Who Says You Can't Make Pesto in a Metal Shop?

Well, in fact I don't recall that anyone actually did. And I suppose had Keith been welding the day after I foraged for nettles, the metal shop wouldn't have been an environment conducive to the project. But he wasn't, and I had the ingredients, the equipment, the time...and the welder's permission to use the table for a culinary project.

One of the benefits of eating seasonally and locally is that it accords with the earth's wisdom on the topic of what we should be eating when and where. Stinging nettles have been shown to be an excellent liver tonic, and they are ready to harvest in spring - at precisely the time that the liver's influence over our physical and emotional health is prominent (and when the liver needs to divest itself of toxins accumulated during the winter months). Blackberries are ripe and ready to support the digestive system when it is experiencing its greatest annual hurdle: The shift from summer to fall. Autumn pears moisten and tonify the lungs, the dominant organ of those months. And on it goes.

I look forward to stinging nettle season, especially in winter when invariably I have used up the last of last season's vinegar. Given the common name's adjective - stinging - nettles can seem off-putting to consider as an object of one's foraging desire. Get a pair of garden gloves, though, and you're in business. With scissors, take just the top growth of not more than 1/3 of the plants in any given area, taking care not to trample tender wildlife, mid-March to mid-April. Collecting about a quarter pillowcase-full will be enough to put up a couple quarts of vinegar, a couple pints of pesto and a batch of soup.

Take the nettles home and rinse them. To make vinegar, soak the tender tops in apple cider vinegar for 6 to 8 weeks and strain. There are many recipes for nettle-potato soup, nourishing and capable of boosting energy levels, especially at a time of year when we are feeling collectively soggy here in the Pacific Northwest. Risotto is another option. The highlight for me, though, is the pesto. I far prefer it to the traditional Genovese variety, and use walnuts in place of the pine nuts Langdon Cook's Fat of the Land blog calls for. Tip: Don't discard the blanching water. Strain and drink as a tea for an immune system boost.

Once you've got the pesto, the only question is what to do with it. Whether you toss it with pasta and spring garden peas, spread it on crostini, or use it as a dip for another seasonal companion, asparagus spears, nettle pesto is a local seasonal treasure not to be missed.

http://fat-of-the-land.blogspot.com/2009/03/stinging-nettle-pesto.html

Starting from Stone: the Backstory

Stones are where it all started for Taproot. Keith had been laying stone pathways for a client who wanted her collection of beach rocks incorporated into the paths. When she asked him for a trellis, Keith reflected on what he felt was missing in so much of the ornamental metal work he'd seen in the past: Row upon row of vertical rods that lead the eye up and out of the landscape they guard. Coming from a contemporary art background, that didn't work for Keith. He looks at his clients' yards as compositions. He wouldn't draw a line off the page, as it would lead the viewer's eye away from the piece; he wasn't going to design a trellis without something to lead the visitor's eye back to the garden.

That first trellis design is still the foundation of what has become our extensive standard product line. 40.5" wide and 84" tall, the five vertical rods of 1/2" hot-rolled round mild steel are crossed with four horizontals and each topped with a nondescript gray stone wrapped in steel on four sides. The stones provide a tranquil resting place for the viewer's eye, and the steel rods in which they're wrapped guide one's gaze back to the plantings. That first client was so taken with the trellis that she asked him for several more, and made it a fence. In the intervening years, Keith has added a bracketed option, so that the panels can be mounted onto 4x4 posts, as well as additional vertical or horizontal rods for clients who wish to tighten the weave.

We recently found ourselves running low on stones, and took Tuesday to drive out to the coast. Keith uses four basic sizes, each for different purposes and products. For example, the arbors require several stones all about the same small size; a 40.5" wide trellis/fence panel requires three sizes, as they tier up from sides to center. The sizes are so specific that there is even a laminated sheet with the traced ideal circumference of each to reference. In addition to canvas bags for the stones, we brought several plastic bags for trash. Trash pickup is the post-collection quid pro quo that Keith settled on years ago. Combing the cove this particular trip, we were pleased to find it fairly clean. Apart from a shoe, a length of twine, three plastic bottles and a few scraps, there wasn't much to scavenge.

Want to learn more? Our web site provides additional information about our entire line of fence and trellis panels, with PDF catalogs detailing the available finial combinations - including the stones we collected this week.

http://www.taprootworks.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3&Itemid=5