Zone 6 zone denial tip: standard hybrid gladioli are reliably hardy only to zone 9 - or 8b, maybe - but if you have well drained soil, plant them 5 or 6 inches deep and mulch heavily in fall (in this case before the ground freezes), there’s a good chance they’ll come back.

By now you’ve probably gotten the word: the long awaited, massively updated USDA Climate Zone map, the first revision since 1990, has finally arrived. And  – insert giant snarky “this is news?” – it shows large swaths of the country have moved up at least a half zone.

In 1991, when I got together with Bill and began gardening in the Hudson Valley, I could joke that my new life didn’t net me a single climate zone, even though the NY garden is about 300 miles southwest of the one in Maine. Until a couple of weeks ago, they were both in zone 5b. Now, while New York remains 5b – by the skin of its teeth, from the looks of things – Maine has been promoted to 6a.

Of course the difference between the two may well be less than the full 5 degrees between half zones. Same with the big chunk of Nebraska that’s now 5a instead of 4b. It’s also possible that Chicago, a heat island, may have remained exactly the same while getting a higher zone assignment because of better measurement.

But whatever the physical changes, most of the numbers did go up. The USDA, however, refuses to draw what appear to be obvious conclusions.

Perhaps not surprisingly, there has been a lot of flapdoodle* about how the zone changes are strong proof of global warming and the USDA is simply stonewalling. There has also been a fair amount of wishful thinking along the lines of “I thought it wouldn’t be hardy here, but now I know I can grow it. Yay!”

Well, yes and no. USDA representative Kim Kaplan doth perhaps protest too much when insisting that the new map differs so fundamentally from the old that the two cannot be compared. Given the unanimity of projections of increasing warmth in future, it could be quibbling to maintain that the 30 years of data behind the new map is weather, not climate, because climate measures brackets of at least 50 years. And when it comes to wishful thinking, no one with any gardening knowledge would deny that plant hardiness is indeed an increasingly mobile target.

But all that said, I don’t think it would hurt to calm down a little and stop making the poor map carry far more weight than it should. On the first count, there are a lot more robust proofs of global warming (check out this government sanctioned analysis of trends in the Southeast, for instance, if you really want to have your pants scared off.) On the second count, it pays to remember that average winter lows – the only thing measured on the map – are by no means the single factor influencing plant survival; and when it comes to climate change the challenges far outweigh the benefits, even at the home garden level.

Some Factors Other Than the Thermometer That Influence Winter Survival of Plants

Time to harden off. When cold comes gradually, plants have a chance to toughen up in preparation for winter. When cold comes suddenly, plants may be killed by temperatures they could otherwise sail through unscathed.

Duration of the coldest temperatures. A plant rated hardy to -10 is more likely to survive a few hours of -15 than ten straight days of -5.

Winter soil moisture. Dry climate plants from lavender to cactus care a lot more about drainage than they do about air temperature.

Yearly rainfall. Seattle and Tucson have the same zone number but are not otherwise similar. Moisture needers and drought needers alike will go into winter deeply stressed if grown in the wrong place, and that weakness can finish them off when deep cold is added.

Late summer and fall care. Nitrogen fertilizer spurs tender growth that’s vulnerable to winter kill. Late pruning does the same thing.

Snow cover. A deep fluffy blanket of snow that lasts all winter will protect plants (especially perennials) from cold that would kill them if the ground were bare.

Some Gardeners’ Problems Headed This Way As a Result of Climate Change

Rapid temperature swings. A long mild fall followed by a plunge into the deep freeze, and/or a very early spring, followed by a plunge into the deep freeze.

Extreme weather events. Extended droughts, torrential rains, hurricane force winds.

Shorter winters. Plants like apples, peonies and lilacs that must have a long winter sleep can languish with too little rest. Insects and diseases once kept in check by extended cold will have higher rates of survival.

Less reliable snow cover, more frequent ice storms. Snow protects; ice kills.

Hotter summers. Northerners will have better luck with heat-loving annuals from tomatoes to moonflowers. Southerners may well have less; too much heat prevents fruit set and pushes annual flowers into early graves. The region of happiness for plants that must have cool nights even in summer (peas, delphiniums, rhododendrons, sugar maples) is headed toward Canada.

