The Sun Is Your Garden’s Best Friend…Or Foe – Greens with Blue Cheese, Pear, and Spiced Candied Pecans
Plants cannot live without sunlight. Photosynthesis converts light energy from the sun into chemical energy of glucose, the food that all plants need to survive. But too much sun might be a death sentence, depending on the plants one desires in their garden. As we march into spring, all gardeners must take sunlight into account.
Along with our plants, we thrive on the lengthening of the day as the sun slowly warms the soil and our seeds begin to sprout, emerging from the ground, growing towards the sun. Based on the light, a gardener must consider where to sow seeds, keeping in mind the future, because the summer sun shines at a different angle than it does in early spring.
Some plants require full sun – at least six to eight hours each day, in the middle of the day, when it is more directly overhead. Others thrive in partial shade, the intense light and heat of a full sun location burning the leaves or encouraging them to send up flowers and seeds before we get much in the way of a bountiful harvest. Tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, beans, corn, and all varieties of squash, both summer and winter, require full sun and warmer temperatures, while lettuces, spinach, cabbages, and peas, for example, are spring and fall crops, preferring cooler weather and less intense sunlight. To extend the season of these cooler weather plants, I often grow them in less sunny parts of the garden or those areas where direct light is only early in the morning or later in the day, minimizing the intense sunlight as spring turns into summer.
After planting in the fall, I cover my garlic with a blanket of leaves to protect them from the winter cold, as some may emerge early from the soil. When spring arrives, I uncover the tender stems. To do so on a bright and sunny day would be devastating to the plants and my eventual harvest, burning the yellow stalks before they become hardy. I study the early spring weather forecast, waiting for a few cloudy days in a row to give them a chance to develop the green chlorophyll needed to absorb sunlight and convert the sugars for storage in their pungent bulbs.
Similarly, after starting seeds indoors – in the basement under lights in my case – immediately planting seedlings in full light would certainly bring about their demise. It is a lesson I learned long ago, the hard way. Instead, they must be slowly acclimated to bright sunlight over the course of a week; a short hour the first day, two the next, building up to the level they need to thrive in the garden. And even then, when the young plants are finally ready to be placed in the ground, planting on a cloudy rather than sunny day will only help them acclimate to their new home. (Seedlings purchased from garden centers are already acclimated to the proper level of sunlight.)
While sunlight in the garden is essential, gardeners must consider it carefully, as the sun can be your garden’s best friend…or foe.
Greens with Blue Cheese, Pear, and Spiced Candied Pecans
One of the first crops available for harvest in early spring before the sun gets too intense are tender leaf lettuces. They go beautifully with slices of pear, pungent blue cheese, and these irresistible sweet and slightly spicy candied pecans. Since lettuce also grows well in the fall, this recipe might even be better then, when pears are in season.
The recipe for spiced candied pecans, modified from David Lebovitz, is the easiest recipe for caramelizing nuts that I have found. It is quick, simple, and mostly hands off. Definitely prepare more than you need, as there’s a danger of snacking on them before you are ready to serve them in your salad. Luckily, David Lebovitz’s recipe prepares two cups, which is more than you will need for salad for four. The spice level is easy to modify. If you don’t want any heat, leave out the cayenne entirely, and add more if that is to your liking.
serves 4, about a half hour
for the spiced candied pecans:
7 tablespoons confectioner’s sugar
3 teaspoons water, divided
¾ tsp. kosher salt
½ tsp. cayenne pepper, or to taste
2 cups raw pecans
for the dressing:
½ cup olive oil
¼ cup white wine vinegar
1 tsp. Dijon mustard
1 Tbsp. honey
½ tsp. salt
¼ tsp. fresh ground black pepper
for the salad:
10 – 12 oz. leaf lettuce, spring mix, mesclun mix, baby romaine, or other greens, washed,
dried, and torn into bite-size pieces
6 – 8 Tbsp. salad dressing or to taste
1 firm but ripe Bosc, Anjou, or Bartlett pear, seeded and sliced into wedges
1 cup spiced candied pecans
½ cup (about 4 oz.) crumbly blue cheese, such as gorgonzola
12 cherry or grape tomatoes cut in half (optional)
- Preheat oven to 350 oF and line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat.
- In a medium bowl, stir together the powdered sugar, 2½ teaspoons of water, salt, cayenne, and pecans. The pecans should be coated with the mixture, although there may be some wet clumps of sugar. Add remaining ½ teaspoon of water, if necessary, to fully coat the nuts in a thick syrup. They should not be watery.
- Spread the nuts on the baking sheet and bake, stirring once or twice during baking, until they are golden brown and shiny, 10 to 12 minutes.
- Cool on the baking sheet, breaking up any clusters as they cool. Once cool they can be stored in an airtight container. Spiced candied pecans can be made a few days in advance.
- Whisk together salad dressing ingredients in a medium bowl.
- Toss greens with 6 tablespoons salad dressing or to taste. Top salad with pear slices, nuts, blue cheese, and tomatoes, if using.
