What Am I?

Sometimes identifying a vegetable in the field can be tricky. Sure, we know what the vegetable looks like on the store shelf, but are we sure we know what it looks like in the garden? Frankly, I haven't always been able to recognize the vegetables in their natural state. Here are some of my favorite "clueless vegetable" moments:

The first time I saw a Brussels sprout plant, I had no idea what I was looking at. That was back when Tim and I volunteered at Angelic Organics, a big CSA outside of Chicago (if any of you saw the The Real Dirt on Farmer John, then you've seen Angelic Organics). I had to ask a farm intern what it was. Later that day I also had to ask what the celeriac was.

In our first CSA year, my sister and I weeded out all the mizuna (a spicy green) from our mesclun mix. When we had just finished up, Tim came along to set us straight!

That first CSA year we also lost the tags out of a couple of vining plants. So we planted the vines in a special little patch next to the greenhouse. Eventually we determined that the plant was a melon, and it was growing some huge fruit! Every day in August we eagerly thumped a watermelon, eager to eat it. Finally Tim pronounced it ready. We pulled it off the vine and chilled in the refrigerator. At last it was time to dig in. It took me 5 minutes to cut my way through the monster melon! I opened it up and was in for a surprise. The inside was white and dry. We were still clueless until we tasted the thing. It turns out we had harvested a green pumpkin. That was the worst...melon...ever!

The hardest time to identify a plant is in the spring--that's especially true when I plant something I haven't grown before. Sometimes I'll find myself a couple of weeks afterward staring at my plot, wondering what's weeds and what's not.

Earlier this month I ventured out with my camera and took pictures of plants that were just starting to pop up. I've posted some of the pictures below. See if you can guess what they are!

I'm a potato!

Soon we'll be producing succulent strawberries.

We're red and yellow spring shallots.

I'm a future head of lettuce.