Foraging for Dinner

There are times that I know that moving here was the right decision. Most of the time I believe it and I feel it, but nights like tonight I know it deep in my bones and my soul.

Mike left this morning on his annual elk hunting trip. I’m home alone tonight, then my dad arrives for a couple of nights starting tomorrow. So tonight was all mine to do as I pleased.

First I swung up to Charley’s Greenhouse Supply to pick up some greenhouse plastic to use to cover my tomatoes when it cools off again and then create myself a row sized hoop house for winter greens. While there I admired the greenhouses and had to restrain myself from drooling as I checked them out.

Then I came home and used Ali’s twine trick to try to dissuade the hawk. It seemed to work this evening, I guess tomorrow will be the real test. If that doesn’t work, I’ll be off to the farm store for bird netting. After that I headed back out to the garden to finish pruning back the tomatoes. That’s when the foraging started.

Once I got all the extra growth off the plants to expose the tomatoes I started finding hidden gems. Mostly on the Mirabelle and Sun Gold plants that Denise gave me, but a few others turned up here and there including the first couple of Romas and a handful of chocolate cherry tomatoes. Hmmm, I ate my fill while I picked them to bring in the house.

Then I wandered out to the herb garden and munched on some bright juicy strawberries while contemplating the artichokes. The last few warm sunny days had the two largest chokes thinking about opening to flower. So off they came for dinner later.

Deciding that I was done working for the night I grabbed a cold beer from the garage and took the dogs out for a walk to check the blackberries along the back property line. I think that there’ll finally be enough for a batch of jam in the next week or so. The three of us wandered along the row picking and munching and mumbling Mmmm to ourselves. Jake even figured out how to pick his own from the low hanging branches.

We walked back to the house with a view of the sun setting over the Cascades and the moon rising over the neighbor’s hay field. Swinging by the hen shack we said goodnight to the chooks and pocketed the day’s eggs. One still warm from the last hen to lay.

After eating my way around the farm, all that was left to make dinner complete was a steamed artichoke with lemon butter for dipping and a glass of Washington wine. Of all the things we grew this year, the artichokes mean the most to me. I never imagined before we moved up here that someday I would be eating an artichoke that I grew myself, that just an hour before was growing in my own herb garden. My favorite food and I grew it myself.

That’s how I know that we’re in the right place, doing the right thing.

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