Since I only have room in the garden for a half dozen cauliflower, I chose a rainbow six-pack this year. Mine was heavy on Romanesco with one each of purple, cheddar and white. One cheddar and a Romanesco remain and finally the red cabbage get more sun. Next year I’ll plant them in front of the cauliflower.

My favorite ways to use the magenta vegetable are in salads or lightly roasted. Steamed, it turns a disagreeable (to me) blue.

I’m overrun with greens now so the large cauliflower leaves went to a friend who has a passel of bunnies. I saved the smaller Romanesco leaves to use in a soup or saute.

Preparing dinner I glanced over to the counter and the late afternoon light was stunning. So one more shot of Romanesco. To read more about Romanesco, see my earlier blog post.

Everything in this weekend salad came from the garden.: Three kinds of lettuce, arugula, celery, snow peas, purple cauliflower and radishes.

Oh how I love the winter garden.

The magenta stock (growing near the purple cauliflower and red cabbage) merited a bouquet for the kitchen. See my short blog post from last week on how I value the garden as a place for artistic expression.: To Make the World More Beautiful.

So I didn’t get too much gardening in last week as I was in Seattle for the birth of our first grandchild, Shiloh. What a joy as we celebrate with our son, Andy and his wife, Sarah.

See what other garden bloggers are harvesting in North America and elsewhere at Harvest Monday, hosted by Dave at Our Happy Acres.