The other day, I was heading toward Highway 52 and noticed the verdant patchwork of colors growing on the hillsides. All the rain we had this past winter created a lush display of varying shades of green intermixed with brilliant orange and yellow cascading masses nasturtium flowers.
\nI’ve had nasturtiums growing in my garden for years, and they continually reseed themselves and come back in abundance each year in the early spring. The nasturtium plant is essentially a flowering vine and it loves to ramble through my flower gardens.\u00a0As the flowers die, a large round seed pod forms that will fall into the garden and create more flowers the following year.\u00a0 Once you plant nasturtiums, they will be in your garden forever.
\nWhile shades of bright orange and yellow are the most common colors, nasturtiums also come in a variety of other colors and both the flowers and leaves can be variegated.\u00a0 Other colors include; crimson, creamy white and deep pink.\u00a0 Nasturtiums love to grow in poor soil that is well-drained and they do best if you do not fertilize them.\u00a0 If fertilized too much, you will have an abundance of leaves and few flowers. You can start them from seed in the cooler winter months of January or February, or you can find small plants in six-packs at local nurseries.\u00a0
\nAs the plants begin to form their vine, you can pinch back runners to encourage more flower.\u00a0 From time to time I will deadhead some of the spent flowers to encourage new ones. Once they establish, nasturtiums do not require a lot of care or water.\u00a0 You may need to bait for slugs and snails since they love to munch on the leaves.
\nI occasionally pick the flowers to add a colorful peppery bite to salads or I use them to garnish platters.\u00a0 You can also eat the plant\u2019s leaves, which have a much stronger flavor.\u00a0
\nNasturtium Salad
\n1 bag mixed salad greens (I like Trader Joe’s Sorrento Mix)
\nHand full or more of organic nasturtium flowers stems removed
\n1 Persian cucumber, sliced thin
\n1 cup cherry tomatoes in a variety of colors, cut in half
\n1 tab shallot, minced
\n3 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
\n1\/4 teaspoon dry oregano
\nSea salt and pepper, to taste
\n1\/4 cup good quality extra virgin olive oil
\nWhisk the shallot, vinegar, and oregano together and let the mixture sit for 30 minutes.\u00a0 Whisk in the olive oil to make a vinaigrette and season it with salt and pepper to taste.
\nToss the salad greens, nasturtium flowers, cucumber, and tomatoes together and dress lightly with the vinaigrette.\u00a0 Season with more salt and pepper, if desired.\u00a0 Serve immediately.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The other day, I was heading toward Highway 52 and noticed the verdant patchwork of colors growing on the hillsides. All the rain we had this past winter created a lush display of varying shades of green intermixed with brilliant orange and yellow cascading masses nasturtium flowers. I’ve had nasturtiums growing in my garden for […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":274410,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11560","_seopress_titles_title":"From my garden: Brilliant-colored Nasturtiums are easy to grow","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11560,11551],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-274409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-la-jolla-village-news","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=274409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/274410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=274409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=274409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=274409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}