Moss Garden

With a name like Moss you knew that Kate's wedding (featured in this month's Vogue Magazine)was going to be sensational. The photo shoot featured her beautiful gown, food service and A-list guests. All truly intriguing but what caught my eye was the sensational flower border lining the church where the couple tied the knot. Thickly planted white delphiniums, scabious and daisy were employed to give this effect.





To achieve this look for yourself:
-Rely on all white plantings with subtle hits of light green
-Use plantings that thrive in your plant zone
-Don't be afraid to add your own...ladies mantle, allium, hosta or french tulips
-Think about adding some coniferous plantings to provide structure to the garden off season. I'm thinking a small sequence of box.
-Finally, try to stick with perennials

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DecorVert

In design, I love blurring the line between indoors and out. Here are a couple of ideas to infuse your home with garden inspired delights. This livingroom relies on fresh cuttings stacked on garden books, stone garden statuary, vintage fence tops and rod iron light fixtures to achieve this idea. Ya Dig?

HAMPTONS GARDENS

The newest addition to my library is a beautiful oversized coffee table book by Assouline. Protected by a skin of mauve cardstock, Hamptons Gardens is a visually stunning account of this popular holiday destination. Glossy photos of old school taxus hedges, a decades old tennis pavilion, sleek gabion installations and box hibernating in burlap sleeves are excellent inspiration points. Ya Dig?

Taking Stock

With a dash of measured enthusiasm and a peppering of simmered ballyhoo The Barefoot Contessa has done it again, again. "How easy is that?" is the most recent addition to Ina Garten's cookbook brood and in birth order stands as number seven in her swelling bookopoly. As the name suggests, the featured recipes illustrate Ina's bid to slim down kitchen theatrics and streamline provisions to showcase simplified recipes. The usual suspects are well represented and yes, the indulgent butter prompts remain as innocent red velvet muffin tops continue to threaten even the strongest challah chiseled chests and waistlines. This time around though, the obscure mail order ingredients have become extinct and recipes have been stripped down to reveal only the components that boast maximum flavor crucial to the success of each dish. The greatest gift of this book is plucked from the rungs of the Food Pyramid. Revel in leafing through the recipes to uncover Ina Garten’s professional slant of top taste producing foods including the “chosen ones” from the vegetable garden. Alright Kreskin, perhaps you know where this is subtly heading...so, how will my jardin potager shuffle into Ina's trim new deck? A recap first.
"Ina thought your project sounded wonderful...she had no idea how much she referenced certain vegetables!.." was my official reply from Ina's office in response to the article I published last spring titled "Ina's Garten". (It is featured on www. sowandsow.blogspot.com). The essay determined that there was no better way to decide the architectural edibles that should be included in my garden than to source the recipes from which I cook. It outlined how I catalogued every herb, fruit and vegetable referenced in every single recipe published in each of Ina's cookbooks. Those with the highest frequencies were then considered to join my elite team of boxwoods. Now seasons later, when I learned that there was another cookbook in Ina's pipeline I knew that it would be perfectly poised to choreograph a savory cadence to the archipelago of planting beds in my backyard.
Meg Ryan does a great interpretation of the run/walk in many of her movies. Mothers were covering children's eyes as I performed my own version into Barrett Bookstore the morning the cookbook was released. Imagine, if you will the pure delight I felt when I had secured my own, unbagged copy of "How easy is that?” In a guilt ridden twist, my family feasted on The Colonel that night as I began a detailed index through HRH’s elaborate assortment of caponata, tapenade, bisque, tartare and panzanella. After a quick round of homespun kiddie New York Egg Creams and conscience thus clear, I began my review.
Personally, the highlights of the book for the vegetarian-landscape architect were three fold. Obviously the entries that heavily feature vegetables received my considered raised brow (decidedly low grades were given to beef oxtails," N-I-M-B-Y"). Passing this pivotal first test, recipes that call on produce that I could plant in my potager ranked exceedingly higher marks for merging hobby and lifestyle. (Why, hello to you Tomatoes Roasted with Pesto!) Finally, the cream of the crop, dog-eared medalists were those recipes that paid homage to the herb (Roasted Summer Vegetables, you complete me).
Yes, HERBS. Unless you are wintering in an Observation akin to Paxton’s Crystal Palace, gardening amid November's pursuit to run chlorophyll out of town is fruitless. At this time of year, I thought that it would be interesting to see what was going to keep the real estate over the proverbial kitchen sink green while Jack Frost hob-knobs outside with Clark Griswold.
I'm no actuarial, but I was confident that I could tally up the high frequency of herbs in Ina’s new recipes to decipher what mélange she culled to construct one arm of her “dream team of taste”. How would the herbal frequency in these haiku-sized recipes stand on their own and what would occur when pit against my previous statistics? The very premise on which the "How Easy is that?" recipes were designed suggested that at the very least, I was about to uncover the Rosetta Stone for translating the produce department at Whole Foods! Or so I thought. Allow me to spare you some busy work on Excel. With resounding crescendo...the top three herbs that showed the greatest frequency in Ina's latest cookbook were the exact same top candidates as tallied in books 1 through 6.....HUH? What it boils down to is this: Ina has basically had the perfect combination of full flavored herbs all along! Man, she's good.
Folks, it is with great pleasure that I invite you to remove the paper whites and wishbones past from the window sill. Allow me to introduce to you Ina Garten’s “Ryder Cup of Herbdom”, GARLIC* PARSLEY and THYME.
Ya Dig?
*In every effort to be an accurate actuarial I had to include garlic as a sill contender. However, allow me to suggest you try DILL as runner up.

