Arugula Windfall

They say when life gives you lemons, you should make lemonade. So when the garden gives us arugula, I guess it means you should make…..pesto!

It’s a good thing arugula is a favorite here at HA. The two window box planters that overwintered in the greenhouse were both starting to bolt, so I harvested all the leaves. There was about 10 oz of it total, which is (so far) the most I’ve harvested at one time. I’ve still got some that overwintered in the cold frame, and it hasn’t started bolting yet. And I planted another window box that is almost ready to start harvesting. So we are really up to our ears in arugula, so to speak.

And that is not a bad thing. In addition to mixing it in with other greens for salads, we enjoy putting the leaves on pizzas after they come out of the oven. But when we have a lot of it, like we do now, I really like to make Sundried Tomato Pesto with it. The pesto is great on pizzas or in pasta dishes. I used some of it last night for a dinner dish with cut up grilled chicken, whole wheat penne pasta, and some oven roasted tomatoes from 2010. I added a little of the arugula leaves as well.

Arugula isn’t the only thing going on here though. We continue to get nice harvests of lettuce and spinach. I got a big bowlful of baby cutting lettuce from another of my container plantings. And I got about a pound of spinach, some of which I sauteed for dinner one night and some of which went into a wilted spinach salad.

On another note, I took advantage of warm weather this weekend and got my bed ready for planting potatoes. The soil isn’t quite warm enough to plant though, and my seed potatoes haven’t arrived yet anyway. But at least I got the spot worked up and ready to go.

I also got some scallion seedlings planted in my onion spot. My storage onions should be ready to plant in another week or so. These onions will all be unprotected, so I am hoping our growing deer herd doesn’t develop a taste for onions!