rainbowgardener wrote: Chard is my favorite thing to grow.
I am beginning to feel the same way, now that I'm figuring out how to foil the buggies in my garden that keep eating it. From a comment you made in a post somewhere I grew three plants (1 got eaten, but I re-seeded recently). I swear, nearly every other day there are 2 or 3 big leaves per plant that I can harvest without even making a dent. It grows and grows and it goes with anything. My beets are on the move and I've been snipping leaves here and there, but nothing near the volume from just a couple of chard plants.
I had to laugh the other day. My neighbour a couple of doors down has a leftover veggie garden. I say leftover, because her son planted it for her last summer when he visited her. She asked me if I would come over and help her identify some of the plants in it. She has a rainbow swiss chard that looks downright prehistoric. It's over 3 feet tall and I half expected to see a brontosaurus peek out from behind the fronds. She's also got a broccoli plant about 5' tall (the flower stalks are incredible!) I only know enough about gardening to be dangerous so far, and yeah, it looked like a brassica, but the only way I managed to identify it was from the tiny side shoots.
Back on topic! Beet greens rock! I like to carmelize shallots and garlic in a pat of butter, then add a bit of water and the greens, and cover till a little beyond wilted, but not browned. Cracked pepper to season. Yum.