High Desert Leafy Greens

Maintaining a bed of leafy greens in the garden to pick from nightly, is one of the tasty convieniences of home gardening. They grow quickly, have simple feeding needs (nitrogen!), and are one of the first spring crops on the kitchen table. But, here high on the Colorado Plateau, our spring-greens growing season is limited by cold nights and hot days.

Mixed greens behind young leeks

This is how the broad diurnal shift in temperature (difference between daily high and low temp; 60+ degrees during spring in Gallup) really limits a long season for traditional leafy greens- when winter seems over, the days get hot. But clear nights, well into June, let the daytime heat stream into the atmosphere, even to the point of freezing. These frigid night-time temperatures delay the start of planting (without a cold-frame or greenhouse), only to see hot, windy, and dry days in May and June, push the greens to bolt and turn bitter. This year we had an unseasonably wet late-May and June, and so the farmers markets in Gallup and Ramah still had sweet greens of all varieties well into July. In my garden in Gallup, the lettuce greens usually quickly turn bitter, but I've had great luck in years' past maintaining a cold-frame of baby lettuce throughout the winter with nightly heating with an incandescent light-bulb and daily opening of the glass lid. This year I put my greens planting space into Red Chard and Bok Choy. Both great in stir-fry's when mature, but stay consistently sweet when young well into a hot summer. This interesting NPR article described a new study on the dramatic importance of consuming healthy fats when eating vegetables and greens to maximize nutrient uptake.

Home-grown baby chard-- with insect damage -- and local goat-cheese salad

This was my own recipe, but this huge NY Times food article, practically a cookbook, has 101 salad recipes to find a new twist on traditional favorites.

El Morro Valley Ranch: Local Organic Beef

Somebody que up Leonard Bernstein's rousing symphony Rodeo IV: Hoe-down. . . BEEF- it's what's for dinner! Aah, but tonight it's different. My main course wasn't crowded into a small feedlot as a teenager and fed yummy corn, followed by anti-biotics for it's upset tummy. No, corn and drugs didn't turn into bland fatty meat in this steer. See, tonight it's local range-fed beef. Healthy, lean, dry-aged beef, high in Omega-3's and ingrained with the natural flavors of the native blue-gramma and sage it was raised on, is on my grill tonight.

Photo of their brochure cover

I met the rancher, Charlie Mallory, selling his beef just a few miles from his ranch, at the Ramah Farmer's Market in early July. He and his wife cheerfully sold frozen cuts packaged at a licensed processing facility. Ground beef ($4/lb), Sirlion ($9/lb), and T-bones ($10) jumped into my basket. Quarter sections of an animal(about 60 lbs. of equally distributed cuts @ $6/lb = $360) will be available around August, but reserve ahead of time. This seems to be resonable pricing for local food produced on the small-scale that allows for humane and observant care of the animals and land. I'll try to post again later after visiting his ranch in person.

This interesting Wall Street Journal article describes how the down-turn in the economy has reduced demand in the high-end beef market, resulting in lower prices and more wide-spread availability of prime cuts and grass-fed beef. It's in market conditions like this that local producers like El Morro Valley Ranch need local customers more than ever.

So how did the sirloin taste? Perfect. Moist and smooth even when cut with the grain. Salt, pepper, and a searing hot grill for a couple minutes was all it took to have a great meal. Sauted home-grown brocolli and baby yukon potatoes, topped with rosemary chevre from the Windy Ridge Goat Dairy south of Ramah completed this all-local ranch dinner.

El Morro Valley Ranch

P.O. Box 250

Ramah, NM

(505) 783-4521

elmorrovalleyranch@gmail.com

From My Garden: Water

"Whiskey's for drinking - water's for fighting" is how the old play-on-words captures the spirit of how water's been historically regarded in the west. And things are little different here today; Gallup's aquifer is receding; many Native Americans and ranchers still haul water by the ton, weekly, in back of pick-ups; sprawling ranchette developments, each with a thirsty straw sunk into the ground spread in the foothills of the Zuni Mtns. each year. I live in Gallup and so that means my tap water is the non-renewable ancient variety pumped from deep in the ground. Reports say the aquifer is receding at such a rate that the only solution is to put another straw into my favorite river- the San Juan - and pump it 120 miles to Gallup. And so, I've often considered the ethical choice i'm making by using non-renewable water to grow food in this inhospitable growing climate; is it a sustainable food solution or an expensive hobby cloaked in 'green' intentions? I hope the former, but I'll be the first to admit I could improve the effeciency of my water use in the house and garden to avoid the latter.

