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<\/a><\/p>\nGiven a bit of success with this starting-a-plant-from-seed thing, I’ve gotten more bold about doing this more. Most recently I’ve been sprouting some celery seeds; one of the Alinea dishes is served atop a bed of sprouting thyme, and I’m curious about the idea of how far a seed will sprout without any dirt (obviously serving a dish atop dirt isn’t terribly appetizing). I don’t have thyme seeds, but I did have some celery ones, so I tried sprouting them on a wet paper towel.<\/p>\n
Some seeds I can just find at Home Depot easily enough; if not I often turn to Amazon for them. The Zuta Levana was a tougher one though; these seeds came from a small horticulturalist in Canada, and are just now starting to peek out of their peat cups two weeks after planting.<\/p>\n This is Kentucky Bluegrass growing in a smal bread loaf pan. I like the idea of potentially serving something on top of this because it’s more personal, or maybe finding some other interesting use for it.<\/p>\n By far the most elusive growing endeavor for me so far is bee balm; there’s one dish in the book that’s so incredibly beautiful, largely due to a garnish of a bee balm flower. It’s very distinctive and vibrant. Shortly after I started this project I bought a bee balm plant in New Zealand; I cared for it for about a year before we left. It never bloomed. A month or so after we got to Oakland I tracked down a pack of seeds and started all over again. Right now I have about 20 plants growing in various spots around the house and in our yard. I’m trying to hedge my bets as much as possible to increase the\u00a0likelihood\u00a0that at least one of them will produce a flower this summer sometime. If so it’ll have taken me two years to get it. I refuse to make the dish without that flower though.<\/p>\n This one seems to be doing the best; he’s got the prime real estate in my kitchen window and I’m also trying the use of a full-spectrum light bulb that stays on for most of the day, which seems to be working well.<\/p>\n I also still have and am caring for three lemon verbena plants, originally used in the Huckleberry dish to make Lemon Verbena Gel. They’re very active and are pretty easy to grow.<\/p>\n Some mint…<\/p>\n …lavender…<\/p>\n …and some cucumbers and zucchini. I need a flowering cucumber\/zucchini for a dish I hope to make later this summer.<\/p>\n By far the most exciting plant I have at the moment though is this guy: a hop plant. I bought him as a rhizome (a root section from which sprouts grow after its been planted) maybe about 2 months ago. It’s already sprouted several vines, some of which are over 10 feet long. They seem to be growing by about a foot per week; it’s totally amazing and awesome. I’ve run coconut coir lines around my yard for them to hug onto and spiral around. Interestingly, the info I’ve found about growing hop plants suggest training them onto lines in a clockwise direction so that they follow the sun’s arc through the sky throughout the day, so that they continue spiraling around the lines. Pretty neat.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n