Tag: vegetable garden how to

Seed Starting 101

February 20, 2021 / / 7 Comments

Seed Starting Tips Step by Step

Tiger Eye Beans

Seeds are nothing short of magic!

You hold this seemingly inanimate object in your hand. Once you place it in soil, give it some water and light it GROWS! And it keeps growing, giving pollinators a purpose and habitat, sequestering carbon, building soil, and giving you food—plus providing its own seeds to continue the process.

Being part of this process ties us back into nature in a way that very few things can. And more of us are feeling that pull back to nature as gardening continues to grow as a hobby and passion across the globe.

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Why Start Seeds?

Slow Bolt Napa Cabbage

On a more practical level, an obvious benefit of growing a garden from seed is major cost savings. A packet of seeds is usually less than the cost of a single small potted vegetable or herb start. Add perpetual savings if you can save the seeds that grow from the plants as well. More about this in my article, Seed Saving Starts Now.  

Remember only open pollinated varieties are recommended for seed saving, as these are the only kinds that will grow back ‘true to type’. Many seeds sold are hybrids, meaning that they took certain traits from two different plants and combined them. Growing seeds saved from those hybrids will likely revert back to parts of their parent plants, sometimes with really funky outcomes!

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Using the Winter Sowing Technique with Vegetables

January 20, 2021 / / 10 Comments

I’m always looking for ways to stretch my growing season up here in Minnesota, and winter sowing lets me get a jump on starting seedlings—without extra lights! The trick is in choosing the right seeds to start and when!

Late in January, you can find me thawing out some soil to plant seeds. Not seeds to grow under lights just yet, though; I send these earliest planted seeds out into the elements. This is the art of winter sowing! And of course I wanted to share what I’ve learned over the last few years.

Before we get crafting the weird little mini greenhouses that make winter sowing feel sort of like a pre-school art project, let’s go over the basics.

What is Winter Sowing?

Winter sowing is a way to work with Mother Nature to grow plants from seed. You plant seeds in a container and set them outside. They sprout in the containers and are ready to plant out into your garden from there. Trudi Greissle Davidoff was the first to write about the process of winter sowing.

Winter Sowing Jugs planted and outside in February

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My Top 5 NEW Garden Veggies

February 7, 2019 / / 2 Comments

Many of us have our tried and true favorite Garden Veggies to grow. Salad greens, tomatoes, green beans, snap peas… so much deliciousness I could never pick out so few as five to highlight from my whole garden.

So instead, I’m sharing my favorite NEW veggies from last Summer’s garden. I love growing ‘new to me’ varieties every year, and usually try out quite a few unique plants each year. Once you start growing from seed a whole new world of flavors opens up to you, and my taste buds will never be satisfied with the same old same old again. For more information on starting seeds, check out my Seed Saving Starts Now blog.

This is a review of my five favorite new to me vegetable varieties.

Romanesco

EAT: fresh, roasted or in stir fry

If ever there was a Diva Vegetable, here she is! The unexpected fractal patterns on this vegetable, paired with the lime green color sets her up to steal the show. The taste is milder than cauliflower, almost nutty. And my kids LOVED IT. It grew well for me in the Spring and Fall. I got seeds from Jung’s Seed Co. and these germinated and grew just as well as their white amazing variety. The purple graffiti was a complete wash for me though.

I loved how the Romanesco’s leaved covered each little pyramid point. The plant itself was even bigger than an average cauliflower, and that’s saying something. Even with taking up considerable space in the garden, I’ll be growing even more this season. I’ll be interplanting  beets and spinach for an early harvest before these girls take over the beds.

Tall Utah Celery

EAT: fresh, in soups, as celery salt

This Celery makes the cut because after being scared to grow it I jumped in last year. Guess what, No worries! There are many varieties that don’t need blanching, are so flavorful, yet not bitter! I started them from seed last February, so they do take time, but they are 100% worth it! They don’t take up too much space and play well with others in the garden. I chopped and froze some for soup when I had an abundance.

I also dehydrated and blitzed the leaves for celery salt, which I use in soups and stews.

So, for $3.25 for a packet of Tall Utah from seedsaversexchange I ate fresh cut celery all summer, still have some frozen, and I’ve just started new babies under my grow lights for the coming season!