1500 gallon chalkboard

However, water in Gallup is not only found deep beneath the rocks; 11.5" of rain or snow falls from the sky each year. And so to limit my use of the city's fossil water I invested in a 1500 gallon plastic tank (about $900 at most local hardware stores), a 400 gallon galvanized stock tank ($159; T&R Market), and new rolled-aluminium gutters ($3-4/foot, locally installed). The stock tank captures run-off from the rear portion of the roof to irrigate my rows of chile, tomatoes, and corn. A stone hearth under one side of the tank allows it to be heated for winter soaking. The plastic tank captures rain from the front-half of the aluminum roof. A 12-volt SHURflo pump powered by a 115 amp deep-cycle battery distribute water in the tanks to any portion of the gardens. A solar-cell to charge the battery is in the works. My most trusted technical resource for water planning is Tuscon permaculture expert Brad Lancaster's website and book, Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands Volume 1.

400 gal. hot-tub cistern awaiting adobe plaster

In addition to the intrinsic sustainabilty of rainwater harvesting, the roof water has been great to have on-hand for uses where chlorinated water would kill beneficial bacteria like making compost tea, bread yeast starters, brewing beer, soaking shitake mushroom logs, etc. I recently read this article showing that my rainwater harvesting and storage would amazingly be illegal in next-door Colorado, where century-old water laws prevent storing water destined for downstream users.

Welcome to Black Diamond Canyon Kitchen

Welcome, to my blog! Black Diamond Canyon Kitchen; a local food blog. I've decided to start sharing what has for the past few years been my occasional Garden Log, photo folder, and sprawling binder of brochures, sketchings, and notes on regional food sources, growing techniques, and general experience. I enjoy writing, though I've written little without being required to, for fun I guess, up to this point in life. Among other close people, I'm inspired to share my thoughts in words and pictures by the eight-year olds I try to teach to love and understand the power of writing and ideas. And so, for many reasons I've decided that starting this local food blog is a good idea. I'll try to keep it up-to-date, interesting, and real for everyone. and maybe occasionally funny and hopefully inspiring. we'll see. Please read it with a light-heart, and liberal acceptance of my creative writing conventions- 2nd grade, remember. Also, with some un-hip Palin-esque twitter symbols.) enjoy.

Me, bikes, and the little Nikon Coolpix

So, this canyon, Black Diamond in the past but now called Wilson St., is where I live in Gallup and my garden is the local-est food I eat. It's still relatively small, an eighth of an acre, but it provides me with the conveniences of always having fresh or recently preserved cooking staples- herbs, onions, garlic, greens, squash, peppers- on hand, and more importantly, the health and timeless satisfaction I've felt with growing food on any scale. Though, with the harsh growing conditions and my lack of a barnyard of livestock and years of experience, I, like everyone, still need to buy food. This is my way of sharing my attempts to grow, buy, cook, and preserve seasonal local food- with an eye towards increasingly sustainable food choices when I can.

Local goat cheese and grass-fed beef

The foothills of the Zuni Mountains have sustained the Zuni, Acoma, and Navajo people for many, many centuries, and with a little planning and seasonal recipe-planning, locally sourced food can be a reality for the modern day residents of Gallup, Zuni, and Ramah. The open range of sage and blue-gramma still supports year-round goat-daires, grass-fed beef ranches, sheep herds, and plenty of back-yard poultry. Amongst all this protein are scattered garden-plots that produce a surprisingly diverse harvest that ranges from the first spring greens, asparagus, and garlic, to the squash blossoms, fresh herbs, and fruits of summer, that last well into the fall. I'll try to support these local growers with my purchases and by highlighting various seasonal recipes I make using majority local ingredients.

My first baby potatoes of the season

My current vegetable garden started in 2006 as a 3' x 6' patch of existing well amended rich soil amongst the scattered fruit and native trees of my recently purchased dream-house - the little 'cottage' at 322 Wilson St. Gallup's north-side. I've let the number of flower patches die back since I've bought the place, but in addition to the original 18 sq. foot plot, and a beautifully mature patch of asparagus I 'discovered' the first spring, my vegetable garden has grown to more than 600' of growing rows in a variety of designs. From my 1200 sq. foot roof, I can collect 1500 gallons of water in an above-ground plastic tank, and 400 gallons in my stock-tank/hot-tub cistern, yet unfortunately, my usage of the municipal ground-water, 'fossil-water', has grown each season. I'll post individual descriptions of each of my crops as I harvest and cook with each this summer and fall.

Again, welcome to Black Diamond Kitchen and please come back soon.