Morning At The Stove

It seems that I spend my life either taking things out of the freezer (fall and winter) or putting things into the freezer (spring and summer). The putting-into-the-freezer season is here, and I\’d better get busy, if we want to eat next winter.

I harvested a big armful of rhubarb this morning.  I love those huge leaves, as big as elephant ears, and stack them on some wild rosebush sprouts that I\’m trying to suffocate to death (it\’s almost impossible to kill a wild rosebush without using herbicides).  I chopped up the rhubarb stems and filled three one-gallon bags, each of which–with the addition of eggs, flour, oil and pecans–will make  a batch of six rhubarb bread loaves on some snowy afternoon.  When the chopping was done I was left with the trademark black fingernails that result from some weird reaction between the rhubarb juice and my skin and will take about a week to disappear.

I also picked a basketful of kale, which I tore into pieces and threw, stems and all, into the big vat of dog food that I cook every month.  In case you\’re wondering, this mixture of rice, veggies, eggs, oil, garlic and powdered milk does not constitute my dogs\’ entire diet–only about a quarter of it, the rest being a decent kind of kibble.  Wolfie and Bisou love it, though, and I feel that I\’m ensuring that they will live forever….

The lavender has just started blooming, so I picked that, hoping to encourage the plants to produce more.  It\’s not been a good lavender year so far–lavender wants hot, dry weather instead of this chilly damp. I lost a couple of plants over the winter, and the survivors are putting out feeble little blooms.  I hung today\’s harvest in a bunch from the light fixture above the dining room table.  It doesn\’t look like much, but I can smell it every time I walk by.

I\’ve been meaning to make arugula soup while the arugula, which does like chilly damp weather, holds out.  Also, my spinach crop has been negligible, but I should do something with it before the weather changes and it bolts.  Meanwhile, it\’s started raining again.  My green Vermont is so green these days that when I look out the window I almost feel like I\’m swimming underwater in some woodland pond.