Food for Dragonflies and Chard Two Ways

There is a dragonfly and mosquito hatch happening simultaneously in the garden. Another ecological balance-mysterious and illuminating and almost as fascinating as warblers gleaning insects. Fortunately for us there is a source population of dragonflies migrating over from the wetland. In numbers strong enough in combination with the nesting swallows to keep the mosquitoes somewhat down. As much as mosquitoes seem a nuisance they play an important role directly and indirectly on many trophic levels. But if you'd like to keep them off-we like mixing vodka with this synergistic melody of essential oils ~ clary sage, rosewood, lavender, peppermint, lemongrass ~ 4-8 drops each in a 4 oz bottle. Any bites we got this week we covered with calendula salve which dramatically improved inflammation including itching within a few hours and totally healed within a day.  

You might enjoy this refreshing soup from the garden the other night. We cooked down some chard and baby bella mushrooms then added the sliced garlic for 2 minutes and poured the coconut milk over the top. Finishing it with fresh dill.

Northern Lights Chard in a Lime Coconut Soup with a hint of Dill

5 stalks Chard

Baby Bella Shrooms 

3 garlic cloves

a few sprigs of Dill

Coconut Milk

Our sunset dinner last night of Garlic Scape Pesto over stir fried Chard and Orach was not only brilliantly colorful and tantalizing to the taste buds but full of pure health benefits. We paired it with the Yugoslavian Butterhead lettuce, you'll find in your share this week, topped with shredded zucchini and golden beets, avocado slices and raisins.

Garlic Scape Pesto

1 cup soaked cashews

7 garlic scapes

1/2 cup grapeseed oil

2 handfuls of basil 

a little water to get things moving in the blender

salt to taste

My measurements are always estimates so the blender should visually be about 2/3 of the way full of ingredients. Add the water while the blender is running until it's a nice creamy green consistency. We cut the scapes where they start to curl and chop the remaining stalks for the stir fry of chard and orach and served it over a bed of penne rice noodles.

As for how the garden grows ~ We really enjoyed the first round of peas-they were well worth planting back in March and have served both purposes as staple and nitrogen fixer. The sugar snaps never tasted so sweet. We'll be turning the veg under for the cucumber crop. The peppers, tomatoes and tomatillos that made the transplanting window before my departure a month ago are loving these warm nights that are barely dipping below 60. The squashes are coming-just a little later than planned. I'm catching up on transplanting our namesakes in the ground to climb up 3 foot radius tepees. And even though the we'll use the flowering arugula next season once it goes to seed I'm restarting another round along with bilko chinese cabbage as both started flowering during my hiatus.

Today we resumed the earth building adventures. After flipping the tarps off I discovered some ants making a home in the premix and thankfully not the sand in the earth oven where the toad was found. Lesson here keep the premade mix in trash cans instead of tarps. So instead of the full foot immersion we spent an enjoyable day hand building and throwing on the wheel. Talus taking his first ride at the wheel and showing me few new ways to work the clay. Tomorrow is another day of opportunities.