A Few Coping Strategies may be found here.

* Some back story on the flap.

Whatever its limitations, the USDA hardiness zone map has long been a widely recognized metric. Breeders and nurseries use it to rate and label plants. Scientists use it (along with a lot else) when investigating things like the spread of invasive weeds. The USDA itself uses the map to set some crop insurance standards.

Not chopped liver; and by the time the century turned, it was clear to all that the 1990 map was both insufficient and inaccurate. The USDA commissioned a new one from the American Horticultural Society, which had produced zone maps before. Projected appearance date was 2003.

But then the map didn’t show up – or rather it didn’t show up for long. As I remember it, there was a new version on the AHS website, but only very briefly. The curious were told it went away because it was just a draft; the USDA was not satisfied, and revisions were under way.

This was the party line for quite a while. During this while, we were enjoying the G.W. Bush administration, increasingly notorious for its disinclination to confront man made climate change. People began to think dark thoughts.

These thoughts were not brightened when, in 2006,  the Arbor Day Foundation published an updated zone map of its own, using some (but not all) of the same data as the rejected AHS draft. The ADF website provides an animation of the old map morphing into the (ADF) new one. It is not reassuring.

More grumbling. More Bush administration. More delays, now routinely attributed to the difficulty of producing a sufficiently sophisticated, web friendly interactive map.

Not so fast forward to January 25th, 2012. The new map is introduced at the National Arboretum. Distant journalists are invited to attend via webinar. I attend.

Neato! The thing is terrific. It really IS a great leap forward – for doing what it’s supposed to do, anyway. One need only enter a zip code to get the corresponding zone assignment, and there is a lot of other information there for the drilling down.

The introduction ceremony concludes with a question period. Various reporters ask questions. The most vocal questioners do not appear to be gardeners and what they really, really want to know is why the long suffering Ms. Kaplan, who has been fielding these enquiries ever since the flap began, will not knuckle under and admit that the map proves global warming is undoubtedly here. She won’t do it. (Her reasons are detailed on the map site, under “what’s new?”)

So, official word is still that the map was not delayed  - perhaps by underfunding? –  during the previous administration, which may or may not be true. But in fairness, nobody’s trumpeting its appearance as the return of sanity, either. So at the very least the USDA is an equal opportunity sphinx.

Our holiday tree, 2011, aka the top of the former arborvitae. There’s a bucket of water inside the pedestal.

Putting it up was extremely easy; taking it down wasn’t much  harder and now we have the same pile of long branches anyone with a regular tree will have as soon as they saw them from the trunk, first step in successful home recycling.

Some will argue deconstruction is unnecessary; you can simply recycle the tree by setting it up outdoors, replacing the human-centric ornaments with items of interest to birds: cut oranges, a feeder or two, that cute bell made from suet and encrusted with seeds you got from the office gift-swap.

Well, yes, but myself I’d rather use cut boughs to mulch the perennial beds, evergreen boughs being just about ideal for this purpose: They hold in the cold without matting down and they’re quick and easy to remove in spring without harming tender emerging shoots.

That’s right, hold in the cold. There are some instances where the object is to hold in warmth – such as when you’re trying to protect the fig tree.

Wrapped fig tree surrounded by bagged leaves, further insulated by a large pile of hemlock boughs

But most of the time what the mulch is doing is keeping the surface frozen, so you don’t get repeated thaws and freezes between January and April. “Frost heave” doesn’t just happen to roadbeds. Even when plants stay put, delicate feeder roots right near the surface are often damaged by soil that expands and contracts like an accordion.

The beds in Maine take a lot of boughs, so each year Kristi goes scavenging right about now, looking for raw material. Being well out in the country, she has to work at it. But in towns that offer municipal pick up there’s a bounty of useful material conveniently located right next to the curb.

Alternate use for evergreen branches: back door decor. Former “tree” makes a good anchor; saved up shrub and hedge prunings add variety.

Beds already all cozy – or non-existent? Consider the outdoor arrangement. In cold climates cut evergreens will stay fresh looking right through the entire Carnival season (Epiphany to Mardi Gras).

Added benefit of tree-in-tall pot: this is actually the first tree we’ve had in several years, feline depredations having finally discouraged me from even trying. But it looks like a combination of cat maturity and – comparative – tree inaccessibility is a winning one.