Glass Gem Corn

EAT: Popped with a drizzle of butter

I’ve been crushing over this for so long, so glad I dove back into these rainbow colored corn rows! This is a flint corn, not a sweet corn, so no fresh eating off the cob. They’re so beautiful you want to have time to enjoy their beauty for a stretch first anyway

We fed some fresh mini-cobs to our hens. I’ve planted some for “corn shoots” micro-greens with varying success, and by far our favorite- popping! I’ve saved some cobs to plant with the kids’ garden clubs I run in the summer (HEARTS) I hadn’t grown any corn for a few seasons after a ‘bad bug’ year, those can take a while to get over… I still had all kinds of insects around the corn this year- just none burrowing into the corn. (whew!) $3.25 for a packet, from Seed Savers Exchange, I planted 3X16 foot bed.

Cucamelons

EAT: fresh from the vine, sliced in salads

These little cuties are as adorable as they are delicious! They also go by the names ‘Mexican sour gherkin’ and ‘mouse melons’. They have a slightly citrus/sour cucumber taste that becomes more pronounced the bigger/more mature they get. These guys were slow to get started, (they like it hotter to germinate) and I totally underestimated how they much they would grow- AND how many little cucamelons they’d produce! Still, giving these away was much easier than say, a zucchini. My kids loved picking these garden veggies as much as eating them- until those really hot late August days after eating these daily… we still have some ‘pickled’ versions in the fridge- both a garlic and a straight ferment- they are a bit more sour than a regular fermented pickle, but add a great kick to salads and cheese trays! We’ll be growing these on a full size trellis this summer instead of in with our beans, lesson learned! Seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, which shows up online as Rare Seeds

Berner Rose Tomato

EAT: like an apple, plus any other way you eat tomatoes.

This tomato was the workhorse of my dreams last summer. I was gifted seeds from family in Switzerland, the true “Berner Rose”, a Swiss heirloom variety of German Pink.  These were the best germinating and hardiest of all my tomato plants from the start. These are a potato leaf determinate plant that gave me the tastiest tomatoes that didn’t split, wilt or get any diseases. I’ll know to use thicker stakes on these this year because they produce SO MANY tomatoes on each cluster, my gardens looked a little like a mouse trap by September. Still have gallon bags of frozen, a few jars of sauce and salsa- these are the tomatoes that just keep giving! Thank you to my cousin, Seraina, for the thoughtful gift 😊 I wish shipping the tomatoes back to her was a viable option !

DIG IN!

So, have I inspired you to try any new garden veggies in your garden? Or maybe to buy a new variety from farmers markets yet? Let me know if you plan to grow any of these varieties or have questions I didn’t answer above. I can’t wait to DIG IN!

-Michelle

Dig garden

Three Easy-Peasy Vegetable Plants to Grow

May 12, 2017 / / 0 Comments

It’s that time of year again/finally… Planting Time! I dream of it all winter, impatiently waiting for snow to melt and then bam, it sneaks up on me.

No matter where you are on the gardening continuum, there is always more to learn about the basics. And there is a way for you to grow some of your own food this summer. One potted tomato plant can bring pollinators, joy and flavor to your home. Let’s get started, shall we.

Cold crops, like radish, spinach and cabbage were seeded in weeks ago, but this weekend (OK, officially Monday May 15th) is when us Minnesota Zone 3b/4a gardeners get the green light for planting out our plots with the seeds and seedlings too touchy to handle frost. And Mother’s Day Lines up perfectly with this timing 🙂

Small garden space? You’d never believe how much food can come from a 4X4 foot space until you try!

No garden space? Many vegetables can be grown in pots too!

Here are the 3 most fool-proof plants, with their fabulously funky variations, to get you started eating from your yard, deck, patio or hanging basket all summer long. And the best news, these easy to grow vegetables are still some of my favorites!

Tomatoes

From sweet little cherry poppers to beefsteak whoppers there is a tomato for your every food mood. These fruits are always a garden favorite and for good reason; there’s something deeply satisfying about picking a sun warmed ripe tomato and popping it into your mouth. Home grown tomatoes are so much tastier than their store bought styrofoam copies that it is like eating a different veggie.

To be fair, I just found some Bushel Boy locally grown tomatoes (Southern MN) that were many steps closer to a real tomato.  Go local greenhouses! I agree with Joel Salatin of Polyface Farms, Inc. in his belief that the best use of petroleum products is polyethylene reinforced plastic to cover and make greenhouses to extend the growing season.

Back to the varieties. An online search for tomato seeds at my favorite go to seed company, Jung Seed,  came up with 71 seed varieties. I love how Mother Nature diversifies.

There are varieties best for eating, slicing, canning or salsa. Then there are the colors. With names like Chocolate sprinkles, Lemon Boy and Midnight Snack you can dream for days. But dream time is over people, time to get planting. And sadly, we are now too late for starting tomato seeds. So, if you’re looking to get tomatoes in and enjoy them before September, gotta go buy some plants.

But first, know your options! Continue reading

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