I've been getting a lot of excellent harvests from my winter garden in the last couple of months, which is good, because summer is almost here. I had great success with the turnips, carrots and chard in particular. I've always been intimidated to grow leafy crops like chard and arugula, but they have turned out to be easier than I expected.

Dakota's favorite garden-fresh meal ever came from the vegetables pictured below. I peeled and braised the carrots and turnips together, using a simple recipe from How to Cook Everything. Then I cooked the chard with a bit of garlic and olive oil until it wilted, and steamed it briefly in the pan. Served with a bit of wild rice, it was a pretty delicious and extremely healthy meal.



Just a couple of weeks ago, I pulled these lovely beets. They're kind of striped on the inside, although not as stripey as the picture on the seed packet. I roasted them, which is my favorite way to eat beets.



The biggest crop this winter has been carrots. I've pulled several big bunches so far, and I still have quite a few left in the garden still waiting to be harvested. This winter I grew pretty traditional carrot varieties, but, this summer, I'm going to try a more exotic type called Dragon Carrots.



And of course this summer I'm growing tomatoes and peppers, plus eggplant, radishes and, for the first time, corn. The corn was planted last month and is coming along nicely. I hope it works out--and so do the chickens. They love corn.

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