Tuteurs for Tutelage

If you are interested in learning more about Alice Waters and her Edible Schoolyard Project or joining Noelle Henderson's team please find the attachments below.

www.edibleschoolyard.org

www.edibleschoolgardeninitiative.com/edibleschoolgardeninitiative/abouttheinitiative.com

Also may I recommend www.pickyourown.org to find out what foods are in season, local haunts to harvest from and recipes to enlist your cornucopia in the crisper.

Tuteurs for Tutelage
I call it the back-to-school breeze. Seasonally, it begins with just a breath in August and crawls up to no more than a whistle just as the aces are crowned at Flushing Meadows. Its force has nothing on the Santa Ana or Chinook winds but it's significance carries with it much weight. In tune with my own maternal instinct, (but perhaps more temperate) it’s Mother Nature's subtle gesture to suggest to our children that the summer months of beach lollygagging are coming to a swift end. The time has come for them to return their focus on achieving a higher education and grace the halls of academia. Greeting them on campus each September are math, english, science and a prodigious splash of language and arts. For years, these subjects have been the usual suspects in forming the all star "core curriculum". On the heels of next year’s breeze though, things may be a little different. Recently, I met with Noelle Henderson who is interested in nourishing the traditional model of education with the debut of plants in the classroom. A passionate supporter of resuscitating local schoolyards with working gardens she and her team hope to graft the benefits and experiences of an outdoor classroom with current lesson plans.
I find this to be an interesting concept. (Even though, it would be a severe blow to the beloved rye grass/Styrofoam cup campaign.) Perhaps I listened to too much Cat Stevens in the 80's that left me wondering the quality of children’s play? In any event, I was game to learn more. Kindly, Henderson introduced me to the cause she champions; The Edible Schoolyard Project which has been soldiering across America since 1996. The concept for the Project began in 1971 when gourmand and owner of Chez Panisse Restaurant, Alice Waters began her quest to source premium tasting produce to heighten the essence of her fare. Ultimately, her scrupulous palette led her to enlist the local California farmers who seemed the only purveyors capable of fulfilling her refined culinary demands. A noted pioneer of the organic and locavore trends she relied on these movements to endorse her signature dishes.
Fifteen years passed with great success and Waters realized a philanthropic need to share the benefits of her gastronomic philosophy with a greater audience. The Edible Schoolyard Project was Waters’ short order for duck soup. With a background in the Montessori Method and livelihood in food, it only made sense that she married her interest in teaching with her love of fresh food. The Project became Waters' medium to feed the nation her news, propaganda that would have put a smile on even Tom Joad's face. Like budding Bourdains I'm sure Waters envisioned monkey bar chatter to feature dizzy banter boasting of broccollini conquests blanched with premium soil ratio debates.
Fourteen years strong, The Edible Schoolyard Project has had the luxury of time to smooth it's wrinkles and a visit to it's website presents a truly persuasive argument in favor of introducing plants and planting techniques into the schoolyard. While stewing over the Project’s philosophy, I began to conjure kiddies captivated by the gentle art of crudite arrangement, children trading heirloom seeds from their retired Pokemon binders and backpacks brimming with basil. This Moosewood-esque nirvana would have ranch dressing usurping regional ketchup sales and the coveted Sotheby's Art of Farming Auction would replace requests for FAO boondoggles. Just think about it, a mere trip to Whole Foods could potentially assuage any child surfing along Disney's lunatic fringe!
Jamie Oliver, Vogue Magazine, Oprah and Martha Stewart are all extolling The Edible Schoolyard Project. But yes, there are always skeptics and some do believe that this approach is more educational garnish in place to satiate the horticulturally hungry diet of today’s culture. That is for you to decide. However, cheerfully deriding Cheetos in promotion of cherries seems logically in tune with Michelle Obama's admirable crusade to stop childhood obesity. At the basic level, the Project looks to educate students on the values associated with local, sustainable and organic food and serve as a platform for helping them make reasonable food choices. Ultimately, it's up to the local community to embrace this blue ribbon approach and shepherd it to the schoolyard. If you’re interested in learning more about Waters' Project or joining Henderson's team visit my blog: www.sowandsow.blogspot.com. Until then, the next time you feel the back-to-school breeze rustle through the aspens consider it an invitation to recall Water's delicious revolution as food for thought.
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Garden Variety

