The what??
The Blue Podded Blauwschokkers!
I have to slow myself down and sound out that last word, so don’t feel bad if you do, too….
We grow peas every year that rarely make it into the house because the kids snack on them straight off the vine.
No, I’m not complaining – I love the fact that my kids are out there snacking from the garden. It sounds weird, but we sometimes have to beg Alex and Julia NOT to eat all the vegetables.
Anyway, at the beginning of the year when we were ordering seeds, we decided to order these – the Blue Podded Blauwschokkers – from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.
Why did we choose these? Incredible flavor? High yield? Disease-resistant?
Nah.
They’re blue!
Or, they will be, eventually, according to the package.
We planted them outside in buckets in early April. I think we’ve got three buckets of the blue peas and two of the green kind.
April 17th
Once they start getting tall (6” or so) you’ll need to give them something to climb on, otherwise they’ll just grab onto anything they can. You could wake up one morning and find them twined around your toothbrush if you’re not careful. We like to use tomato cages with pieces of string hanging down.
April 24th
At that point, just let them go and keep them watered. They’re pretty low-maintenance.
April 27th
May 19th
May 22nd
At this point, the plants are very tall – some are taller than I am, and they look like they want to keep growing. But – they probably won’t. The sun and warm weather finally showed up this week and – as I anticipated – they started blooming.
Peas are a cold-weather crop – they do great in early spring when the nights are still cold, the skies cloudy, rainy or drizzly. But once the heat arrives, it’s time for them to bloom, produce seed pods (the peas) and, within a few weeks, die. Theoretically the pods would dry out, land in the ground below, lay dormant for months, and repeat the cycle in the spring. That’s the great circle of plant life.
But all that autumn-of-life stuff is in the future. Right now, our peas are teenage girls going to the prom, gorgeously decked out in gowns of pinky-purples. So pretty!
The first few blossoms appeared yesterday.
And a lot more have shown up today…
The best part of all this is that I didn’t even remember reading that the blossoms would be this color. I was just expecting white ones, like we’ll get with the other peas.
What a happy surprise!
Very pretty!!!
Posted by: judith | May 29, 2011 at 11:59 AM