One Tablespoon of Culinary Poppy Seeds

Most of our harvests at Dirtpatch are counted in bushels but the harvest of my culinary poppy seeds is more modest in volume. This year my yield was exactly one tablespoon of the bluish gray Hungarian poppy seeds that have taken all season to mature. But I can't complain. Last year my harvest was one teaspoon--so technically I've tripled my yield.

I started the seeds in the early spring this year and watched them bloom with luminous pale pink and white flowers that quickly lost their petals forming chubby little urn-shaped green pods. As the summer progressed, the pods and stems dried in the garden. In late September, I cut the stems about 4 inches below the bottom of the pod and placed them in an empty vase to dry indoors. This morning, I cut the pods open and reaped my harvest.

Culinary poppy seedlings thrive in cool weather so I'm going to plant my seeds for 2009 in a few weeks to see if I can give them a head start on growing during the cooler spring months. I've been told the seedlings are fairly hearty and should overwinter well in this area.

Now, my dilemma...what to do with the harvest? Should I make poppy seed dressing? Poppyseed bread? Lemon poppy seed muffins? After much consideration (not just any recipe will do for these tasty treasures), I've decided to make Braised Turnips with Poppy-Seed Breadcrumbs. Our turnips are just beginning to get large enough to harvest and the recipe takes exactly one tablespoon of poppy seeds. Sounds perfect. Who knows, next year I might get a few more tablespoons and go for the muffins!

Photos: Dried culinary poppy seed pods
            Green pod after petal drop
            The graceful arch of a flower bud