January 8, 2023- Week #7

Time marches on. The days are at least a minute longer each day. I have started some lettuce. Lettuce is so rewarding as it germinates in just a few days. I also planted some lupine seeds, which can take a week.

I ordered some lantana seed. For about $10 I got 400 seeds. Unfortunately the instructions say it takes up to 60 days to germinate. It seems like in that time about all I grow is fungus gnats. Yuck! Maybe I will try something like a sealed container which I will look at every week. 

In another sign of warmer times to come, the first amaryllis broke dormancy. It was one that Katie had given me last winter. I really have to look under the stairs every few weeks now to catch any other bulb that wakes up on its own. Coincidentally Katie sent me a picture of one of her amaryllis that was also waking up. (She lives in Portland, Maine.) How long until it flowers? I would guess about 3-4 weeks.

What is it that wakes a dormant plant? It did not rain under the stairs. Was it the temperature change from two weeks ago? While sheltered from that under the stairs it still might have felt the difference. 

Let us look at flowers.

Last Week the winner was the pink waterlily. After a slow start the pink flower ran away with the selection.

Here was the full vote 

This Week which is Week 7

I suspect this week's selection will be difficult. At this point I do not know which one I prefer. I would be interested in not only which one you pick, but also which one you think will win.

# 1 Pink Trout lily April 23, 2022

We know trout lilies by other names, such as dog tooth violet. The botanical name is Erythronium americanum. It is called a "trout lily" because the leaves resembles the coloring of the brook trout. The name "dog-toothed violet" comes from the shape of the bulb/root. Mostly we do not see that for reference.

The common one in our woods, and in part of the garden, has a white flower. It grows by the thousands. I have a few that are yellow. The yellow and pink ones do not spread much, but do seem to come back each year.

#2 Orange Martagon Lily June 11, 2022

I have added martagon lilies to my list of enthusiams. (I may have to stop a make a list.) Martagon lilies are wonderful, and are just getting started. I got my first one maybe 4 years ago. It did not do so well. I ordered 4-5 in 2020 and 2021. Particularly the ones planted in 2020 did really well in 2022. I see this group of plants climbing the enthusiasm list. 

The botanical name is Lilium martagon.

They are know for being the lily that can grow in the shade.

The produce many little flowers on the same stem. Please see the bonus section for other pictures from 2022.

One somewhat discouraging thing about these beauties is that they sometimes do not grow the first year. What? I gather it is important to mark where they are planted for that reason. This is particularly true for ones that are planted in the spring. (I plant all my lilies in the fall.)

#3 Big Sunflower July 21, 2022

This wonderful sunflower grew this summer in our garden plot at Chadek Park. You get the same garden plot each year, if you want it. This was our third year there.

In 2021 Katie and family visited us in late May. While they were here Christopher planted a few sunflower seeds. The plants grew and dropped some seeds for this year. Sure enough, we had 4-5 plants from those seeds this past year. They grew to perhaps 12-14 feet. 

In a year when the Ukraine was very much on our mind, this flower towered over all the garden plots.

Please see the bonus section to appeciate that even more.

#4 Orchid Cactus Hookeri September 26, 2022

This wonderful flower is Epiphyllum hookeri.

I have had this plant since 2018.

Unlike most of the orchid cacti it blooms throughout the year. Like the epiphyllum oxypetalum (Night Blooming Cereus) it will rebloom during year, right through October. I have sometimes brought in a plant in bud when a frost was coming. Usually it will not bloom inside.

#5 African Violet Birth of a Galaxy December 28, 2022

My mother grew African violets. I have tried them over the years. They usually did not last more than a few months.

I am prepared to try them again. This flower is named "Birth of a Galaxy." Nice name. Big flowers. And so far, in the 6 weeks we have had the plant, it continues to bloom.

The flower in this picture is amazing. It has those sparkling bits I associate with a very few flowers. The center is good too, where the sexual parts are. 

