to take on the challenge of a too-productive garden.
What follows are some thoughts on the vegetable annuals I do plant. This list is governed by one simple rule: plant what you want to eat. Although beauty and orderliness have some merit, if it doesn’t have a place on the dinner plate, why bother? (Which begs the question of why I raised those damned prickly cardoons last year.)
- Tomatoes: I typically plant at least a half-dozen varieties, ranging from the unproductive but outstandingly delicious Brandywine to the sturdy and prolific workhorse, the Rutgers. With at least six and often more varieties in the ground and 20-30 plants in all, I’m ready for whatever the season throws at the garden. Too much or too little rain, cool or hot, a few if not all will thrive. A summer table without tomatoes is a sign of celestial disfavor. And besides, who would want to eat an egg and bacon sandwich without a slice of tomato?
- Peppers: While one good pepper plant can satisfy a family, and the pigs will not eat the excess, I still can’t resist putting at least a dozen in the ground. Like okra, they make this gardener look highly skilled. (These are the plants needed to provide ample cover for my other horticultural sins.) I find that a planting of Hatch and jalapeño peppers provide what we crave.
- Eggplant: I plant about four (usually Black Beauty) and as late as I can still find them. Because covering crops with row covers, dusting with diatomaceous earth, are activities performed only in the most lazy and forgetful fashion by this Scotch-Irish descendant. If the flea beetles are to be outwitted, my plants go in the ground in late June or July and we dine in September on eggplant parmigiana.
- Southern field peas: That my beloved is not a fan does not limit the space devoted to this most prolific of all that is grown in my garden of Southern varieties. I keep more than a dozen heirlooms: Texas Zipper Creams, Red Rippers, the Unknown field pea, Polecats, Purple Hulls, each lovingly preserved in the freezer for their chance to be chosen to shine bright on a summer evening. A small pot of field peas (also sometimes called crowders) with a bit of smoked tasso, fresh herbs, and other seasonings, all simmered in homemade chicken stock for a couple of hours is as close to perfection as I might hope for in this life. To paraphrase old Ben Franklin, they are proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. A bonus is to have a reason to sit quietly and shell peas in the cooling shade of the evening while sipping a cold beer.
- Green beans: Just a trio of poles, formed into a couple of tepees and planted with the variety called Murphy’s, is sufficient for our green bean needs. They will keep us fed, if harvested regularly, fresh in summertime and canned or frozen for out-of-season dining.
- Butter beans: A row trellised in mid-summer, packed with pods (most often Snow on the Mountain), mounds of verdant vines, conveying richness and a promise of food security at the table. Serve them cooked in pork products, in a jambalaya, or in chicken stock, buried beneath a slow-cooked, garlic-stuffed leg of lamb.
- Lettuce: Sharpen your pens in rebuke, but lettuce is a backdrop to the seasonal plate, always present, even needed, but seldom remarked on or loved; a mere conveyance for the main event, yet, it is still essential. I plant a rotating crop of a market mix to provide textural and taste contrasts for whatever use is called for at dinner. Obligatory, attractive, but boring.
- Garlic: Easy to grow, essential, exciting even, garlic should always be planted in longer rows than one can spare. For to run out of garlic mid-winter is to contemplate the dark thoughts of a trip to Olive Garden. We always plant at least two varieties, Killarney Red being a favorite.
- Onions: A row of red and a row of white, well-watered, yields a surprisingly large amount for the larder. True, we can buy them, like potatoes, “dirt cheap” at the store. And we never quite grow enough to forestall their purchase. But having your own red onion, freshly cured, is just the thing to make that lettuce look and taste less boring.
- Winter squash: Typically I will grow three different varieties (although, for some reason I have grown none the past couple of years). Hubbard, Candy Roaster, pumpkins, the list is endless. A winter squash mashed up with butter and Steen’s syrup, with a sprinkling of pecans — now who can think of a better accompaniment to a dinner of pork chops and rice smothered in tomato gravy?
- Okra: That ultimate cultural identity test, separating the newly arrived New Yorker from the Chosen. I grow the variety Dub Jenkins every year, courtesy of that gardening giant John Coykendall. Okra bulks up a vegetable stew (which will always have beef, my protein- and flavor-deprived vegetarian friends), should never be seen in a bowl of gumbo (unless you hang out with those misguided souls from New Orleans), is perfect in fritters, and is absolutely lovely when pickled (but only made by my friend Susan or Talk of Texas).
- Yellow squash: I grow it every year and am always grateful for the short season we enjoy it before the squash borers invade. Then it is gone, which is fine, because too much of a good thing and the palate is jaded. Served in a casserole with bacon (from the oft-mentioned Ms. Lundy’s cookbook) or sliced thin with potatoes and zucchini, then sprinkled with herbs and salt, and baked in the oven — these are my two favorite ways to eat crooknecks, please.
- Cucumbers: That a fruit can be so bland by itself, yet leave you salivating in the kitchen, a halved cuke in one hand and a fistful of kosher salt in the other, is a marvel. Cucumbers never last long enough.
- Cabbages: I will war with the natural world to keep these whole and fresh all the way to maturity. Cole slaw, home-fermented sauerkraut, or alongside some freshly cured corned beef or pork, the world would be less than whole without the contributions of cabbage.
- Greens (all of ‘em): I’ll refer you to my Ode to Greens. Let the rest of the garden be washed away or eaten by the undeserving, but please leave me the greens.
Now, you may wonder at the obvious ones missing, potatoes and corn. And I do typically grow some for the table. But here, and just between us, I blush to confess, the economy and scale of the grocery store to provide quality at a reasonable price makes my efforts superfluous. Besides, I am a rice man by inheritance and culinary inclination. And, as for the noble corn, it is always at its best stone ground and made into cornbread.
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Reading this weekend two books (again and again) by very different Southerners, both of whom knew that the meaning of a good garden is hospitality. Butter Beans to Blackberries, Recipes from the Southern Garden (R. Lundy). What prose, what style, what wisdom and joy is found in these pages (such as the instructions on page 164, for okra and corn fritters with sorghum and pepper relish). And Thomas Jefferson, the Garden and Farm Books (T. Jefferson). A fascinating glimpse into his world and life.
