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| Dwarf Grey Sugar Peas and three kinds of lettuce (Merveille des Quatre Saisons, Ruby and Lollo Rosso) |
I picked all of these veggies this morning. The peas come from those beautiful flowers I showed in my first post.
Here's another close-up look at the peas:
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| Dwarf Grey Sugar Peas, lightly sauteed in olive oil and tossed with garlic |
Many other gardeners whose blogs I read wax rhapsodic about the taste of fresh peas from the garden. Maybe it's the variety of peas I'm growing or maybe by tastes are just different, but I actually was underwhelmed by the fresh pea taste. It was not as tender as I thought it would be and the pea taste was not as pronounced as I had imagined.
But just toss those peas in a little olive oil (pinching off the ends first), saute them for a minute or two over medium heat and finish with a little ground garlic and the difference is astounding. Melt in your mouth tender. Sweet and succulent.
I actually asked my wife if she had added any sugar while she was cooking the peas, but the answer was no. Just as with the spinach, it is the cooking process itself that brings out the sweetness in the peas. (But then I guess that's why they are called sugar peas!)
As for the salad, it's a combination of three kinds of lettuce - Merveille des Quatre Saisons, Ruby and the delightfully-named Lollo Rosso (no relation except in homophony to the beautiful Italian actress and artist Gina Lollobrigida).
I'll have more to say on my success - or lack thereof - growing lettuce in an upcoming post...
