Garlic! and tomatoes! and raised beds! Oh my!

It is growing time.

This year, Roland built me some raised beds. They are gorgeous.

The best part about raised beds is that they are easier to maintain. Little to no weeds (fingers crossed), no deep bending at the waist (takes a toll on your back), lots of sunlight - I placed them in the sunniest part of my yard.

Going into these plush growing plots are tomatoes, basil, parsley, lettuce, salad greens, beans, peas, radishes, carrots and cucumbers.

In other parts of the garden... garlic is growing.

I just finished a piece for Pearl Magazine (www.pearlmag.ca) about garlic scapes and some favourite Peterborough Farmer's Market vendors, Christine and Romeyn Stevenson of Ashburnham Farms and Gaelic Garlic.

Christine and Romeyn are lovely people, committed to sustainable farming. They plant all their garlic by hand, and raise all-natural pasture fed beef. Christine told me their cows are essential to their garlic production - they need the manure in order to grow their fantastic garlic. I love that - the circle of life.

Last fall I planted 12 cloves of garlic. They are shooting out of the ground now - leafy, layered green flora promising scapes by mid-June and garlic by mid-July.

Planting garlic cannot be easier:
1. Separate the cloves - leave the cloves whole!
2. Plant late September/early October. Timing is everything. It's important that the plant develops a root before the ground freezes, but doesn't start shooting out of the ground until the following spring, when there is no chance of fatal frost.
3. Plant about 1 inch deep and about 6 inches apart with the sprouting bit down.
4. Wait all winter long...
5. Visit your garlic plants in the spring - hopefully they are peaking through the ground.
6. As they grow, they'll develop layers of foliage. From the centre of the garlic plant a firm, green, curling extremity will grow. This extremity is the scape, and it will develop a bud at its tip. Snap this scape off - it will encourage the plant to put most of its energy into developing the garlic bulb. The scape is delicious fresh or fried (there's a great pesto recipe in Pearl).
7. The layers of foliage will start to brown and wilt. This is a good sign your garlic is ready to be picked. Pull a bulb out. If it looks large enough to you, it's ready for harvesting.
8. Once harvested, the garlic needs to dry. Choose a well ventilated spot, out of the sun.

9. Trim the tops and bottoms of the bulb and enjoy! New garlic is called green garlic and is fresh and juicy. Garlic can also be dried and braided, something I'm going to try this summer.

This is a very exciting time at the Mak/Hosier homestead. I'm on the edge of my seat - this weekend will be very productive. Digging and planting and weeding and mowing and staking and watering and cutting and harvesting... it all begins this weekend.

While waiting out the winter for fertile summer we like to exercise our cooking skills. It's become a mission to perfect homemade pasta. We may be getting close. Roland is the pasta maker in our home, and I'm the saucier. It's very rewarding to watch him improve his technique with each crank of the pasta roller.

Over time he has developed a feel for fresh pasta, but his basic recipe is an unmeasured amount of tipo "00" flour, one or two eggs and an occasional splash of olive oil. Soft wheat flour type "00" is essential to getting the right texture. You can find this type of flour in gourmet food shops.

I realize Roland's recipe isn't helpful for first time pasta makers, so I've included a great starter recipe from Jamie Oliver. This recipe makes a load of pasta, so you may want to half or quarter it. He uses much more egg than Roland, which will contribute to the flavour of the pasta, but will also result in a wetter dough - something that's more challenging to knead and roll.

A basic recipe for fresh egg pasta dough
from Cook with Jamie by Jamie Oliver

5 cups tipo 00 flour (pasta flour)
6 large free-range or organic eggs or 12 yolks

Place the flour on a board or in a bowl. Make a well in the centre and crack the eggs into it. Beat the eggs with a fork until smooth. Using the tips of your fingers, mix the eggs with the flour, incorporating a little at a time, until everything is combined. Knead the pieces of dough together until you have one big, smooth lump. Wrap in plastic wrap and let rest in fridge for 1/2 hour.

Jamie's excellent recipe goes on to provide detailed instructions on rolling out pasta and shaping it. I'm going to offer my own advice here:

The secret to rolling out pasta is to constantly fold it over itself and roll it through the machine until its rolling out in a symmetrical shape. Once you have a relatively flat and square lump of dough, you can begin to roll it into a sheet of pasta.

As you tighten the gauge on the roller, the pasta will become thinner and longer.

You're looking for a long, nearly transparent sheet of pasta, 4-6 inches wide. Depending on your pasta roller, you can now slice the pasta into spaghetti, linguine or fold it and slice by hand into thicker pappardelle, or use as is for lasagna.

We like to make ravioli by dropping spoonfuls of filling onto the sheet, folding the sheet over the filling and slicing into neat packages.