This month I'm inspired by entertaining in the garden. Clean lines and muted tones mixed with beautiful plantings will set the tone for any fete.

1. These pool locker baskets would make great centerpieces when lined with sheet moss and planted with powdered succulents. Alternately, place them on the ground as creches filled with moss and tickseed "little penny" or a bundle of blue fescue.

2. Flank the bar area with these low zinc planters placed on tall pedestals.Fill each with an unexpected planting. Here I have sourced a profusion of Mamoth Red Rock Cabbage.











3. Outdoor umbrellas give any patio an added three dimensional feel while creating shade for guests. Charcoal and linen canvas versions are a must.


4.Corbels topped with a thin bluestone slab creates the perfect spot to store extra glasses and napkins.

5. Mark the entrance to the patio with these Campania urns and plant with a brown leaf turkey fig or sweet bay tree.
Eugenia topiaries would also look great.










6. After dinner, fill these zinc footed bowls with decadent delights or fresh fruit.

7. Using natural cord, tie a unique seed packet to a Guy Wolff pot as a kind gesture of thanks for each guest.













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Sow & Sow Digs For Hadrian's Hortocouture:

Urns are a great way to delineate the transition areas between outdoor rooms. These are all weather and hold year round stamina when planted with a native evergreen.


What is not to love about an outdoor shower? This is an inexpensive model that can be hooked up to an existing external water line. Sand and salt can be sluiced off while enjoying the blue sky above. A simple cedar screen would add privacy and a dry spot to hang a robe. A simple outdoor room that boosts the appeal of the garden. Summer is here!




An outdoor living room is a great way to extend the liveable space of your home. Buy solid Sunbrella pillows and have them monogrammed with a poignant design or crest. Watch the sunrise with your kids and listen to the world wake up.

Finally! In October 2010 Ina Garten is coming out with another one of her signature cookbooks. In celebration, why not add an herb garden to your jardin potager or plant them in an elevated window box in an outdoor room? Simple ingrediants can make even her recipies more delish.


I loved this concept of the steel mum. Adding antiques in the garden is a great way to source the local treasures of the community and anchor the landscape into the greater whole.


Tuteurs are classic garden structures that brace climbing plants like tomatoes, eggplant and cucumber. They are beautiful in a jardin potager and also add visual interest in cold months. I would source a large version to ensure that they would not get lost in the summer greens.


A client of mine introduced me to her son's fabulous website www.dwconcrete.com where you can purchase a concrete ping pong table which also seats 12 for dinner. The vision is brilliant (and Agassi thought so too) and a great accoutrement to any outdoor room.

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