It's not that he COULDN'T jump; even fat as he is that's an easy distance. But as long as nothing moves he's not that interested.

And almost everything deciduous is down to the bare branches, many of them in need of shaping. What all this is reminding me is that I definitely need some snazzy new material for the string of garden beds that will (next spring) finally be unified into a single sweep of Things That Look Good From Inside The House When Inside Is Where We Are Most Of The Time.

Enter Eric’s excellent suggestion:

Corylopsis pauciflora – earlier than forsythia, far more delicate and FAR more fragrant, to say nothing of better behaved.

Buttercup winter hazel (Corylopsis pauciflora)

By Eric Larson

The winterhazels (Corylopsis species) are in the witchhazel family (Hamamelidaceae) and have many of the witchhazels’ virtues: fragrant flowers on bare branches, wide adaptability and ease of care. But unlike most of its siblings and cousins, Buttercup winter hazel is on the short side. It tops out at six or seven feet, ideal for the home landscape where space is at a premium. And it grows at a modest rate to its eventual manageable size, leaving little need for corrective or size pruning

In mid- to late April, this dainty shrub pops into bloom with a display of buttercup yellow flower clusters. The fragrance is delicate yet quite noticeable, making it perfect for end of the shrub border nearest the breakfast terrace (if you are lucky enough to have such an architectural element). New leaves show red edges before darkening to rich green, then (with luck) turn a rich gold-bronze before falling to reveal the slender but sturdy branches.

Witchhazels (Hamamelis species) bloom at different times: North American mostly in fall, the Chinese and other Asian species and many of their crosses generally in the late winter to early spring, much earlier than our Corylopsis. If you plant as many of the Hamamelidaceae as you can find – and fit in – you can enjoy their flowers for a good part of the year, but if you only have room for one this may be the one for you.

Like most of the Hamamelidaceae, C. pauciflora has very few insect or disease problems to worry about. This combines with its modest pruning needs to make it especially suitable as part of the ‘sustainable’ (was there ever a word so overused?) home landscape. Plant either in spring or fall, in good humus-rich acid soil, being sure to choose a nice partly shady spot.

Our winter hazel here at the garden gets lots of reflected light but no direct sunlight, and it seems to provide plenty of bloom and plenty of fall color, too.

If you can avoid windy exposed locations, you will have better luck with keeping this plant from flagging during the hotter months. In fact, if sited properly, it will need supplemental water only during severe summer drought. Mulch it well, and then let nature take its course.

This is a good addition to the shrub border, but it can also be used as a specimen and as forest underplanting. Planted in front of evergreens, the flowers, spring foliage and fall colors will show up with more contrast. A famous combination at Winterthur Gardens in Delaware includes C. pauciflora and Rhododendron mucronulatum, the soft buttery yellow of the Winterhazel providing perfect counterpoint to the rich almost electric purple of the Azalea, and of course they flower at the exact same time.  I would also look for good combinations with bulbs and other spring flowering perennials.

C. pauciflora can be hard to find, but well stocked independent nurseries sometimes carry it, usually in pots, occasionally  balled-and-burlapped. Spring bloom is fairly consistent and your best chance of finding the plant is in spring. But fall color is highly variable, so if you’re willing to shop around it pays to check out your purchase in fall.

In general, witchhazels have better fall color than winterhazels, but our winterhazel here at the garden has a rich gold color. In addition, the darker coloration along the leaf edges in the close up shows a nice reddish tint in spring after the flowers have dropped and the leaves emerge. Eventually turning green as the leaves mature, that nice touch of color in May and early June is a good foil for other colors provided by bulbs or herbaceous plants. For instance, there are several Tulips that have the same red tints and tones, so that repeating elements from ground to mid-level can be achieved.

Allium christophii, aka A. albopilosum, aka Star of Persia. A prolific self-sower, among its other virtues, though succeeding generations are smaller than the originals. Also a bit less intensely purple than my camera wants you to believe.

Pop Quiz

1) How many spring-blooming bulbs is too many?

2) How many spring-blooming bulbs is there room for?

3) How many spring-blooming bulbs must be planted before there are enough to cut for the house without diminishing the outdoor show?

