This week I harvested the beetroots and being more or less 100% self-sufficient in vegetables, seasonal food is the thing! My favourite way to use beetroot (both red, yellow and white cultivars) is to make vegetarian beetroot burgers (patties), known in our household as blood burgers! The beetroot is first steamed (I used the wood stove), then grated and mixed together with fried Egyptian onions (luftløk) bulbs and garlic with Himalayan balsam / kjempespringfrø (Impatiens glandulifera) seed. Chili, salt and pepper and golpar /ground seed of any Heracleum / hogweed species (instead of cumin) are then mixed in with eggs and 100% wholegrain emmer wheat flour (or any other grain) to bind the patties. Finally, we fried the patties in butter! Good wholesome slow harvest food!
From left to right: Boltardy and Rhondda, Albino white and Cylindra!
Allium x proliferum / Egyptian onion (luftløk) bulbs
A little secret I’ve had since last autumn (apart from a select few) when I was told that I would get my very own Allium bed at the Ringve Botanical Garden in Trondheim :)
Yesterday, 18th August 2017, I finally got the time to start the planting. I will be planting both the collection of old Norwegian perennial onions that I have collected from all over the country over the last 10 years and a selection of species Alliums to show off their incredible diversity!
The first phase was mainly the planting of my old Norwegian onion collection, Allium schoenoprasum (chives / gressløk), Allium fistulosum (Welsh onion / pipeløk including old Norwegian roof onions from Gudbrandsdalen) and Allium x proliferum (walking onions, tree onions, Egyptian onions / luftløk, etasjeløk). I also planted about 22 accessions of Allium cernuum (nodding onion, Chicago onion / prærieløk) plus a few others like Allium carinatum pulchellum and Norrlands onion (Norrlandsløk).
It was a long day starting at home at 8 am with packing, sorting and documentation, returning home after 10 pm – it was worth it for the sunset from the garden over Trondheimsfjord!! Looking forward to phase 2 which will probably be in September!
Thanks to the Norwegian Genetic Resource Centre and particularly Morten Rasmussen for funding the bed preparation and Vibekke Vange and the staff at Ringve for making me feel so welcome!
Before!
The first Alliums in the ground were two accession of Norrlands Onion (Norrlandsløk) from Lund and Harstad (from Magnar Aspaker)
Norrlands Onion (Norrlandsløk)
Spacing out the chives (gressløk)
Chives and Allium cernuum finished planting
Finished planting 93 different onions!!
This sunset from the garden I take as a good sign! It was a beautiful evening in the garden and several people stopped by to ask what was (finally) happening!
Preparing Allium cernuum accessions for Ringve at home:
Sunset and the new Allium bed with the accompaniment of screaming (approving) swifts! Life is good!!
A collection of pictures of greens now available in my house (15th February 2016), mainly shoots of perennial vegetables!
Garlic bulbil (hvitløk-toppløk) shoots – I eat garlic bulbil shoots for most of the winter, Bulbils (topsets) form instead of flowers on hardneck garlic and are ideal for winter forcing indoors. I’m clipping them every day now to go with my lunch. The sprouts in the bucket on the left have been clipped down twice already and will try one more time before giving up. The bulbils were planted in the bucket on the right about two weeks ago.
Seed sprouts from an oriental brassica that produced masses of seed…
Madeira vine, Anredera cordifolia, is mainly known as a marginal root crop that’s not to everybody’s taste. It’s in the Basellaceae, related to both Basella (Ceylon spinach) and Ulluco (Ullucus tuberosus). All have edible shoots and greens. I had lots of small tubers last autumn, so why not use them for winter sprouts!
Madeira vine, Anredera cordifolia
This is Japanese chives (japan-gressløk), received as Allium schoenoprasum var yezomonticola years ago, now apparently a synonym of Allium maximowiczii
This is Japanese chives (japan-gressløk), received as Allium schoenoprasum var yezomonticola years ago, now apparently a synonym of Allium maximowiczii, which is closely related to chives. It’s a more robust and productive plant than most chives. I replanted my oldest clump this autumn and had lots left over, so why not force them inside for winter onions! I’ll use this one again!
This is Japanese chives (japan-gressløk), received as Allium schoenoprasum var yezomonticola years ago, now apparently a synonym of Allium maximowiczii, which is closely related to chives. It’s a more robust and productive plant than most chives. I replanted my oldest clump this autumn and had lots left over, so why not force them inside for winter onions! I’ll use this one again!
Oca (Oxalis tuberosa) can also be winter forced for the greens!
Allium cernuum (Nodding onion / prærieløk) dug in the autumn and now providing winter onions from the living room….
Egyptian/ walkabout /topset onion (luftløk) aerial onions can be sprouted indoors for winter greens
I moved 10 buckets of roots and stratifying seeds of edible perennials for sprouting and eating before the spring greens come on tap…filling the hungry gap. These have all been outside exposed to the cold since November.
Bulbils of Egyptian Onion / Walking Onion / Luftløk will have a shock coming from outside into my living room!
Allium cernuum has been completely unaffected by the extremes of climate we’ve experienced and are ready to eat…also in my living room…
Seeds and roots in my unheated porch
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
