Spring Garden Report

A fantastic month of April weather here has helped things move along nicely on the roof.  Much time spent up there in the last few weeks replanting containers of perennial herbs that survived the cold of winter — chives, lovage, thyme, mint, rosemary, lavender — now all in new crates with fresh compost and already showing lots of new growth.  Two weeks ago, I did my first complete harvest of the chive crop, providing enough for our kitchen use for 4 consecutive days, and then divided all of these plants into 2 and replanted, thereby doubling our crop for 2010 — now totaling 30 separate plants!

Also recently started new seeds and seedlings of annuals  including parsley, chervil, sage, sorrel, dandelion greens and micro-greens.  First little crop of French breakfast radishes went in this week, too.  Now up to 35 crates of herbs, with a plan for 15 more in the next 6 weeks as the weather continues to warm up.

The herbs from the rooftop garden are already making a big impact on the menu here this month.  I am especially fond of the beautiful dish on our Sunday menu of sautéed halibut with a white wine butter sauce flavored with lovage and chervil.  Trimming and re-growth provide just enough of these two herbs to flavor 2 dozen orders for each week’s special Sunday menu during this spring season.