Around here, the answer to all three questions is “Who knows?” Several hundred into it I’m not there yet, and that’s not counting the little guys (crocus, muscarii, scilla and the like don’t even show up until there are thousands – unless you force them, which I heartily recommend).

Reason for mentioning it now, when even procrastinators – no names please – have usually gotten all of them in: CLEARANCE SALES!!

Two of my favorite Mail-order Sources are in final get rid of ‘em mode:

Brent and Becky’s, home of gazilllions of nifty narcissi as well as a wide selection of less-usual crocus and other things. Half-price while they last or until 12/05, whichever comes first.

Van Engelen, wholesale quantities and no slouch in the choice department either. Minimum order $50.00, a distressingly easy target. Forty percent off until they run out. Quantity bulbs can be “estate size,” which is to say on the small side; don’t forget to check sizes when ordering.

It being after Thanksgiving, most garden centers have already gone All Christmas All the Time, but every once in a while there’s a bin or two of orphans. And every once in a while they’re worth buying.  But not alas all that often. I’m disappointed almost every time I start inspecting them carefully for shrinkage, mold, etc.

Storage in the warm drought of sales rooms is just about the opposite of ideal, and of course anything in open bins could indeed be anything. (People who just toss their rejects into any old bin are not rare, unfortunately.)

This lily flowered mystery been coming back for years, as sturdy as the astilbe I probably planted later.

In our gardens, lily flowered tulips are among the more reliable returners. Catalogs don’t seem to list this among their virtues, so our situation may be unique. But it’s something to think about. A few other Tulip Tips are here.

This is recent experience talking,

We got 22 inches of snow in the infamous October storm. Note that the maple not only has leaves; they haven’t even started to turn.

The loss list keeps expanding as falling leaves expose broken branches we missed earlier, but the general shape of the disaster has been clear for long enough to prompt a bit of family discussion on the subject of remedial pruning.

Casualties:

Somewhere between a third and a half of the magnolia, seen here in happier days.

It’s not too clear through the snow, but you can see it’s the middle that went.

Barely visible in back on the left: a bird's eye view of the top of one of the ancient plum trees. You don’t have to be a bird because the tree has snapped at the base and is now horizontal.

Also a 15 foot arbor vitae and most of the treasured oak leaf hydrangea it fell on

Arbor vitae and oak leaf hydrangea are a lovely combination – until they’re not.

and a great deal more.

A lot of the clean up was pretty much cut and dried – or cut, anyway  (saturated ground left by repeated heavy rains is one reason so many things went over)

But after we cleared away the broken branches, cut the stubs clean to prevent disease and removed unsafe imbalances, we were left with several trees that had – still have, actually – severe aesthetic problems, primarily in the form of  major branches that cry out for shortening or outright removal.

In spite of being perfectly healthy and unlikely to cause any trouble, they’re visual offenses: out of proportion, badly spaced, no longer harmonious with their surroundings.

Bill, who prunes the fruit trees and does all of the chain saw work, kept occupied at first

The other plum tree was also recumbent, but not otherwise damaged, so he borrowed a neighbor’s come-along, pulled it back up

and braced it for the winter with a chunk of the recently-deceased arbor vitae.

But after that, having done a lot of pruning that was pure maintenance, he’s quite eager to keep going and address the art part. I, on the other hand, feel strongly that we should hide and wait at least until late winter. Two reasons:

1. Unless you’re cutting something to the ground for total regeneration, the standard rule for shrub and tree pruning is to remove no more than a third of the healthy wood each year. The storm has already done that and more.

2. I’m afraid to do anything that might further stimulate new growth. In theory, it’s so late in the season plants are already going dormant and won’t start trying to make fresh leaves until next spring. In practice, this here is being one warm November, no matter how inexorably the nights are getting longer. I see what looks a lot like swelling buds and would rather be safe than sorry.

Fortunately for the trees and for domestic harmony, just when he was about out of tasks the fishing started picking up. With luck he’ll be well occupied until it’s almost time to prune the trees that weren’t damaged.

snow photos by Bill Bakaitis

late autumn color, late autumn flavor: winter squash, chestnuts and wild mushrooms

Must say I do love a soup that tastes rich and creamy without being heavy – or containing cream. Also nice if it doesn’t require an arsenal of seasonings and is easy and quick to make.

