summer, dans le jardin
The weather has warmed here significantly, and, with the days stretching deliciously longer, I look forward to my summer garden. In the summer, the garden is heavily abundant, and even with our smallish space we end up growing a huge portion of our food needs. Over the years, I’ve tried lots and lots of different varieties of vegetables and I feel I’ve finally settled on my personal favorites. I thought it might be nice to share them here if you are also planting your summer garden. Something to keep in mind is that the varieties that work in my garden (zone 9b) so well won’t always work in yours. We have long, very dry, extremely hot summers. If you have specific vegetable varieties that you’ve found are delicious and work very well for your area, please leave a comment with the variety name and your growing zone to pass the information along to others.
seeds/ plants:
i. I source my seeds from a variety of places, here’s a few of my favorites: Uprising Seeds // Floret // Baker’s Creek // Botanical Interests // Seed Savers Exchange .
ii. Mostly I grow my vegetables and flowers from seeds, but occasionally I buy plant starts, my favorite local sources are Redwood Barn // Talini’s Nursery // Annie’s Annuals (they ship some plants).
tomatoes:
i. Costuluto Genovese: (pictured above and below) these tomatoes are my very favorite. They tick all the boxes- they’re gorgeous to look at, richly flavored, perfect sliced and eaten as is and cooked into sauce or canned, and the plants themselves are very unfussy and easy to grow with heavy loads of fruit. The fluted shape makes them look gorgeous sliced on a plate and on bruschetta.
ii. Jaune Flamme: A smaller size tomato, rich gold in color, slightly sweeter but still retaining a good acidity.
iii. Sun Gold: my kids eat these like candy, the plant itself is heavily productive and the fruit is golden, sweet and delicious.
iv. Cuore di Bue: resembling a pouch in shape with their narrower tops and fuller bottoms, these dense, flavorful tomatoes are wonderful both for sauce and also for slicing in insalata caprese.
beans:
I prefer pole beans, I find them to be more vigorous and heavy yielding, plus since they grow vertically, you save a lot of space. I grow them on a simple, inexpensive trellis made from steel rebar (can get at any place like Home Depot/Ace) strung with jute twine.
i. Spanish Musica (or Romano): these are flat, wide beans common in Italy. Like regular green beans, but with a meatier, thicker flesh. I think the flavor is more robust, too, and I simply prefer them to the pencil shaped green bean. These are a staple of my summer garden, I stagger the plantings of them successively to ensure a fresh supply all summer. The musica beans are so, so tender that I prefer them slightly to the regular Romano. But both are great.
ii. Tavera: These petite “filet” type bush beans are very slim and tender, and I like having a few plants on hand for when I want a smaller bean- such as in potato salad, pasta salads, etc.
iii. Cocaigne: growing these heirloom French white beans this year for the first time. They are shell beans, meaning you harvest when the pods are larger and eat them like a dry bean, shelling and eating the beans inside.
iv. Trionfo Violetto: these purple pole beans are tender and delicious, their rich purple color makes them easy to find amongst the leaves, and the flowers are gorgeous. Kids love watching them magically turn from purple to dark green when cooked.
cucumber:
i. Armenian: Highly productive, ribbed light green cucumber with a very crunchy, mild tasting flesh. They can get quite large and still have small tender seeds.
ii. Suyo: Long, dark green, a little spiny. Excellent flavor and like the Armenian, they will get very long without getting tough or seedy, meaning higher overall yield.
iii. Lemon: round, juicy variety with lemony fresh flavor. Super crunchy, excellent in salads.
zucchini:
i. Costata Romanesco: this is my all time favorite, so much so that I don’t grow other varieties anymore. Dense, extremely flavorful flesh that isn’t watery. The plant itself is extremely vigorous, produces lots of male flowers (pictured above; great for picking and stuffing, frying etc), and the fruits are a beautiful green with ribbed skin that makes a gorgeous flower shape when cut into rounds.
ii. Eight Ball: a round zucchini, petite and perfect for stuffing and baking, and using its perfectly round slices in tian.
herbs:
i. basil- I like to grow the standard genovese, and also purple opal, which is a deep aubergine purple that tastes wonderful and also is great in flower arrangements. I grow about 10 basil plants to ensure a regular supply throughout the summer, and enough to use in my canned tomatoes at the end of summer. Regularly water, and pinch off developing flowerheads to keep the plant bushy and growing well. Here, where it’s regularly scorching temperatures, I find that basil enjoys afternoon shade.
ii. gigante parsley has giant, sweet leaves that I use whole in salads, pastas etc and also like you would normally use parsley, chopped into things. I always have at least 6 plants because I love parsley so much. If you let it bloom and go to seed, it not only will self seed to come back next year, but also the flowers attract beneficial insects.
peppers:
i. jimmy nardello: I strongly prefer the long thin frying type peppers to the thicker walled typical bell peppers. I find that bells are hard to grow to the size and thickness you may be used to, and aren’t nearly as productive plants that are susceptible to sun scorching (a real issue here). Jimmy Nardello peppers are long, slim, deep rich red, and very sweet and flavorful. I fry them with potatoes, broil them and use them in pasta salads, ratatouille, peperonata, and more.
ii. padron or shisito peppers: these small, bite sized green peppers are highly productive and delicious. We fry them simply in a very hot pan for a minute, under the broiler to char the tops a bit, then sprinkle with salt. The perfect summer aperitivo with a cold drink.
eggplant:
i. rosa bianca, listada de gandia: Eggplants are highly productive plants, and my family is lukewarm on them although I love them. Because of this, I usually only plant 2 or so. Rosa Bianca and Listada de Gandia are both gorgeously colored and smaller, with creamy tender flesh.
flowers:
i. cosmo double click: I always plant cosmos, as they are so easy to grow and bloom all summer long. This double click blend has lovely pink and white colors that are double, meaning they have 2 rows of petals, thus look fluffier. A primer on growing cosmos here.
ii. zinnias: Zinnias are another wonderful, extremely easy and hardy flower that blooms for months on end and last for ages in a vase. They come in all the colors under the sun, I love a scarlet red, apricot, soft pink, and Benary’s giant makes beautiful large flowers. Butterflies love them. A primer on zinnias here.
iii. sunflowers: No summer garden would be complete without sunflowers. We like a few kinds, always the giant Mammoth type simply for their sheer size and grandeur, and also the fluffy double types for cutting (think Van Gogh’s Sunflowers) such as Honey Bear and Teddy Bear.
iv. nigella: I love these darling little flowers, they are so pretty, with the added bonus of gorgeous lantern like seed pods that you can cut and dry for dried arrangements.
v. dahlias: I grew these for the first time last year and fell in love. Unfussy, loads of flowers all through the season, long lasting cut flowers, and gorgeous. My favorite variety is Café Au Lait.
Some utility gardening links:
Charles Dowding and his no dig gardening (there’s loads of info on no dig online, but I love him best as he explains things so clearly and calmly).
Monty Don’s month by month to-do in the garden blog. If you don’t know Monty Don, you’re in for a treat, he is a delight, and also pretty cute. Just saying.