Fall Garden Harvest: Daikon Radish, Spinach and Scallions

Here in Northeast Pennsylvania it’s been a pretty mild fall (not much frost), so the garden crops are still growing. Today I pulled scallions and Daikon Radishes and cut some spinach (that’s a picture of today’s harvest). It’s a week and a half before Thanksgiving and we’re still eating fresh garden vegetables-how wonderful. I threw it all together with some brown rice and carrots tonight and made a wonderful stirfry.

For those not familiar with Daikon Radish, it’s a very healthful vegetable and very easy to grow in the fall. Using it as a cover crop is great, because whatever we don’t pull and eat will be left in the ground to do its magic providing nutrients for the raised garden beds as the radishes deteriorate. It will also help preserve your soil if the winter is particularly harsh. As an added bonus, the garden is very low maintenance at this time of the year, because most weeds have gone dormant. Just watch those veggies grow!

The scallions grow slower at this time of year, so it’s a race against heavy weather, but they’re very sweet. Next year I think I’ll cover the rows as Eliot Coleman writes about in his Winter Harvest Handbook and see if I can keep growing into December.

Gardening isn’t just a spring and summer sport!