African violets are the only plant that does not go outside in the warm half of the year. I understand that water on their leaves is bad. We are talking about major discoloration.

As an inside plant they require a consistent watering pattern. This has been our problem in the past.

This fall/winter someone at the Iowa City winter farmer's market was/is selling African Violets. They come already set up with an unusual watering feature. It is called wicking. It involves some synthetic string or yarn threaded through the hole in the bottom of the pot. That string dangles in a pool of water. The water wicks up into the plant and keeps it moist. This works so long as the plant does not get too wet. 

The way to ensure that it is not too wet is to have the soil mix be at least half perlite. Perlite, for those of you who do not know it, is a kind of pulverized volcanic glass. What? So I guess it is an industrial mineral. There must be a lot of it in the world as it is not expensive. You look at it or touch it and say "this is not dirt." 

Adding perlite to the potting mix allows for better drainage and the retention of moisture. Both? Here is the scoop on perlite.

https://www.thegardensuperstore.co.uk/advice-and-inspiration/perlite-how-useful-it-can-be-in-your-gardening-job#:~:text=Perlite%20speeds%20up%20the%20germination,twenty%20times%20its%20original%20volume.

What I do not know at this point is what other plants would benefit from a wicking system.

I do know that I will continue to get another violet at every market for the rest of the season. There are about two each month, until May.

Vote away. I do appreciate the comments or the reply emails. Upon request I send out emails on Sunday morning with the links both to the garden blog and the blog with Julia's archived recipe posts.

Bonus time

Wicking

Here is one violet we jsut took to the office.

We have the wicking set up using a half pint jar.

Here are more Martagon lilies.

More trout lilies/dog tooth violets

This flower, looks like the flower on the martagon lilies, the way it curves  backwards. Such long stamen.

The white variety is what we find in the woods in Iowa. I have an area that is completely packed with these flowers. It must be several square yards in size. You can see the similarity in their spotted leaves.

Here is that first picture enlarged. I thought about putting this in the contest, but chose the pink one instead.

Sunflower pictures

Hookeri throughout the year

May 21, 2022

June 24, 2022

September 8, 2022

Right Now

Dracena Fragrans is blooming and at its peak fragrance. This plant is sometimes known as the corn plant. As I may have mentioned this is the most fragrant flower we have ever had. It is in our bedroom, in a north window. You can smell it on your way up the stairs. Julia said just last night that it is almost too much.

We got this plant  about 10 years ago. It took about 8 years to bloom. That was in January of 2021. 

See how it evolved this last month.

December 10, 2022

   When the bud arose, there was no fragrance. That was        not surprising. 

December 17, 2022

  There still was no reagrance even when the flower stalk     reached its full height.

December 17, 2022

     A differet view on that same day in December. There         were actually many little buds in each cluster. They           had not opened.

Sorry for the interuption. This little guy really wanted to make an appearance in the blog.

January 1, 2023

 Finally the buds began to open, emitting more and more fragrance as 3-4 flowers became 10, then more.

January 1, 2023

   For this last week it is just been everywhere.

Julia's recipe

Rigatoni, mushrooms and pancetta

This recipe comes from the Milk Street magazine, Christopher Kimball's latest venture. I liked it - pasta, mushrooms, parmesan, what's not to like? But I found it a bit (unnecessarily) fussy so I have some proposals to simplify it. Fussy or not, it's tasty and pretty fast - on the table, start to finish, in less than an hour. 

The ingredients (as per the recipe):

1 lb. box of penne or ziti (I used rigatoni);

4 oz. pancetta (see comment below);

1 tablespoon olive oil (see comment below);

1 cup diced onion;

1 tablespoon smushed garlic;

1/2 cup dry white wine;

1 lb. mushrooms (I used cremini);

1 14oz can tomato puree (I used crushed tomatoes);

1/4 cup heavy cream (see comment below); 

1/2 cup (plus) grated parmesan; 

salt and pepper.

