I'm in Phoenix but lately, your temps have been similar to mine, just cooler at night. I grow winter lettuce, it's all over by April but yo can't do that due to harder freezes. You can grow spring and fall. When I want a little slightly out of season, like now, I plant a leaf lettuce mix in part-shade, water the heck out of it and eat as baby greens. I don't expect to get more than 3-4 weeks of eating before it gets bitter. I have a little patch now and it's still very sweet. Planted late Feb or early March. Make sure you give plenty of nitrogen too. These need to be fast growing little salad gardens. Don't plan on keeping them around too long. Once bitter, it's all over. Plant a warm season crop in it's place.

Back in the day, my favorite commercially bottled salad dressing was Catalina. But they reformulated it to be sweeter (and full of HFCS, but it was the extra sweetness that turned me off) in the 1990s or maybe it was the late 1980s. Right now, it is Annie's Balsamic Vinaigrette. Tart, creamy, not too sweet. No ingredient crud. I intensely dislike sweet salad dressings. When I want sugar, I'll have a dessert. If I want my salad with some level of sweetness, I'll add actual fruit into the salad itself. For a regular vinaigrette, home-made: Juice of 1/2 lemon Add rice vinegar to make 50 mL / 1.7 fluid ounces total volume atop the lemon juice (I used one of those Ball half-pint canning jars, and just added everything directly to that. The metric side of the scale on the jar was more convenient to me.) 1.5 teaspoon Dijon mustard 75 mL / 2.5 fluid ounces of oil. I recommend a 1:1 mixture (approximately 37.5 L/1.25 ounces of each) extra virgin olive oil to avocado oil. See below, and no, I don’t expect this to be measured out Exactly! Two teaspoons Penzy’s Herbes de Provence dried herbal concoction. 1/8 teaspoon salt, or to taste 1/4 teaspoon cracked pepper (approximate) I put it in that Ball canning jar, cap, and shake the devil out of it.

Oh, boy, do I hear you. For some reason, I've never been good at salads. I hear people talking about how much they enjoy chopping up the vegetables -- not me! Ruthanna, I'm going to try that lemon spinach salad. It sounds great. Here is the salad that changed my life, salad-wise. It's delicious, a little special, and unlike any other leafy salad I can think of, the leftovers keep nicely. I love to eat it with breakfast, too. I got it from Betty Rosbottom's "For the Gourmet" column in the Columbus Dispatch a couple of years ago and we have eaten it many times since. I even started growing kale, we like it so much! KALE SALAD WITH PINE NUTS AND GOLDEN RAISINS Makes 4 servings (sez she; I think more) 2 tablespoons olive oil 1 tablespoon lemon juice 2 teaspoons maple syrup 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt Scant 1/2 teaspoon red-pepper flakes 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 6 to 8 ounces kale (I use more; there's plenty of dressing) 1/4 cup golden raisins 1/4 cup toasted pine nuts Whisk together olive oil, lemon juice, syrup, mustard, salt, red pepper flakes and black pepper in a nonreactive bowl. (The dressing can be prepared 1 day ahead; cover and refrigerate. Bring to room temperature 30 minutes before using.) Remove and discard the tough stems and center veins from the kale leaves. Then cut the leaves crosswise into 1/2 inch-wide strips to yield 6 cups well-packed kale. (I often just chop up the leaves rather than worry about pretty strips; it's a LOT quicker.) Place the dressing in a salad bowl and whisk well. Add the kale and toss to coat greens thoroughly with dressing. Divide salad evenly and mound on 4 salad plates. Garnish each serving with raisins and pine nuts. (I like to serve it in a big bowl instead of on individual plates, so I just put the raisins and nuts on top and eventually it all gets tossed together.)

Just got back from Bunnings - didn't buy the rotary tiller as Bob reckoned he'd rather dig than pay $750; but I did score a nice patio heater to go with my Pinot Gris this summer. Talked to the sealant and paint fellows who gathered round in discussion and the outcome of the meeting was that water based outdoor paint should do the job - offered me a free tin of Mission Brown which I politely refused and sent me to the water feature department, hahah. Patronising b....s So it may be a simple thing after all. I will check that option for garden edges - it sounds interesting. Thanks for the link . I have the watercress run design in mind, should cost about $6 plus free labour! I also checked the plastic stake situation. Bunnings have 1.8 m steel stakes that are covered in PVC that look quite swishy, but not tall enough I suspect. They are $11 for 5 - similar wooden ones are $10 for 10. There were some 2.5 m ones at $5 each which I reckon puts them out of range. Now for a nice cold Viogniere........ Cheers Linda