Class Preview: Cooking from the Garden

By Annie Yang T'20
Photos by Lindsey Fleetwood

The exciting sizzle of the pan, the comforting smells of something cooking, the warm fullness of sharing a meal with your loved ones--food is a treasured constant in our lives. Many of us have been cooks for as long as we can remember, but our techniques and our approaches to food do not also have to stay constant. We need not look further to spice up our usual, garden-variety cooking than our gardens.

Chef Katie Coleman, owner of Durham Spirits Company, will help you unlock the culinary potential of your very own back yard in her "Cooking from the Garden" series at Duke Gardens.

Unlike purchasing produce from a supermarket, picking herbs and vegetables from your garden will guarantee that your food is seasonal, fresh and local. As Katie points out, tomatoes bought in the middle of winter that have had to endure the shipping process are not nearly as flavorful as tomatoes grown in your back yard over the summer.

Cooking from the garden is very much a seasonal affair. Currently, rosemary and squash are growing abundantly, bringing great variety to potential dishes. The "LateAutumn Salads" and "Warm Winter Soups" classes are geared toward specific times of the year and will help you learn to work with what’s in season.

Selecting your ingredients can be as easy as stepping outside and picking them off the stem, and cooking can be just as easy, too. There are all sorts of kitchen gadgets and gizmos that people may be tempted to use, but Katie prefers to keep things simple.

“I think the less you do, the more you highlight the vegetables or whatever it is that you’re cooking with,” she says.

Many people have been cooking for their entire lives, but they can also pick up habits that don't serve them well. Katie often catches people adding sugar to their onions during caramelization, or she has to coax them to be more liberal with their herbs. You might be a seasoned cook, but everyone has more they can learn!

Join Katie for one class or both, and she just might transform the way you view a certain vegetable or dish. At the least, this master chef will help you improve your cooking and bring more flavor into your meals.

Katie will teach "Cooking from the Garden: Late Autumn Salads" on Monday, Oct. 24 and "Cooking from the Garden: Warm Winter Soups" on Monday, Jan. 23. The class runs from 6-8 p.m. Both classes feature in-class tastings and are limited to 12 participants. The cost to register for one class is $28 for Gardens members and $35 for the general public. To register for both classes, the cost is $50 for Gardens members and $64 for the general public. To register, or for more information, please call 919-668-1707 or email.


Annie Yang is a Duke freshman and a work-study marketing assistant at Duke Gardens. Lindsey Fleetwood is a horticulturist in the Doris Duke Center Gardens at Duke Gardens.

Vegetable Gardening Tips

Summer campers helped tend a
vegetable garden at Duke Gardens.
Let Duke Gardens help you grow
your own bountiful garden.

By Kate Blakely

Gardening tips always take on the perspective of the gardener. What the gardener cares about intimately shapes the information he or she is sharing. Vegetable gardening is no different. Amidst all the wonderful info about growing veggies, it’s the intent that makes each tip unique and special.

Vegetable gardener Andy Currin has lots of tips to share. Currin will teach a Spring Vegetable Gardening class that begins Thursday, March 22, from 6:30-8:30 p.m. and runs for three weeks. It’s part of Duke Gardens’ Vegetable Gardening through the Year series. Currin shared some tips for how to grow vegetables in a healthy, sustainable way.

Watch when you water. “Of all points of sustainability, the main component is efficient water use,” Currin said. A lot of folks will water their gardens, their lawns and their flowers during the heat of the day, when the sun is working hardest. “You lose more water to evaporation than will actually get to the plants to be useful to them,” said Currin. The best planet-friendly practice is to water in the early morning or after the sun starts going down.

If you want to eat organic, start organically. If you want to grow organic vegetables, you must be vigilant about everything involved, from soil to seeds. “Some of the seeds, if they’re not labeled as organic, could contain seed treatments that would be systemic,” Currin noted. This means that chemical compounds in the seeds will be found throughout the plant. “And that would be included in the vegetables that you’ll be eating. You really have to start with the seed, any soil amendments, anything like that. Everything has to be organic approved.”

Watch (and help) the right bugs. Pollinators and predatory insects are the most beneficial. Currin has a “good list” and “bad list” of insects. At the top of the good list? Hoverflies. They are both a pollinator and a predatory insect, Currin said. Native bees also help out. The orchard mason bee, the bumblebee and the leaf cutter bee work to pollinate plants. Praying mantis, ladybugs and green lacewings also help. “They eat the bad guys,” said Currin. The bad guys? Aphids, thrips and squash bugs.

As part of your organic practices, make sure to complete any pest treatments around dusk, when the beneficial insects are not going to be out and about. That makes the least impact on the beneficial insect population. “Even organic treatments don’t really discriminate; they just take out everything,” Currin said.

Learn more: Want to know more? Consider taking Currin’s vegetable gardening classes at Duke Gardens. The class costs $75; $60 for Gardens members. If you can’t take the spring class (or in addition to it), consider the fall series, which runs from Sept. 20 to Oct. 4, also from 6:30-8:30 p.m. Please call 919-668-1707 to register. Please see our website for more information about classes and other public events at Duke Gardens.

Sarah P. Duke Gardens creates and nurtures an environment in the heart of Duke University for learning, inspiration and enjoyment through excellence in horticulture. The Gardens is at 420 Anderson St.

Kate Blakely is a graduate student at Duke Divinity School and a work-study assistant at Duke Gardens.

