An Ode to Alliums

It has been incredibly mild over the last couple weeks.  And this soft, slightly wispy weather is fueling my always-too-ambitious plans to add additional bulbs to my garden beds.  As long as I can work the soil, there is still time to plant.  And I find myself tempted by bags and baskets and bins of lovely little bulbs at local nurseries, especially Alliums.

First, I must admit that most of the Alliums in my yard are Allium tuberosum or Garlic Chives.  These are essentially perennial herbs.  Instead of traditional onion-shaped bulbs, Garlic Chives are tough little tubers or rhizomes that can spread like Daylilies or reseed like Poppies.  The foliage emerges in late spring and is often described as strappy, reminiscent of chunky, flat chives or very thin leeks.  It smells oniony.  The leaves, flowers and even the black, black seeds are edible.  Allium tuberosum is similar to other ornamental onions in that each “flower” is an almost dome-shaped umbel… made up of many little stars on many little stems… in this case, white with green centers and miniature antennae.  Very pretty.  And like other Alliums, Garlic Chives prefer a sunny location with well-drained soil.  They can all handle drought-ridden summers.

Garlic Chives bloom through late summer into early fall.  The flowers are sweetly fragrant; and their nectar attracts bees, butterflies, skippers and other insects.  So my patch, planted among Rose shrubs, a Weigela ‘Wine and Roses’, Lamb’s Ears and two kinds of Sedums, literally hums with activity.  I’ve even seen a hummingbird hover nearby.

Now in November, the skeletons of former blooms provide architectural interest in the faded garden and protection for small birds.  These dried starbursts often last through the winter or until a thick snow.



Garlic Chives are vigorous… some may say aggressive.  My original quart-size plant has multiplied and filled in all the little spaces around the Roses and other perennials.  But it has taken years.  And when the clump becomes too dense or I want a little variety, I just pluck some plants.  This summer, I pulled up a 2-foot swath near the edge of the border and sprinkled seeds from my frilly Columbine (Aquilegia vulgaris) ‘Nora Barlow’.  I’m hopeful.

Traditional ornamental onions, basically Allium bulbs you plant in the fall, can provide several months of ethereal blooms from late spring until early summer.  They bridge the gap between Daffodils and mid-summer perennials.  Rosemary Verey famously paired incredibly tall and vibrantly purple Alliums, ‘Globemaster’ I think, with Laburnum x watereri in her gardens at Barnsley House.

My garden is a lot messier and just less perfect, and I like Alliums, such as A. sphaerocephalon;

A. moly;

and A. unifolium,

which are less round than ‘Globemaster’, blue ‘Gladiator’ or white ‘Mount Everest’, but still provide height and/or an airiness to my sometimes dense perennial arrangements.

I’m always drawn to ones like A. bulgaricum

and A. thunbergii

with their charming, bi-colored stars that seem to nod and fall.  But I’ve had mixed results with these two particular bulbs.  As I mentioned, all Alliums need excellent drainage.  Although I’ve amended our soil substantially, it is still basically clay, and I believe the tiny bulbs sometimes rot during a wet winter.  Also, I’m not convinced that any bulb is rodent-proof.  Our squirrels seem willing to dig up just about anything!

You can still purchase some bulbs from major catalog suppliers like Dutch Gardens, Brent and Becky’s Bulbs or White Flower Farm.  But you might want to check close to home first.  I found these pretty, pinky A. ‘Graceful’ bulbs at one of my local garden centers.

And they seem to be sold out everywhere else.

More Comfort Food: Basic Pesto Sauce

Pasta is definitely one of the foods I crave on a regular basis.  And pesto is my comfort food sauce.  To be honest, there are so many great ready-made sauces available from local cafes and markets (and Walter does NOT like pesto) that I seldom make my own.  But I was feeling a little guilty about my gorgeous basil plants that were about to be zapped with frost, so I decided to make a batch… or two… or three… or actually five.  I was on a roll.

I grew Perpetual Pesto basil this year.  It is beautiful in the garden and on a plate.  The leaves are variegated, soft green with ivory edges, and the scent is much more like pesto than other basils.  Also it never flowers, or at least mine didn’t from March until October.  Even after seven months, only the main stem became woody.  The minor stems remain soft and the individual leaves are small and easy to pluck.  This variety can grow very tall, 24-30”, and kind-of Christmas-tree-shaped, which is useful in flower beds.

I planted two Perpetual Pestos in my “bulb bed”… a summer herbaceous border planted over hundreds of spring bulbs… mainly for foliage and fragrance.  It’s just lovely to brush against the basil while I am weeding and working.  And they mingle well with pastel daylilies, various coneflowers, peonies and a few yellowy-orange cosmos.

I didn’t want to destroy my pretty plant combinations, so I only picked basil leaves that had reverted to solid green.  But they taste exactly the same as the variegated ones.  I used the basic Pesto Sauce recipe from Craig Claiborne’s The New York Times Cookbook.  I own the 1990 edition.

The New York Times Cookbook is an excellent reference and my go-to resource for uncomplicated dishes in all their variations: all sorts of stuffed vegetables, salad dressings and dips; seven different pancake recipes and six potato salads, plus classics like Pineapple Upside-Down Cake, Lemon Sauce and Buttered Nuts.

Pesto Sauce makes about ¾ cup and reads as follows:

2 cups (about 2 ounces) basil leaves, stems removed

2 large garlic cloves, peeled
3 tablespoons pine nuts, preferably lightly toasted
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/3 cup olive oil
Salt to taste

Rinse the basil leaves in cold running water.  Drain and pat dry with paper toweling.  Pack them compactly inside a 2-cup measure.  Press firmly without crushing the leaves.

Put the leaves into the container of a blender or food processor.

Put the garlic cloves between 2 sheets of wax paper and smash them with a flat mallet or the bottom of a clean metal skillet.  Scrape the garlic into the blender or processor.

Add the pine nuts, cheese, oil and salt.  Blend thoroughly until the sauce has a liquid consistency.  Use immediately or scrape the sauce into a 1-cup jar with a screw top lid.  Seal and refrigerate until ready to use.  It will keep for 1 or 2 weeks.  Or freeze the sauce.  It will keep indefinitely.

I basically follow the recipe exactly, except I don’t really understand the part about smashing the garlic.  I just press each clove with the broad side of a chef’s knife, like I would normally.  It crushes the clove nicely to peel off the skin.  Also, pine nuts are so tasty whether you toast them or not.

The New York Times Cookbook recommends two variations:

Pesto Sauce with Sun-Dried Tomatoes
Prepare the basic pesto sauce, but add 3 (about 1 ounce) packed-in-oil sun-dried tomatoes or home-dried tomatoes.  Add the tomatoes while blending the basil and oil.

Pesto Sauce with Anchovies

Prepare the basic pesto sauce, but add 3 flat anchovy fillets or 1 tablespoon anchovy paste, while blending the basil and oil.

Yum!

As I mentioned, I got a little carried away with all the beautiful basil, so I ended up making 5 batches of Pesto Sauce… one for immediate use and the rest I froze for the holidays.  Here’s the deal: I would serve Pasta with Pesto Sauce as a side on Thanksgiving, a starter at Christmas or as the main course for lunch with friends.  It’s gorgeous.  And I can brag that I grew the basil myself.