The Fink Farm Dirt

Nothing spells summer to me like f-l-o-w-e-r-s. Next to sprouting carrot tops and growing sweet potatoes in a jar of water, few garden plants are as rewarding as zinnias, marigolds and cosmos. They don't have many requirements to thrive and they produce such glorious blossoms.

Two years have gone by and we've scarcely stuck a trowel into dirt. I blame these fallow periods on California's lack of seasons. It's even worse with a four-year-old drought on. Planting time seems to begin earlier and earlier and there's always something else to grab our attention. The oregano, thyme and mint that we moved away from the main vegetable plot are still going. There are brown paper bags hanging from my balcony with drying herbs. They should be ready to put into jars tomorrow. The biggest challenge is harvesting before they go to flower. The mint died off and has now come back.  It's indestructible, it seems. It makes wonderful tea when added fresh to black tea.  We need to work harder on summer recipes that use mint with yogurt, quinoa or cucumbers.  Perhaps with the Fourth of July holiday coming up we can spotlight some dishes featuring mint. All that's left in the main vegetable patch is a tenacious yellow chard. We cleared away the k...

Our first green tomato is visible under the leaves inside the tomato cage. It always amazes me how quickly and dramatically a gardener can go from impatient waiting to an avalanche of harvest. Tomatoes especially arrive as genteel newcomers and grow into sprawling monsters. When the first crop of tomatoes start greening up, it seems almost scandalous to pick them for fried green tomatoes (or baked, which we discovered we preferred last year.  When they start turning red, there's no end to them. Until you start trying to can them or turn them into sauce.  Then it seems as if we should have just plowed up the entire backyard and planted "Fink Tomato Farms." This year, I've promised myself that I'm going to scout out the perfect tomato sauce recipe.