Monday, July 24, 2006

it grows

You know that feeling the day after the day after. No more seediness, and the sun's shining. You come home and there's time to play in the garden, to transplant little lettuces and not worry about if they'll get torn up by marauding chickens. The shit that ate your head up last week seems to have scampered somewhere on the dancefloor and you don't feel the need to worry about if it'll come back.

The plants are in so you wash the dirt off your hands and pick the leaves off the radishes, and the young shoots from the pea straw. The nettles you rescued from another garden are growing faster than myspace and you manage to pick a handful without any prickles. So it's into the kitchen..

The greens are washed and wilted in the water that clings to them. They're tossed with chickpea sprouts* and a diced radish. There's lemon juice, balsamic and some of the really good olive oil mum passed onto me. Oh and sesame seeds.

You know the feeling when you're cooking something really good from things you've grown yourself? When you've done unhealthy things to your body all weekend and no matter how hypocritical you just love the feeling of looking after yourself with vegetables and sunshine and maybe a kick of the footy after?

Well maybe it's just me, I shouldn't try and universalise... but I hope you have some similar feeling.

*Chickpea sprouts are so easy and good I can't believe I never ate them until this year. These ones were made when I soaked chickpeas and never got around to cooking them. Instead of leaving them in water to go fetid just drain the water off and then rinse once a day or so.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

you're making me miss having a garden...those greens sound great...do you eat the radish tops too??
another question...how long do the chickpeas take to sprout??

joe cupcake said...

hey jules - yes yes, the radish tops are part of the greens. they're good.. a bit chewy but good.

the chickpeas will probably start to sprout in the first day and then I'd eat them after about 2 or 3

crankypants said...

hey lady, i know you've been dying to check out those lawball hotties again so just for you i've put the link on my blog. about gardens, you should see how quickly the broccoli is growing! There are definitely some advantages to gardening in a colder climate- in my experience, broccoli simply does not thrive in queensland. but can a hub survive on broccoli alone? xxx

joe cupcake said...

no.. sadly i think a hub needs pawpaw for green papaya salad... and also sunshine for happy hubsters.

still.. i'm almost as excited by your speedy broccoli as i am disturbed by the blonde cleavage explosion that is the lawball. why you try and terrify me like this?

shannon said...

i think the reason i feel so terrified of commenting here is because your posts are so infrequent. so then i feel like it is an occasion and i get all nervous and ending writing about how i'm scared of writing...

you see? xx

joe cupcake said...

it feels like an occassion? sometimes mr price, you are ridiculous. and yet, so endearing....