The quick part does assume the squash is already baked, and that you know speedy ways to peel chestnuts, but why not? *

As usual, the ingredient list is pretty much the whole recipe, but given that the beauty shot of the main ingredients promised something a bit more extensive, here’s a rough outline, based on the most recent iteration.

“Rough” and “most recent” are definitely the words for it; this is one of those home style soups that’s infinitely variable.

In other words, almost impossible to screw up.

If we’ve eaten most of  the squash, I just use more mushroom and chestnut. When I have the help of chestnut peelers, I shamelessly take advantage. Don’t have these particular mushrooms ? No problem, there are plenty of alternatives.

That’s “alternative,” as in “it’ll be good, but in a different way.” Recipes that call simply  for wild mushrooms or mixed wild mushrooms drive me nuts.

As though there were no differences! Granted, all of them taste like mushrooms, but anyone who thinks Boletus edulis and Cantharellus cibarius can be interchanged willy-nilly should have their head examined simply isn’t paying attention.

I am tempted to rant at length. Instead will just mildly point out that this soup can be made with almost any pair of mushrooms, wild or domestic, but one of them should be an intensely flavored low moisture variety like hen of the woods or shiitake and the other should be a firm, meaty but tender variety like lactarius or cremini.

AUTUMN SOUP

as measured out in midcoast Maine in Late October 2011

3 tbl. butter

3.5 oz. Lactarius thyinos, cut into half-inch chunks

A large onion in roughly 1/3 inch dice

5 oz Grifola frondosa coarsely chopped

12 chestnuts, roasted, peeled, and coarsely chopped

5 c. light chicken stock

6 oz. baked winter squash, roughly cut into walnut sized chunks

4 good sized springs of fresh thyme – enough to add a hint but not a shout

3 scrapings of nutmeg

1. Melt the butter in a soup pot over medium heat. Add the lactarius chunks and cook, stirring occasionally, until they are lightly browned and completely cooked through. Remove and set aside.

2. Add the onion, cook until golden, then add the frondosus. Keep cooking and stirring until the vegetables are brown and there is no free liquid in the pan. Stir in the chestnuts, add the broth, cover, and simmer over very low heat until everything is falling-apart soft, about an hour, maybe more.

3. Stir in the squash and seasonings, cover and cook until the squash is more or less dissolved, about 20 minutes.

4. Fish out the thyme and puree the soup. Depending on the toughness of the mushrooms, it will come out somewhere between fine applesauce and French Restaurant. This batch was the former and perfectly tasty, but I did put it thorough a strainer to achieve F.R. for its portrait.

5. Reheat, salt to taste and portion out, topping each bowl with a sprinkle of the reserved lactarius. An herb garnish doesn’t help, tastewise, so I resisted the temptation to pretty it up with something green. If you feel you must, a sprig of chervil wouldn’t do much harm.

BAKED WINTER SQUASH

Is more flavorful and less watery than squash that has been boiled, steamed or microwaved. All the same like baked potatoes, including stabbing here and there to prevent explosions. Unlike potatoes, squash leaks sweet juice, so you do have to put it on a pan. At 375 degrees, it’ll take anywhere from one hour to two, depending on the squash variety, size and age. (They cook more quickly after they’ve been stored for a while.)

That’s my preferred method, but when I’m in a hurry I halve the squash, remove the seeds, rub the cut surfaces with olive oil and roast the halves face down. Seed removal is a bit more of a chore, but you do get those delicious caramelized cut surfaces.

* Frozen partially cooked peeled chestnuts are quite tasty and an enormous time-saver, as I learned some years ago when a chef friend sent me some. Being as they’re not a money saver (unless you’re a chef with labor costs) and are not sold at any stores nearby, I have never bought any. But they are available retail, from Chestnut Growers Inc., a Michigan farmer’s co-op, among others. If you decide to go for it, please come back and let us all know how it worked out.

Ingredients for autumn soup: chestnuts from a farmers market, Lactarius thyinos (no common name), hen of the woods, Queen of Smyrna squash

I took this picture to run with the recipe – not yet written – because I was about to roast the squash and chestnuts, making them less photogenic.

