I'm still looking for the Kale, planted a few types of Collards and dwarf blue Kale, need purple and/or red kale. hopefully, Bea

Hi Sherilou! I'd love your Kale seeds! Still have a few of the same that survived this heat but it'll not make seeds, doubt it the way snails attack it even if I spray often with soapy water, oh well, it was great and used for a few months..and it all originated from GW Fall seed swap, smile. I have a blue kale, artichoke, asparagus, broccoli, different beans and more, let me know, thanks. Bea

Okay, I've seen the High Line in a children's book, and do get the part about TJ's being far. The rest could have as easily been about Kamchatka, given how much I know about New York. :) TJ's has things that come and go, so if you're making a special trip, it might be worth calling ahead. I do the same with kale, in the low oven, but I cut out the heavy stems. Can't do it with kale sprouts, so did the hotter. They were probably too hot, but they got nice and crunchy. :) Your toasted garnish sound great! I was thinking more of the little shreds of veg that you're supposed to eat with the meat, which they also call garnish, but so much better yet to make the decorative bits into a snack! I think plenty of people in New York, at least among the people I know, are more like you with the less amount of meat. It's the chefs who don't get it! Or maybe not even the chefs there, but the ones who come here from there--maybe their fare wasn't what the New Yorkers wanted anyway. Or maybe an Eastern thrift thing of if you're paying $$$ or more, it should be for something with Calories. :) The French and German chefs seem to have at least a good acquaintance with vegetables. The Italians--the fine dining chefs here here--use them in the cooking, but it seems if you want one to actually bite into, it's in a salad, and the Brits promise all kinds of delightful veg, but it's really just a smear of puree meant to be eaten with the meat (high class substitute for ketchup) with a few micro greens and three twigs for color on top. The other fun thing that TJ's had this last year was "heirloom red spinach". I love that they're getting in these oddities, half cleaned and ready to use. :) I admire your vegetable garden. I have herbs and peppers, but I'm not a great gardener, and am not ready to commit to vegetables. Are there any you're planting now for the Spring?

I've grown tree collard (similar to D'aubenton's) for going on a decade and it's wonderful. Stems of it were passed around my community garden in San Francisco so that we had a little forest of the plants at one point. It's incredibly easy to propagate this way in mild climates; I just stuck a bare stem in the ground and off it went. I've relocated to the Pacific Northwest and had qualms about duplicating my success with it here but I ordered a few non-sprouted cuttings last spring and they took right off after planting. Did great through our frost, snow, and freezing temperatures and after a proper freeze the flavor is just fantastic. You can buy cuttings online instead of seeds and that will get you going sooner. Here's a good rundown of some of the different varieties, I grow the purple tree collard: https://www.projecttreecollard.org/tree-collard-varieties/