California-grown Hass avocados are now available in local markets. These are on sale at Young's Market for 79 cents each. Photo by Jennifer Baldwin

Susan Tesch holds a bundle of garlic blossoms at the Tesch Farms stand at the Bakersfield Farmers' Market. The blossoms taste milder than the cloves and make a pretty addition to veggie dishes. Photo by Jennifer Baldwin

By Michelle Beck

During last Sunday’s dust storm, I went outside again and again, not just checking on my beautiful irises and Asian poppies, but also anxiously watching my tomato plants, the little green apricots and peaches on my trees and the hundreds of boysenberry blossoms on my vine. Each boysenberry blossom will produce a berry, so I didn’t want to lose any. Thankfully, nothing was ruined, although all of the plants do a look a little disheveled. I hope your gardens were similarly unharmed.

Blueberry plants

Now is a good time to plant blueberry bushes. Although our heat makes the season short, blueberries grow well here. Most nurseries sell several of the varieties that are bred to do well in the Central Valley. The bushes are pretty and mine are covered with small berries (thankfully unharmed by the wind). If you plant a blueberry bush, don’t let your children pick the flowers – every flower is a berry! This is also true of fruit trees, tomatoes, peppers, and many other food plants.

Herb garden

Before I built my raised beds, I used to simply put my herb plants wherever they would fit among my flowers. Herbs are easy to grow, and are delicious not only in recipes, but also chopped raw into salads. I always plant sweet basil, and this year planted lemon basil as well. I’ve planted cinnamon basil in the past, but find the flavor a little harsh. I also have parsley, chives, tarragon, garlic chives, sage and thyme. My chives are starting to bloom. I leave most of the blooms for the bees, but it is fun to cut a few and add them to a salad.

I love fresh mint in my summertime tea, but mint is extremely invasive, so I plant my mint in a large pot. Most herbs prefer full sun, but mint likes a little shade, so I keep it on the eastern side of my house.

I also plant fennel. The plant and its blooms are pretty, and the fronds make a nice addition to salad. Mostly I plant it for the swallowtail butterflies it attracts. Swallowtails are big, gorgeous black and yellow butterflies, and fennel is a host plant for their caterpillars and larva. I love watching the caterpillars and trying to find the chrysalides hidden on the stems of the plant.

If you’re looking for something to cook with herbs, The Gluten-Free Goddess has a recipe for Turkey Meatballs with Asian Noodles that uses a variety of fresh herbs.

Avocados

It is also finally California avocado season. Murray Farms has some available at the Farmer’s Market, and I saw some at Winco. I try not to buy produce that is better-traveled than I am, so was thrilled to finally find avocados that were not flown from South America. As I am sure you all know, avocados are good in practically everything. (Unless you are my brother, who calls them “awful-cados.” We think he was left by aliens on the doorstep.) There are several varieties of avocados, but the variety most commonly found in grocery stores is the Hass, with its thick, bumpy skin and creamy flesh. Zutano is the variety most seen in Bakersfield yards. It has thin, light green skin and a somewhat watery flesh. This is my favorite guacamole recipe.

Garlic blossoms

Greg Tesch has had garlic blossoms on his table at the Farmer’s Market lately. Garlic blossoms taste like garlic, as you would expect, and can be used in any dish in which you would use garlic. The garlic flavor is a little different than clove garlic, however, so I would use the blossoms in addition to garlic cloves, not in place of them. Garlic blossoms have a milder garlic flavor and taste almost like a combination of green onion and garlic. They make a pretty addition to a stir fry or sauteed vegetables. I, of course, like to scramble them with eggs. I made a great lunch recently by sautéing some garlic blossoms with some of Greg’s sweet onion until softened, then adding some eggs whisked with a little half and half. I topped the scramble with some asiago-rosemary cheese I found at Trader Joe’s. Asiago has a strong flavor, somewhat like Parmesan, and combines well with eggs.

Haagen Dazs Five

Haagen Dazs makes a delicious line of ice cream called Five, because the ice cream contains only five ingredients. It has no weird chemical ingredients, no gums and no fillers. I love the ginger and bought some lemon the other day. Lemon sorbet is readily available, but lemon ice cream is unusual. It was deliciously tart with real lemon flavor. (Fake lemon is vile.) To learn more about Haagen Dazs Five, click here.

Bryers used to be my “go-to” ice cream, because it contained only natural ingredients, but I was very unhappy to pick up a carton the other day and discover added gums, no doubt to create the “rich and creamy” texture touted on the front. Yuck. I have always enjoyed Bryers’s slight iciness, a result of its natural ingredients, but “mouth feel” is a big part of the food industry. No doubt, Bryers has bowed to consumer demand for creamy-feeling ice cream, even though they have to ruin their product to create it. Cook’s Illustrated magazine did a taste test on vanilla ice cream last month, and it is interesting to read the analysis of the different fillers and tricks used to create ice cream, or in some cases, chemicals and fillers labeled as ice cream.

A little rant here: Why is food with no preservatives and ingredients one can pronounce considered “gourmet”? Why is it packaged in tiny containers and put in the “fancy” ice cream section? Most importantly, why does it cost more?  Does it perhaps have to do with corn subsidies, which make high fructose corn syrup such a cheap form of sweetener? Anyone who has made ice cream at home knows that it only takes a few ingredients – milk, cream, sugar, eggs and flavoring, fruit or chocolate. Take a close look at the ingredient list on the side of a carton of grocery-store brand ice cream. Why are there so many unpronounceable ingredients? End of rant.

Making yogurt at home

A friend of mine makes all of her yogurt at home. It is a surprisingly easy process. It is not only cheaper than buying yogurt, but it allows for more control of ingredients. Homemade yogurt can be sweetened with sugar or maple syrup, or not sweetened at all. Fruit purees can be added, and fresh fruit is always good sliced on top.

Here is one set of instructions for making yogurt at home and here is another.

Yogurt cheese

Yogurt cheese is basically yogurt strained until it is very thick. This simple yogurt cheese has a texture similar to goat cheese, and can be sweetened or combined with herbs and used in the same way as goat cheese. Trader Joe’s has firm, sliceable yogurt cheese, but it involves a more complex process to make it firm. Here are some directions for making yogurt cheese.

King Arthur Flour Gluten-Free mixes

When I still ate wheat, King Arthur Flour was my favorite. It is a small, high quality company, so I was thrilled to discover that they are introducing a line of gluten-free mixes. They are only available online right now, but I plan to ask the manager at my local Vons if they will start carrying them. The more people who request it, the more likely it is that Vons will start carrying it. Click here for more information on the new gluten-free mixes.

Spring lunch

This recipe for green pea soup with cheddar-scallion panini is simple, light and looks delicious. It uses frozen peas instead of fresh, but I have read many times that frozen peas are perfectly acceptable to use. I have actually read that frozen peas taste better than fresh because they are frozen at peak ripeness. Fresh peas lose their flavor rapidly, so unless you are picking them straight off the plant, they will not be as good. Based on my own experience with sugar snap peas, I have to agree. The panini is made on rye bread and looks fabulous. I am planning to make it on some gluten-free bread and pretend it is rye bread.