Spring is officially here -- hooray! My crocuses are up, the robins are back and I'm ready to come out of hibernation. Spring is my favorite season. Don't get me wrong: I love summer and fall, but spring has the distinct honor of being the first season that is classified as "not winter."  And "not winter" is really my favorite season. Spring brings along with it sunshine, longer days, refreshing rain, and the hope of new life. What once appeared dead is now alive and blossoming into something beautiful. Spring is a season of dreams and possibilities. For me, it's also the start of garden season. Well, normally. This year, I got a grow light for Christmas, which I have been experimenting with in my basement.  I tried growing basil, parsley, lettuce, chard, arugula, cilantro, spinach...and just for good measure: tomatoes.  Of course the primary intent of my grow light is to start seedlings, but I wanted to see what I could actually get to grow indoors -- hence the focus on greens and herbs. And, I got an early test for my tomatoes by planting a few seeds.  And let me tell you...I have never grow a tomato seedling as strong and vibrant as this one!

When we first moved into our house, I was excited, albeit surprised, to find chives growing underneath a pine tree in our front yard. As I was frantically trying to fill up the space that would become my perennial garden, I immediately transplanted them. They have grown happily there now for a number of years...until last year when the growing and spreading of said chives turned into more of an infestation than anything else! I removed several plants and transplanted others, but they are still a prevalent feature in my perennial garden and blooming with their little purple puffball blossoms right now. And so now is the time, friends. Now is the time to prevent further infestations. These beautiful flowers must be removed before they go to seed and threaten to overtake the world (or my backyard).

Fortunately, I recently realized that these flowers are edible. So, rather than simply cutting them off and throwing them away, I've been researching uses and ways to eat chive flowers. I've come up with a few really interesting ideas that I wanted to share!

I was always under the impression that not much grew in the shade. The only shade plants I really knew were impatiens and hostas. The problem was, I had created a landscaped area in our backyard, beside our deck and underneath a weeping cherry tree. 

At the back of my perennial garden is a special garden space that really belongs to Tom. This is where his hops grow -- with the bines growing up twine that reaches to the roof of our garage where they can then expand out sideways. Hops grow fast. Really fast. The shoots come out of the ground pretty early in the spring, too. You're only supposed to let a few of the shoots grow on each plant in order for them to be the most productive. We learned last year that the young hop shoots are edible and are sometimes called "poor man's asparagus".  That said, I also read recently that hop shoots are the most expensive vegetable in the world to buy. Perhaps because you only have a few days a year to harvest them before they get too large. Anyways, I never did anything with ours last year, but I wanted to try cooking them this year. Many people recommend sauteing them like you would asparagus. Then I found a couple of recipes for pickled hop shoots. Now, pickling isn't normally my thing, but for some reason, I wanted to try this. I found this recipe that I adapted mine off of.

There's really only one reason I always hope for extra tomatoes in my garden. Okay, make that two. One is salsa. Two is homemade tomato sauce. I don't usually have much of a bumper crop, so I've only tried the tomato sauce thing once or twice before. This year, between my garden and our CSA, I did have an overabundance of tomatoes, and I was on a mission. You see, I wanted to make homemade tomato sauce that I could use in lasagna and spaghetti and other Italian dishes, but I wanted it to be simple. The recipes I had tried before involved boiling the tomatoes in hot water, followed by a cold water bath so you could remove the skins, and then removal of the seeds...just to then put it all back on the stove to cook for an extended period of time, only to end up with water, soupy sauce, unless I added extra tomato paste. Whew. After some thought and some research, I began to wonder about using my Crock Pot and immersion blender to make tomato sauce, without peeling and de-seeding. I figured if I blended it up, I wouldn't care if the tomato skins were in there, and I don't notice any off-flavor from the seeds. The results of the experiment were delicious, and the method was unbeatably simple!