Comments: 1) I used pancetta, as called for, and because I like the fact that world class pancetta is produced in Norwalk, Iowa. But I think good bacon would be fine. And less expensive and more readily accessible. 2) I don't think one needs olive oil in a recipe that starts with cooking bacon (or a baconish product) with onions and garlic. Plenty of grease in the bacon. 3) I don't think the heavy cream is necessary at all. It was not noticeable in terms of taste or texture in the final product.  And who wants to buy whipping cream to put 1/4 cup in a pasta recipe? Sheesh. 

I started by washing and slicing all of the mushrooms. This was the most time-consuming prep step. Next, I diced the onion and smushed the garlic. 

This is a picture at the point in the process where I had the onion in one little bowl and the garlic in another littler bowl and the mushrooms (off camera to the right) in a big container. 

I put a big pot of water (with salt) on to boil and turned my attention to the pancetta. I cut it all up into little strips crosswise. You could easily do the same thing with bacon. Not turkey bacon. 

More pancetta work. 

I got out a skillet, put the oil in it (unecessary), followed immediately by the onion, pancetta and garlic. 

I cooked this stuff over medium-high heat until the pancetta was browned and the onions/garlic were translucent. 

Here we are at the pancetta-browned stage, which took maybe 7 or 8 minutes. I added the wine and stirred it up until the wine was mostly evaporated, a minute or two. 

Followed by the mushrooms. By this time, the water had boiled and the rigatoni was cooking. 

I added maybe 1/2 teaspoon of salt and some black pepper to the skillet. 

I turned the heat up a bit (a slightly higher medium-high) and stirred now and then until the mushrooms had deflated a bit and browned a bit. 

I dipped some of the pasta water out of the pasta cooking pot in case I needed it to thin the sauce a bit. 

And then I added the crushed tomatoes to the skillet and turned the heat down so that the sauce simmered. I let it simmer for a few minutes.  

I drained the pasta and returned it to the pot, off the heat, of course. 

I poured the sauce into the pot with the pasta and stirred it up. I added some more salt and pepper (to taste) and maybe 1/2 cup of the pasta water to make sure that the sauce was thin enough to coat all of the pasta. 

I added the parmesan and the heavy cream and stirred some more. 

On the table. The pancetta flavored the dish, as did the mushrooms and the tomato. 

As I said above, I did not detect the cream. I did (in a subtle way) detect the wine. We could taste the cheese, but put a dish with more parmesan on the table for extra sprinkling.

I think next time (in addition to the adjustments noted at the top), I will add maybe 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of red pepper flakes at the first stage of skillet cooking to make the dish a bit zippier. 

We had some leftovers, and we found the dish improved with sitting in the refrigerator overnight and being reheated. 

Odds and Ends

Other than a few bitter days several weeks ago this winter has been mild. (I do understand the peril I create by saying that.) So far it is not quite like 2012. There really was not a winter that year. Look at these pictures.

January 31, 2012

February 17, 2012

Look at these temperature maps for those months in 2012. In 2023 we are not at these temperatures yet. 

But it is not crazy to begin to look for snowdrops just emerging. I did see one last weekend, when it was 49 degrees. It was just barely out of the ground. But it was there.

This was January, 2012.

This was February of that same year.

Poisonous plants-

It seems like many plants are toxic. Some are sufficiently so that warnings get made.

Apparently martagon lilies are highly toxic to cats. Who knew? Dogs? Apparently not. How odd. 

How about deer? If they are toxic to cats, could they be tasty to deer? Regular lilium are a deer favorite.

Apparently martagons are said to be more deer resistant than the regulars.

It has been a strange week. 

It seems someone has made clowns very important in part of Washington. I fear for the country.

There are serious problems, and having clowns around will not help.

I guess we do what we can. 

Grow some plants. Feed some people.

Remember those who have no voice, no power, no clowns at their beck and call.

Pray for peace.

I am not sure about reconcilation with the clowns. 

Maybe their actions will get them thrown off stage sometime soon.

Be safe and stay warm.

Philip