Salad Stroll

When my nephews, Joel and Garret, and niece, Dori, came to visit with their parents during Memorial Day weekend, the first thing they did was head for the gardens, looking for what was edible. In May, that mostly means salad. I followed, pointing as they tasted. Each leaf differed from the one before: lemony sorrel and lemon balm, licorice-flavored Sweet Cicely, a spicy hot mustard. Tangy arugala. Chrunchy chard.  Spearmint. Dill. Garlic greens. Several different lettuces.

If I had space to grow only a few things, salad greens would be at the top of the list. With greens, fresh makes a huge difference, as does variety. They take up little room, and do just as well in containers as in the ground.

We’ve been learning to extend the harvesting season beyond central New York’s short Memorial Day-to-Labor Day “frost free” months. In early April, I built two wooden boxes covered with old window frames garnered from the “Free Fridays” at Significant Elements, our local salvage and re-use operation. They joined the raised bed with clear plastic thrown over some low hoops.

As a result, we’ve been well into salad season for weeks now. Some days, rushed and late to work, I simply grab whatever greens are closest at hand, throw in some chick peas and feta cheese, and head out the door. But I much prefer what I’ve come to call my daily “salad stroll.” Dori became quite expert at it.

The “stroll” begins at the kitchen door. Close to the house, surrounded by a low brick wall and an open southern exposure, are the earliest lettuce, mustard, and baby kale greens, started under a cover of plastic in mid-March, weeks before the last snows fell. 

Next come the “rays” of the sun patio, where we pick edible leaves from the perennial plants: lemon balm and fern-like Sweet Cicely in the shadiest “ray”; chives and garlic scallions on the sunnier side. Through May, violets (both leaves and flowers) and young celery-flavored lovage stalks – now past their prime – join the mix. All are reliable perennial crops, needing minimal care.

Then it’s on to several annual vegetable beds to snip a mix of greens: lettuces, mustard, spearmint, Asian “spoon” greens and Mizoona, spinach leaves, arugala, and chard. A few beet greens occasionally make it into the mix. Plus a couple of leaves from an overwintered hot mustard. Somehow I missed replanting the hot mustard seeds until a few weeks ago; so for now, it appears only sparingly in the salad mix. 

The small flower buds from the mustards and kales (florettes that look and taste like miniature versions of their close cousin, broccoli), go in, along with some of the already opened yellow flowers. And then there are the “volunteer” greens around the edges of all the beds, self-seeded from last year’s plants, that look like a mustard-chard cross.

The dill is in the front beds. Last year’s few gangly dill plants self-seeded themselves profusely, so some always goes in the salad these days. Each year, something grows taller, fruits more prolifically, or self-seeds more profusely than expected. Two years ago, it was the cherry tomatoes, which grew to about 7 feet before they fell over. Last year, it was the kale, which seemed to pop up everywhere. We ate kale several times a week, and had kale to spare. This year seems to be the Year of the Dill.

Next come the just-emerging snow peas and snap peas, scattered liberally through the yard. The Johnny-Jump-Ups’ edible flowers go in last.

When I’m not driven by the clock, the “salad stroll” is about more than fixing lunch or dinner. It’s a chance to look things over, check in on later maturing plantings, admire the lupine or peonies (or whatever else is in bloom), pull a few weeds, and notice the profusion of growing, growing, growing all around. 

Photos -- Top: greens on May 8; middle: chives and arugula in bloom; bottom: ready to serve.