Yellow is the signature color in my landscape. I use it to visually tie one garden to another throughout the entire yard. There are yellow flowering plants for every season and every micro-climate. The color is such a great complement to our blue, blue Colorado sky. I also find that clear, lemon yellow is a great mixer with almost any color palette. Although masses of yellow may be too vibrant to be considered “mellow”, a little bit is always “quite right.”
Here are just some of the yellow flowers blooming in my garden this week:
Photo above: Missouri evening primrose Oenothera macrocarpa
Giant silver mullein Verbascum bombiciferum
Yellow flowering pine-leaf penstemon Penstemon pinifolius 'Mersea Yellow'
Red-leaf honeysuckle vine Lonicera japonica 'Purpurea'
Rosa 'Topaz Jewel'
Some Like it HOT
Hot, summertime weather means living and cooking outdoors on the patio. It’s time to crank up the grill! Yesterday I was bound and determined to make a sauce to go with our grilled spare ribs, but didn’t have the key ingredients advocated by most recipes - ketchup and brown sugar - so I improvised with what I had on hand. Oftentimes simple recipes are the best, but when you want a rich, complex sauce it’s time to get creative and start building layers of flavors. This recipe was inspired (obviously) by Mexican cuisine. I hope you’ll give it a try and let me know if you enjoy it.
Jocelyn’s Chipotle-Chocolate BBQ Sauce
1 15 oz. can tomato sauce
½ disc of Ibarra Mexican chocolate*, coarsely chopped
3 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced
¼ cup apricot jam (or other fruit jam-cherry would be good too)
2 Tbs. honey
1 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1 Tbs. brewed coffee
¼ tsp onion powder
¼ tsp dried oregano, crushed
Combine all ingredients in a heavy saucepan. Cook over low heat until thickened, stirring occasionally, about 20-30 minutes. Use as a basting sauce while grilling pork or beef, and/or serve on the side for dipping. Enjoy!
*this is not sold as candy, but for cooking and baking.
Jocelyn’s Chipotle-Chocolate BBQ Sauce
1 15 oz. can tomato sauce
½ disc of Ibarra Mexican chocolate*, coarsely chopped
3 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, minced
¼ cup apricot jam (or other fruit jam-cherry would be good too)
2 Tbs. honey
1 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1 Tbs. brewed coffee
¼ tsp onion powder
¼ tsp dried oregano, crushed
Combine all ingredients in a heavy saucepan. Cook over low heat until thickened, stirring occasionally, about 20-30 minutes. Use as a basting sauce while grilling pork or beef, and/or serve on the side for dipping. Enjoy!
*this is not sold as candy, but for cooking and baking.
After the rains....
Wow, we have just finished a long week of rain here in Vancouver. It feels more like April than June but hopefully the weather is turning around.
Ilse, our wonderful SPEC employee, that keeps things running in the office.
Tomatoes are starting to form...
Our vertical food container.
We moved the tomatoes in order to give them more room to breath and better access to sun.
Insect mimicry....this fly looks like a bee.
Alyssum flowers have a rich honey perfume. They are a great living mulch and also attract beneficial insects to your garden.
Topsy Turvy - the upside-down tomato planter. This is our first year of using this technique. So far so good.
Our snow peas taste wonderful!
Orange You Glad?
Orange is the color in my garden now. This bright, vibrant hue screams “Ready or not, here comes summer!” All of these plants do well in my sunny, xeric garden.
Above: Bearded iris, Iris germanica
Atlantic poppy, Papaver atlanticum
Sun rose, Helianthemum nummularium
Horned poppy, Glaucium flavum
Orange flowers look their most vibrant when paired with blue flowers (complementary colors opposites on the color wheel). Many of the speedwells (Veronica spp.) are in bloom now too, and make wonderful companion plants.