But then I realized the picture itself is a massive seasonal alert. So:

Bill’s detailed hen of the woods hunting advice is here.

The post where I roll all over in delight about the squash, after a timely reminder that the window of specialty squashes is both small and right now, is here.

And really a lot about roasting and peeling chestnuts is here.

Further refinements:

THE SQUASH

This is the first Queen of Smyrna I’ve had this year, and I tasted it with considerable apprehension. Last year’s song of praise was so effusive the possibility of embarrassing disappointment seemed larger than the possibility of confirmatory delight. No worries! It was amazing.

Right now, Queen of Smyrna is being grown only on the farm in Northern Maine where it originated. I got it at Fresh off the Farm, in midcoast Rockport. But that just makes it the poster squash for “eat local.” Wherever you live it’s likely there’s something equally rare and fabulous at a farm stand or farmers market near you.

THE CHESTNUTS

I bought them a couple of weeks ago at the Poughkeepsie, NY farmers market, from a vendor who warmed my heart by clearly being not a professional farmer but just some guy who happened to have a (Chinese, not American) chestnut tree in his yard. Also a couple of apple and pear trees, from the looks of his stand. There was not a lot of anything – a few small boxes of apples and pears, I think maybe three pints of chestnuts.

It was the end of the day, but he couldn’t have started out with a whole lot more.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m profoundly grateful to and admiring of the professional farmers who day in, day out make local food a reality. But I’m also glad this kind of neighborly exchange is not yet dead (and not yet priced out of a place in the marketplace).

The chestnuts themselves, I regret to say, were only so-so compared to those grown by the pros. But being very fresh they were quite wonderfully easy to peel.

THE MUSHROOMS

The hen of the woods is amply covered in the article linked up top.

The L. thyinos isn’t exactly uncommon but I don’t think I’ve ever seen it offered for sale. Some experts rate them uninteresting or even unpleasant. A mystery, that, except for being another reminder that taste is in the mouth of the taster and that mushrooms can vary a lot depending on where they grow.

We have a few reliable spots and the thyinos we harvest there rate quite highly with us. Although the taste is on the delicate side, sort of mushroomy and sort of floral; the texture is outstanding: delightfully firm, not tough but crisp, and it remains so even after thorough cooking.

Thyinos is hard to miss because when cut it exudes quantities of orange milk. The closely related L. deliciosus group has the same milk but turns green when handled. It too is edible, although “deliciosus” is pushing it.

THE APPLES

Not in the picture and not in the soup, but this very Sunday is Great Maine Apple Day and I wanted to give all within driving distance a heads up.

I probably should have titled this “Harvesting Wild Mushrooms;” there are all kinds of them just about everywhere (or at least everywhere in the Northeast). Our vegetable gardens may be soggy – even without Irene this has been a mighty rainy summer – but in the silver lining department there’s a bumper crop in the woods and fields.

Oddly, we haven’t found too many Cantharellus cibarius, the chanterelles usually sold under that name. Instead, we’re getting boatloads of the smaller sorts, including the Craterellus tubaeformis, aka Cantharellus infundibuliformis in Bill’s picture and the ever-popular black trumpet (Craterellus fallax).

Also lobster mushrooms (scroll down for collecting and cleaning tips) and a great many boletes.

This includes Boletus edulus, or king bolete , the species called Porcino in Italy. Friends familiar with both insist our kings are not as royal as true Italian porcini. In my opinion, they’re plenty delicious enough – far better than other common boletes – and absent the genuine article it’s difficult to compare.

Being married to an expert mycologist puts me next to a grand assortment of less-well-known edibles, about which I will not speak just now since you really need to know what you’re doing before it’s safe to eat them.

Actually, you should know what you’re doing before you eat any wild mushroom. After all this cheerleading I’m sorry to be the ghost at the banquet, but I keep reading about wild mushroom feasts where a grand variety is served to people who have not tried them all before and it’s making me nervous.

Most of the time, no problem; the combination of good will and a healthy fear of legal retribution seems to be working pretty well. The scary part is the chance of trouble; sooner or later, it’s pretty much inevitable. The more different mushrooms consumed, the more likely it is that one of them will provoke discomfort – or worse – in at least one of the consumers, and if you’ve served a whole bunch of different species it’s going to be near-impossible to figure out which one’s to blame.

