Sixth season in the vegetable beds

The winter greens we planted a few weeks ago are really filling in thanks to submerged drip irrigation and planting right before a rain. There is definitely something magic about the effect of rain water compared to city water on plants!

Here in Coastal Central California, we can usually grow about 5 or 6 seasons of crops in our beds, if we plan, watch, and act quickly. Instead of Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall, we can usually squeeze in both an early and late Spring and Summer.

One of the first people we ever heard call out these six growing seasons is chef, Joshua McFadden in his groundbreaking cookbook, “Six Seasons: A New Way With Vegetables.”

It’s true. What we planted in our late January beds was a sort of Late Winter / Early Spring mix: a couple of brassicas, lots of greens and cool season herbs, and then spring peas.
Spring is coming now in it’s usual way- as if someone turned on the light switch last Saturday morning.
But for the last 6 weeks, it’s felt too early to plant tomatoes and other warm weather crops. So we decided to put our beds to good use with a short “mini-season” before Spring planting. We planted most of our beds with plants that would mature to harvest fairly quickly so we’d be able to turn them as soon as the warm weather hit.
What you see in the beds right now are:

Butter Lettuce

Red Brussel Sprouts

Mixed Greens

Snow Peas

English Peas

Mustard Greens

Napa Cabbage

Tatsoi

Detroit Red Beets

Green onions

Parsley

We’ve been snipping small handfuls of baby greens and sautéing them with fish and eggs, as a garnish with steamed rice and other simple meals.