GROWING PEAS

 My favorite vegetables in the universe (in food form) are pea tendrils cooked classic Chinese-style (Cantonese tradition) of simply emboldening the ingredients with not much to it but a few confit of garlic, rice vinegar water to liquify and a dab of oyster sauce to braise quick. I could eat a platter of it by myself at any given restaurant that serves it, and if I'm really hungry (which is always due to the chronic exacerbations of stomach pangs because of my plants-only diet) while the rest of my group merry away at their dim sum baskets on Canal St. in NYC, I remember when still living there, I would order another plate of pea vines and chopsticks away to my heart's content. Speaking of restaurants not found on island serving authentic dim sum, that's the very reason I'm growing my own produce (hence in photo the success of seed to fruit) and just in a matter of few months of tending and caring, not to mention the exceptional growing climate here all year round, I have them peas growing. My vegetable garden has a variety of green edibles intentionally intermixed in the ground to create a natural environment of biodiversity mimicking a grazing meadow's multi-flora biome that left undisturbed would allow ecosystem services to take its own course (think of a rainforest creating its own bloomings and provisions, a climate of renewal food). I will leave the peas on the vine until full maturity (say a couple more weeks outside the sun) and flourish plenty to take; the tendrils grow aggressively in harmony to support the hanging pea pods and these green outburst-tendrils are gold to me when harvested. I can't wait to cook them and feast!

My food garden would not be possible without the green hands and generosity of Sal Paradise. (I have written about him many blogs ago entitled "Soul Food"; please check it out.) He plowed the field and cultivated the vegetables and herbs and sprinkled wild flower seeds and planted pansies and impatiens to color the land - for my sake. It's as if there's an invisible botanist Santa who'd climb down from heaven to gift me a self-sufficient and sustaining food source, and that all he wanted me to do in return is to water them with love regularly (he said touch the soil to know when it's time) like a heartbeat, and with my hand the relationship will thrive. Wherever you are "on the road," Sal, know that all is well with the plants - because of you.