Classic Gardening Magazine
Gardening as it ought to be
Can you hear that plaintive cry? It's an artichoke begging for mercy.
Sadly I'm deaf to it's pleas. My first artichoke is ready to eat, it's in the pot and I'm very much looking forward to peeling its little wings off one by one, dipping them in butter and then using my bottom teeth to scrape its lovely young flesh into my mouth.
And that's not all. Once the leaves are off I'm going to rip it's heart out and dip that in butter too.
You've probably gathered by now that I'm no vegetarian. But I defy even the daintiest of eaters to resist gorging on their first artichoke of the season.
The plants may look like bloody great thistles, they may muscle everything else out of their way in the veg patch. They may take up far too much room for what they produce, but I wouldn't be without them.
One
of our most successful dinner parties was in the garden, on a warm June
evening, and the starter was roast artichoke hearts from the garden.
What a hit they were.And, should you get too many to harvest, what fantastic flowers they produce. They are the biggest, bluest thistle flowers you'll ever encounter. I walk past a very trendy London hotel quite often and, when they haven't got bird of paradise flowers brightening their starkly minimalist reception area, they have flowering artichokes.
So, not only delicious; achingly fashionable too. What more can a classic gardener ask for?