Even mushrooms long classified as the safest of the safe can cause bad stomach upsets. Sulfur shelf, for instance, has long been classed as one of the “foolproof four” because it’s so easy to recognize, yet there are many (myself among them) who cannot eat any of what has turned out to be a whole class of related mushrooms.

Short version: persnickety as they may appear, Bill’s Long Lived Mushroom Eaters Golden Rules are worth following.

This festival of links is just a taste of our blog entries over the years. There are many more of Bill’s expert collecting tips and a few of my favorite recipes in the mushroom section. It’s not logically organized( time for an upgrade!), so scrolling can take a while. If you know what you’re looking for, try the index first.

* Michael Kuo, in themushroomexpert.com.

Photo by Bill Bakaitis

That’s a sweet pea (legume family) on the left and a larkspur (buttercup family) on the right. The seeds are coriander and will be a new crop of cilantro by fall.

But then the larkspurs took over, because – at least in the north – they’re a real low fuss delight (unlike some flowers we could name). Larkspurs are so closely related to delphiniums they used to be in the same species, but this airy member of the family almost never needs staking.* Also unlike delphiniums, larkspurs are seldom bothered by slugs and snails. Plus they don’t dwindle and die out on you after a couple of  years. Plant just once and have them forever.

Sort of. Old fashioned larkspurs (Consolida ambigua, aka C. ajacis) are forever because they’re reliable self-seeders. But they do cross with wild abandon, so we never know exactly what color they’ll be when they start blooming – all over the NY vegetable garden -  in early spring.

Usually, they’re blue

A plain deep navy is the dominant blue, but by no means the only one

They can also be pink

Oddly, the plain pink ones are always on the pale side. I only get the deep color with the tie dyed look

And while variegated effects are not common, they aren’t particularly rare.

I'm somewhat less keen on the blotchy ones, but they do have a certain panache

The New York team peters out about when the tomatoes start sizing up. In Maine, they’re around for most of the summer. I’m just now yanking up spent plants, waving them around like foxgloves to spread the seed.

With larkspurs, the fresher the seed, the greater the success, and in all but the very coldest climates they do fine when planted in the fall. (Bargain seed packs purchased at the end of the growing season should be planted before the ground freezes.)

Full sun and well drained soil that’s fertile but not too rich are about the only requirements, if you don’t count sowing them where they can find open ground. Larkspurs are weak competitors.

As for the “larkspur” part – also knight’s spur, lark’s claw, lark’s toe and lark’s heel (do we see a pattern here?) – it’s true.

Larks have a long hind claw, which is indeed called to mind by the pointed upper sepal of the flower. Bees with long tongues do most of the pollinating.

The true petals are smaller and inside

*The tall double larkspurs sold for cutting, the ones almost as tightly bunched as delphiniums, DO need staking.

However.

Reading up on gooseberry fool – don’t laugh; it turns out to be a much explored subject* – led me into a briar patch of nursery catalogs, from which I have only recently emerged.

Two ways of serving Gooseberry Fool.

You will notice the gooseberry color is a sort of midgrade pink-red, roughly the color of faded brick. This is decidedly unclassic. Recipes differ widely in method, sweetness and dairy component (most of the older ones use custard of some sort, rather than straight cream). But all of them call for green gooseberries and usually that’s green as in unripe.

Ripe gooseberries may be yellowish green, or yellow or red or almost purple and they can be delicious – as long as they remain uncooked. Unfortunately, even the best of them turns insipid when heat is applied, which may help explain why they haven’t become the hot new (old) thing.

Or it may be the thorns; gooseberry bushes are by nature dauntingly thorny, and the varieties bred to be less prickly tend to be less tasty as well.

But it’s probably the preparation problem. The blossom end has a dry scar and each little stem clings fiercely. The blossom ends, aka tips, aren’t objectionable in the raw fruit, and when you’re eating them out of hand you can simply nibble each little berry away from its taillike stem. But just about every recipe, whether for savory sauce, sweet dessert or preserve starts  with the instruction“tip and tail” -  as in remove same from each grape sized (or smaller) gooseberry. Not this one.