July + August 2011 events at Duke Gardens

Floral Studio with Theo Roddy

We've got lots of activities in store for the Duke Gardens community this summer. Here's our July and August schedule. And stay tuned for a link to our entire July-December schedule.

Unless otherwise noted, please call 919-668-1707 to register or for more information about classes and events.

July 5 & 6, 9:15 p.m.
American Dance Festival presents Eiko & Koma
Known internationally for their exquisitely meditative dances that resonate with strength and intensity, Eiko & Koma have created a theater of movement all their own. The choreographers will celebrate their 40th anniversary with the reconstruction of River (1995) in the pond of Duke Gardens’ Culberson Asiatic Arboretum. Through their journey downstream in serene waters, their small nuances of movement will transcend your previous notions of life and time and challenge the relationship of audience to artist. 684-4444. tickets.duke.edu; americandancefestival.org.

July 6, 7 p.m.
Duke Performances' Music in the Gardens series presents Holy Ghost Tent Revival. $10; $5 Duke students and employees; free for children age 12 and younger. 684-4444 or tickets.duke.edu.

July 7, 11 a.m.-noon Walk on the Wild Side
Explore wild North Carolina in the Blomquist Garden of Native Plants. Join curator Stefan Bloodworth on the first Thursday of every month to see which plants are in bloom, learn strategies to design with native plants, and discuss regional ecology and global environmental issues affecting native ecosystems and your role in protecting the health of our home planet. $5; free for Gardens members.
July 13, 7 p.m.
Duke Performances' Music in the Gardens series presents Lost in the Trees. $10; $5 Duke students and employees; free for children age 12 and younger. 684-4444 or tickets.duke.edu.

July 17, time TBA
American Dance Festival choreographer/instructor Rodger Belman presents a free outdoor performance by ADF student dancers, See photos and videos of Belman's 2010 and 2009 Duke Gardens projects. No registration required.

July 19, 6:30-8 p.m. Durham Garden Forum
The Durham Garden Forum is an informal group that meets once a month to enrich members’ gardening knowledge and skill. Local experts speak about topics of interest to the group. The public is invited. July topic: dealing with drought. $10; free for forum members. Durhamgardenforum@gmail.com.

July 20, 7 p.m.
Duke Performances' Music in the Gardens series presents cellist Bonnie Thron with clarinetist Fred Jacobowitz and pianist John Noel in the Kirby Horton Hall of the Doris Duke Center. $10; $5 Duke students and employees; free for children age 12 and younger. 684-4444 or tickets.duke.edu.

July 22, 10 a.m. to noon. Floral Studio
Work with floral designer Theo Roddy to design a stunning display for that special place at your home. Studios will also be offered Aug. 19, Sept. 16 and Oct. 21. Attend one or all four. Please bring your own flowers and container. $30; $25 Gardens members (or take all 4 for $20 per session; $16 for members).

July 27, 7 p.m. Duke Performances' Music in the Gardens series presents the Ciompi Quartet cellist Fred Raimi with violinist Eric Pritchard and pianist Jane Hawkins in the Kirby Horton Hall of the Doris Duke Center. $10; $5 Duke students and employees; free for children age 12 and younger. 684-4444 or tickets.duke.edu.

Aug. 4, 11 a.m.-noon Walk on the Wild Side
Explore wild North Carolina in the Blomquist Garden of Native Plants. Join curator Stefan Bloodworth on the first Thursday of every month to see which plants are in bloom, learn strategies to design with native plants, and discuss regional ecology and global environmental issues affecting native ecosystems and your role in protecting the health of our home planet. $5; free for Gardens members.

Aug. 6 & 13, 8-11 a.m. Local Fauna: Butterflies of North Carolina
Expand your enjoyment of these magical creatures as you learn how to recognize specific butterflies and understand their life stages and cycles. Instructor Jeffrey Pippen, of Duke’s Nicholas School of the Environment, will teach you about butterfly behavior and the adaptations that allow such seemingly delicate beings to survive. Class time is spent indoors introducing topics and outdoors seeing that information come to life. See Jeff's butterfly page online.$75; $60 Gardens members.

Photo by Jeff Pippen

Aug. 19, 10 a.m.-noon Floral Studio
Work with floral designer Theo Roddy to design a wonderful display for that special place at your home. Please bring your own flowers and container. $30; $25 Gardens members.

Aug. 21, 2-4 p.m. Cool-Season Vegetables: Expanding Your Garden Season
Double your garden production this year in the cooler (and hopefully wetter!) growing seasons. Durham County Extension Master Gardener Faye McNaull will share her methods to extend summer harvest by planting fall crops and strategies to jump-start next spring. Free; registration required.

Aug. 25, 9-11 a.m. Waterlily Walk
Enjoy the waterlily display across the late summer season. Each tour with horticulturist and water garden expert Tamara Kilbane highlights the lilies in bloom. Learn how these unique plants live and how you can enjoy them at home. $5; free for Gardens members. Registration required.

Waterlily Walk

Outdoor films update: Movies in the Gardens at Twilight will not feature an animation series, as originally scheduled. We are sorry for the inconvenience. Please plan to come to our Sept. 15 free film, "Play Again," a documentary about the consequences of a childhood removed from nature. You can learn more about "Play Again," and read an interview with the filmmaker, on our website. For information on other free or low-cost movies being shown around the Triangle, please see the comprehensive database at WRAL's Go Ask Mom blog.