Current Vermont folk wisdom says you should wait until Memorial Day to plant out warm-weather crops. I've been monitoring the long-range forecast on Accuweather, and temperatures looked to be on a warming trend, with nighttime temps in the low 50s and daytime in the 70s and 80s. When Saturday broke with clear blue skies and promises of temperatures close to 80, I decided to go ahead and plant.
In other years, I haven't had the time to get an early start on the garden, so Planting Day would mean a full 8 or 10 hours out in the sun and dirt. But I already had onions, spinach, cabbage, celery, peas, lettuce, and arugula in the ground, so I could afford to be a little leisurely. It was such a gorgeous day, I decided we should have a late breakfast out on the deck.
Our house is the definition of idiosyncratic, with one of its more charming oddities the way it's partially built into the side of a hill. There are four floors, with the first buried about 2/3 below grade and the second 1/3 into the hill. As the driveway approaches, it splits – with one branch remaining at ground level and coming in at the 'front' of the house on the first floor and the other pitching uphill to arrive at the third floor.
The third floor is the main living area, with kitchen, dining/living room, master bedroom, and one of the prime features of the house: a narrow deck some 20 feet up in the air, facing out into the treetops and overlooking the garden and the river beyond it. It's a perfect spot from which to survey our little kingdom, to take in all of nature and the weather. Like living in a treehouse. And it's a beautiful place to take meals, at our little café table.
I had everything on hand for huevos rancheros (EZ recipe included at the end of this post). Even if we weren't going to be wrangling cattle on the range, I thought a substantial breakfast was in order. With good strong coffee.
It's never a good idea to plant seedlings out in the heat of the day; better to wait until the sun is lower in the sky. There was still plenty to do – most of the beds still needed turning to work the manure into the soil, then raking to level the surface. I still had a few things to start from seed (more peas, some scallions, filet beans, carrots, beets, parsnips). Late in the afternoon, I put in the seedlings: tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, fennel, leeks, basil, cilantro, and dill.
With our short growing season – 120 days from frost-to-frost, if we're lucky, but as little as 90 days in a bad year – tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant can be a real challenge (especially eggplant!). We rarely get long stretches of the hot humid days that really make those heat-lovers grow and produce. And the mountain air at night can be unkindly chilly, even without actually freezing. I didn't bother with eggplant last year and almost didn't this year, but gave in and bought starts just because I LOVE eggplant. In 8 out of 10 attempts to grow it, I'll get lush plants that don't flower until September and never have a chance to fruit. We decided to try building small hoop-houses this year, to provide additional heat for them and the tomatoes and peppers.
TJ picked up some flexible polyethelene pipe and 2-ft. lengths of rebar from Home Depot; I ordered 50 feet of 10-foot wide Agribon and a few packs of snap clamps from Johnny's. TJ pounded the rebar stakes into the ground at the outside of the beds (4 stakes to each 8-ft. side), then cut lengths of the tubing (6 feet for the pepper and eggplant bed, 9 feet for the tomatoes). We slipped the ends of the tubing onto the rebar, then zip-tied lengths of bamboo along the top ridge for extra support. We unfurled the Agribon over the top and cut it so that it came all the way to the ground on all sides. I used 2 clips on each 'hoop', one on either side of the ridge.
By putting the clips low at each of the 4 corners, we can 'seal' the enclosure, or fold back the fabric and clip it high at the corners for more ventilation and temperature control. In the days since, I've monitored the internal temperature with a high/low thermometer; when the outside temperature was 78°F in full sun, the internal temperature was 103° with the ends sealed, so I opened one end on each bed – the temperature held nicely in the high 80s to low 90s with a light breeze blowing. My hope is that by giving all these plants an extra 15 – 20° of heat during the day, they'll grow faster and flower & produce fruit earlier. By the end of June, it should be consistently warm enough that I can remove the hoops (as the plants will be close to outgrowing them). If it threatens to get too cool at night (much below 50° – too many cool nights may inhibit flowering), I'll throw a tarp over them to keep them warm.
By the time we finished up, it was well on cocktail hour. We were filthy, sweaty, sunburned, and bugbit, but we retired back to the deck for refreshments (and to admire our hard work) before scrubbing up for dinner.
Huevos Rancheros
This comes together easily for a quick, hearty breakfast. For each person, you'll need:
One 8-inch corn tortilla
Two eggs
A couple tablespoons each of grated cheddar cheese, tomato salsa, and chopped fresh cilantro
A wedge of lime
Fry the eggs in a little butter over medium heat. While frying the eggs, warm the tortillas (if you have a gas stove, you can just toast them lightly over one of the burners) and place one on each plate. Once the eggs are just about cooked to your liking (I normally like my yolks a little firm, but prefer them gooey in this case to run together with the salsa and the cheese), sprinkle the cheese over the top and slap a cover on the pan for about a minute to melt the cheese. Slip the eggs out into the middle of the tortilla, then warm the salsa quickly in the still-hot pan. Pour over the eggs, scatter the cilantro on top, and serve with a wedge of lime to squeeze over everything.
I used cooked salsa that I had canned last summer, but this is even better with freshly made salsa (pico de gallo); no need to warm it.
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