The Sweet Smell of Spring in Collioure
Gardening in Collioure with Suzanne Dunaway
As I opened my kitchen door to the afternoon sun that seems to be fairly permanent now, I smelled the pungent lovely perfume of grass being cut by my neighbour. He appears not only to have given his spacious back yard a trim, he switched to a cultivator and plowed up a good piece of it for his annual planting. I, too, am planting but it is way too early.
I’m baffled by our weather changes, which include radishes coming up in March (!), seedlings of shisu poking their little early heads up everywhere in random places and the plethora of roses in our small garden that not only never bloom in March, they barely make it to Easter or after unless there is a hot wind from the Sahara coaxing them to make buds. And yet, and yet, bammo, roses everywhere, especially the heavily perfumed Sweet Loves that began as cuttings and took off during the winter and now scenting the garden as if it were summer already.
This weather thing has everyone buffaloed, I’m pretty sure. And my garden guru, with his spacious and perfect rows of broad beans, leeks, potatoes, lettuces and more, also seems to have no answers about all of this unusual activity of Mama Nature.
He recently bestowed upon us (in our bucket that I let down into his garden to be filled with whatever is in season) a bunch of cylindrical beets measuring 10-inches long crowned with magnificent tops with which to make pasta sauces or to roast in a hot oven until they turn into beet-leaf-chips, but the beet itself had no taste at all!
Last year they were sweet, cylindrical, and deep red and this year only the tops had flavour. Another bucket contained 20 or so leeks, long and lean but in their baby state as they simple refused to fill out.
My own hectic, unplanned, topsy turvy garden has only blessed me with two good patches of cilantro, which I adore, but it appeared only a few weeks ago and has suddenly bolted, throwing out shoots that normally do not appear until late in its season. In short, it’s going to seed.
No worries, at least not about a garden, except that I feel we simply cannot know about what this climate change is going to produce, other than melting the ice caps and raising ocean levels to devastating heights
A garden is forgiving, that I can attest to, since it gave in to my hopeful planting of radishes two months ago in winter and pushed up enough of the little devils to eat with butter and make me feel successful as a gardener. Planting radishes always is the first thing I do asap so that I have encouragement that the broad beans and tomatoes might just make it, too.
Speaking of which, my broad beans were not planted at the proper October-waxing-of-the-moon time but instead planted late in November and I just recently discovered clusters of them weighting down what I thought were barren bushes! Who knew?
The planting puzzle now is that I was compelled to plant tomatoes indoors in a sunny window in pots and they have suddenly shot up to towering heights, clearly dying to get out of their root-bound state! In April? You can’t plant tomatoes in April! I’ve never planted until May or June, but I’m going out there today and put those suckers in the soil, come hell or high water, or in our case, high winds of 40-50 kph every day now for about two weeks. Unheard of.
Aren’t winds in March?
Wish me luck as I get brutally whipped around protecting my Marmandes (the race) from having their top leaves ripped off before I get them into their little (safe?) beds.
It’s challenging, this global change.
Maybe I’ll just go for another consoling radish crop, something I can count on to boost my flagging gardening soul/ego. Who needs perfect pasta sauces and sweet slices of homegrown tomatoes brushed with Umbrian olive oil and delectable (round) beets that aren’t shaped like x-rated marital aids, I ask you?
I have put away childish things, my garden wants and needs are simple and I have, thanks to our Italian couple in our open market, pepper-studded pecorino to go with my fave.
And, it is said that one of the most famous chefs of all time, Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, ate only radishes, butter and sea salt for his supper after having served complicated marvels all evening in his restaurant.
I can do that!
I just won’t have the same vintage burgundy he opened to sip with them.