Bzzzz Bzzzz

Tonight we are having cheese stuffed shells for dinner. Cheese, pasta, homemade marinara, what isn't there to love? For starters, it is not a low-calorie dish, but I ignore that most of the time.

Stuffed shells scream for a green vegetable side dish. This week I got a bag of mesclun and a head of lettuce in my CSA share. As much as I despise salads, I know that they go well alongside pasta. It would be a waste to not use the lettuce. Lettuce is healthy. The cards are stacked against me.

So, I tore up the lettuce, washed it and ran it through the salad spinner to dry. Now what? I swear that the best part of the salad is the crouton and I'm all out, so I must find something to top tonight's salad. A bare lettuce salad will not be served. That would just be wrong.

I decided that a few radishes would be nice. So I gathered Samantha and we headed to the garden. She loves strawberries, so we took a detour to pick today's red, juicy berries. My little berry thief ate them as quickly as I could pick them.

With the strawberries eaten, I proceeded to the small row of radishes. However, I couldn't get very close without hearing a very distinctive sound - the buzz of bees. I've never been stung and I'd like to keep it that way. I backed away and observed half a dozen bees flitting about the chive blossoms. Can you imagine chive honey? Ick. It probably tastes like onions, but is sweet like honey.

This spring I divided and transplanted one clump of chives. They have a new home in my garden as four clumps with lovely purple blossoms. The problem is that I planted a row of radishes adjacent to the chives. At the time I figured that the radishes would grow quickly and be harvested before their neighbors, the chives and carrots, got very big. I didn't realize that the chives would be in flower during the radishes' harvest.

No radishes for my salad. I hope there's some shredded cheese in the fridge.