GOOSEBERRY FOOL

1 pint gooseberries, green to partially ripe (The ones in the fool in the photo were about half green and half pale pink, still far from their eventual deep wine red.)

scant ½ cup sugar to start, more may be needed

1 c. heavy cream, the heavier the better

1. Combine sugar and berries in a microwavable bowl. (see note) Cover and cook 1 minute at half power. Stir, then give them a minute at full power. Stir again. Uncover and cook in small increments until berries are soft and bursting out of their skins.

2. Put the mixture through a food mill to get pure pulp. Discard detritus. Chill puree thoroughly; it will thicken as it gets cold.

3. Taste pulp. It should be pleasantly sweet-sour. Add sugar to taste if necessary and stir well to dissolve.

4. Whip the cream until it holds firm peaks. Either fold it into the pulp or layer it with same into a glass serving dish or dishes.

4 servings – the glasses in the picture were 2 servings each.

Note: A microwave isn’t traditional but it is an almost foolproof way to soften the fruit without adding any water or heating up the kitchen. If you prefer, combine fruit and sugar in a small covered casserole and bake at 325 until fruit is soft enough to puree.

RASPBERRY CHOCOLATE FOOLISH PIE

Because it would be foolish to use the oven any more than necessary when it’s 90 degrees out.

5 oz. crisp, plain chocolate wafer cookies. I used Nabisco Famous (the ones with the whipped cream roll on the box) because I keep them in the freezer as a baking staple, but anything unadorned and unfilled that isn’t super-rich will do.

4 oz. amaretti

6 tbl. melted butter

1 heaping pint raspberries

3 tbl. Cointreau

¼ c. sugar or more to taste

1 ½ – 2c. heavy cream

1. Mix the raspberries with the cointreau and 3 tbl. of the sugar. Let them sit for at least an hour at room temperature, as long as overnight (in the refrigerator). Drain well, reserving the juice, then crush the fruit into a medium sized bowl. Taste.  There should be a sharp edge, but if the berry pulp is very sour, add a little more sugar.

2. While the berries are marinating, process the cookies together until reduced to fine crumbs. Or put them in a heavy plastic bag and crush with a rolling pin. Mix in the melted butter and press the (still somewhat crumbly) crumb mixture into a shallow 10 inch pie pan, making a low raised rim. Chill.

3. Whip the cream until it holds soft peaks, add the remaining 1 tbl. of sugar and beat until firm peaks form. Set aside about a third of the cream and gently fold the rest into the raspberries.

5. Turn the raspberry cream into the pie shell, smoothing the top. Carefully dollop on the remaining whipped cream and spread to make a smooth frosting. Chill uncovered for 3 or 4 hours or freeze at once.

Serving:  Cut in slices and pass the reserved juice separately. Be warned the refrigerated slices will be a bit slouchy. If you want the neat edges in the picture, freeze the pie solid, cut in slices, then let them warm up in the refrigerator until semi-thawed.

* see especially Elizabeth David’s An Omelette and a Glass of Wine,  Jane Grigson’s Good Things and  Jane Grigson’s Fruit Book, and Alan Davidson’s The Penguin Companion to Food.  Every one of these books is great reading, worth having for reference and living proof you can’t get everything on the internet. So is Elizabeth Schneider’s Uncommon Fruits and Vegetables.

GARDENERS NOTE:

“Of all garden fruits, least attention need be paid to currants and gooseberries in the matter of sites and soils; they will grow in any garden if the climate is suitable.” U.P. Hedrick, Fruits for the Home Garden, 1944.

True, at least in my experience. There are only two important things:

1. You have to have a real winter; gooseberries are a Northern fruit, and

2. You have to be allowed.

Gooseberries come in two main species Ribes hirtellum (small, American and mildew-resistant) and Ribes uva-crispa (large, European and horrendously mildew prone). There are, not surprisingly, many hybrids aimed at combining the best of both worlds.

The catch? Ribes species, including currants and jostaberries as well as gooseberries, are essential to the life cycle of pine blister rust. The rust is a fungus disease that kills white pines, and for a long time federal law forbade planting any of the enabling fruits. That law was repealed in the 1960’s but some states  – DE, MA, ME, NC, NH, NJ, RI, WV – or counties within them still have prohibitions of their own. Reputable nurseries will not send plants if you live in one of them.