Shiso Burrata Salad

Shiso Burrata Salad

While shiso is mostly known as an Asian herb, it has many delicious fusion applications as well. It’s fruity, minty, citrus tones making a great accompaniment to this burrata salad! Serve with toast points and a nice, finishing olive oil for a slightly different but …

Wilder Saffron

Wilder Saffron

One of the plants I was super excited to get my hands on this year was Crocus Cartwrightianus, otherwise known as Cartwright’s crocus or wild saffron. It’s widely accepted as the wild ancestor of our modern saffron, before it mutated into the sterile triploid form …

Marinated Shiso

Marinated Shiso

I brought my pot of shiso indoors before the first below freezing temperatures to see if I could extend the growing season for just a bit. I had transplanted a few of each variety that had self sowed in my garden into a pot for …

Simple Mint Chickpea Salad

Simple Mint Chickpea Salad

This recipe is always a hit as a side dish during any event or party–it’s tasty in its fresh simplicity. It uses copious amounts of mint (spearmint or peppermint), which is just as well because they can get invasive if not controlled. I usually make …

Surprising Saffron

Surprising Saffron

One of the most interesting things I have in my garden, one that is always a conversation starter is saffron (Crocus sativus). A species of autumn blooming crocus. The same extraordinarily expensive spice is also quite easy to grow here in NY, its prohibitive cost …

Butter From Scratch

Butter From Scratch

When I first discovered how to make butter from scratch, I was horrified. How have I lived so long without making my own butter? I felt like an entire world opened up to me that I had previously not known before. Dinner guests are always …

Wise Sage

Wise Sage

Sage (Salvia officinalis) is a wonderful culinary herb, especially as the weather gets colder and roasts and savory dishes become more frequent. It’s a hardy perennial down to zone 5, so it’s a plant it and forget it sort of herb. It’s also not invasive, …

Sophie’s First Fish

Sophie’s First Fish

Let me preface this by saying that throughout my childhood and the majority of my adult life, I have never been able to kill anything on purpose (except mosquitoes) and the idea has always been greatly taboo not only in my upbringing (my parents are …

Rosie Rosemary

Rosie Rosemary

A lot of sources will tell you that Rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis) is only reliably perennial from zone 9 upwards, zone 8 pushing it, and zone 7 should be wintered indoors. This is where a location’s microclimate as well as choosing cold hardy varieties come into …

Mitsuba Parsley

Mitsuba Parsley

Italian parsley is grown as an annual/biennial culinary, which means that it usually dies in its second year after it sets seed. That doesn’t make it suitable for my particular application of a perennial food forest so sometimes I decline to grow it, even though …