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Lil doesn't have much patience for gardening some days because "it's all about vegetables!" She plants her garden in flowers instead of food and she's taught me to appreciate beauty for beauty's sake alone. But most of the food we grow comes from flowers too. Can you identify these flowers from edible plants?
Answer key: 1. chamomile 2. cucumber 3. elderberry 4. pattypan squash 5. potato 6. sesame 7. tobacco 8. tomato 9. seed poppy
Lil doesn't have much patience for gardening some days because "it's all about vegetables!" She plants her garden in flowers instead of food and she's taught me to appreciate beauty for beauty's sake alone. But most of the food we grow comes from flowers too. Can you identify these flowers from edible plants?
Answer key: 1. chamomile 2. cucumber 3. elderberry 4. pattypan squash 5. potato 6. sesame 7. tobacco 8. tomato 9. seed poppy
I saw plenty of unfamiliar produce at farmers' markets in Hawaii. Often I ask farmers what to do with strange items but when I purchased the above taro root from a non-native English speaker, I didn't receive much guidance. My family was suspect of the taro after eating poi and I wanted to show them it could be tasty so I employed my five step plan to enjoy an unfamiliar vegetable:
1. Raw - I taste everything raw to see what the initial characteristics are like. In the case of taro our tongues were coated with thick starch and not much other flavor. I knew this meant we had to cook the taro for a good while to break down the starch and add heavy seasoning to trick our tastebuds.
2. Steamed - A quick steam is a good way to enjoy vegetables whose initial raw taste has good flavor. I suspected that taro would take a long time to steam thoroughly so we skipped this step.
3. Boiled and Pureed - Most root vegetables taste good when boiled in salted water. Puree with a little butter if the texture is off putting. Peas, beans, and leaf vegetables can also be quickly boiled and added to purees. I meant to try boiling taro but ran out of space on the range.
4. Oven Roasted - Nearly all produce, including fruit, taste sweeter after a trip in a hot oven. Toss the raw product with a little olive oil, salt, and pepper (or brown sugar in the case of fruit) and cook until caramelized. Roasted taro mixed nicely with potatoes prepared the same way.
5. Fried in Bacon Fat - When all else fails, pull out the big guns: bacon drippings. There is precious little that doesn't taste amazing when fried in bacon fat and indeed the taro was more than palatable this way. To completely cook the starch, we fried each half-inch side for five minutes.
What do you do when you come across an unfamiliar vegetable?
Please excuse the poorly lit photos. Despite ample outdoor light for some reason I chose to take pictures in the kitchen. I blame it on the mai tais.
I opened a can of aphids (gardeners like worms, so we wouldn't be scared of a can of worms!) when I asked on Facebook what challenges and questions fellow gardeners have. There are so many I'll do a few Garden Q&A posts. Feel free to add your questions and answers in the comments!
In Ohio, we're well into the summer planting season. Gardeners are free to plant seedlings and summer maturing seeds.
Every gardener should test their soil and amend as necessary to insure the best results. If you grew tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, or potatoes in a particular bed last year, try to rotate to a nitrogen fixing plant like beans to renew the soil. Otherwise, be sure to amend with nutritious worm castings.
For best success, buy seedlings for the following plants: tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, okra, and herbs. Plant seeds for beans, peas (though it's too late for those in Ohio this year), squash, cucumbers, lettuce, radishes and greens.
You want to allow just enough spacing for a plant to grow to maturity without leaving too much room for weeds. Greens, lettuces, radish, and carrot seeds can be planted every 1-2 inches. Space herbs 4-6 inches apart. Plant bean seeds 2-4 inches apart and squash every six inches. Broccoli (pictured above with sandal spacing), cabbage, tomato, pepper, eggplant, and okra seedlings should be spaced every 10-12 inches as they will easily grow to take up that much space and possibly more.
Even though it looks goofy, I advocate for setting up cages and supports very soon after plants sprout. It is easier to train a plant inside a cage than to add a cage later when it can damage leaves. For tomatoes, bury a large cage deep in the soil or put heavy duty stakes on either side of your tomato row and run wire between and around the stakes for support. We often add stakes later as plants need it.
Bean, peas, cucumbers, and squash can be trained to climb up a fence, bamboo teepee, crossed branch trellis, or even an old wire matress frame. The most important part is to bury stakes deeply so they will support the plant as it grows.
My best advice for rodents is to get a big dog. Really, Devie is the only thing that scares away the squirrels with any regularity. She does like tomatoes and peas off the vine herself, so we have to fence our raised beds to keep her out of them!
If a noisy dog is out of the question (believe me, the barking at every little thing is annoying), you can try sprinkling cayenne pepper around the beds as some digging rodents will be deterred by the spice.
Removing any other potential food or housing source is another way to deter rodents. Stop feeding birds near the garden, as mice and squirrels are attracted by bird feed too. Keep compost and wood piles away from vegetable beds because they house rodents.
I generally see two kinds of insects in my garden - legged beetle-type bugs and crawling caterpillars. Both tend to eat the leaves and young fruit of my future food. Many gardeners hand pick largest pests like caterpillars and slugs, killing them in a jar of soapy water. Lil likes to find slugs and grubs to feed to Austra - the better for my garden and my eggs!
For leggy pests, spray the plants with a dilute solution of Dr. Bronners lavender or mint soap, 1 teaspoon per 16 out spray bottle. This makes it hard for beetles to crawl on the leaves and they will find somewhere else to live.
Crawling caterpillars and slugs can take out a whole plant overnight. I combat them by sprinkling diatomaceous earth (DE) on the leaves and around the soil. Diatomaceous earth is the sharp silicon shards of ground up diatom fossils that cut through the skin of insects without an exoskeleton. It is safe for humans and pets to consume, even, though during application gardeners should wear a mask as DE is a fine dust that can be a breathing hazard.
Introducing beneficial insects like ladybugs and praying mantises will result in the 'good' bugs preying on the 'bad' one. The most fail-proof, but costly, way to avoid many of these pests is to install row covers or grow in high houses or high tunnels.
The Mother Earth News article 'Organic Pest Control' provides specific recommendations for the top twelve harmful garden insects.
Eight hundred words on six questions seems like enough for today! I'll answer more questions about pruning, containers, and anything that comes up in the comments next week. If you're planting a garden for the first time, don't forget about my free Grow Your Garden ebook - it covers all the basics.
Please join the conversation - do you have innovative solutions to these questions? Or more garden challenges? Leave a comment.
The USDA recently updated their Plant Hardiness Zone maps. The new map reflects that warmer temperatures allow less-hardy plants to survive Ohio winters. Columbus (and most of Ohio) is now in Zone 6a, an upgrade from Zone 5b. Not in Columbus? Check out the interactive map to find your Zone.
It must be noted that the Arbor Day Foundation came to the same hardiness zone conclusion in 2006. Both groups say that this is not necessarily a reflection of climate change but better data mapping. I think it must be a combination of climate change, heat island effect, and natural variability.
What does this mean for fruit and vegetable gardeners?
First, some annuals can now be grown as perennials. Many herbs such as rosemary, thyme, and oregano will pop up in the spring and not require re-planting. Greens allowed to go to seed may reseed themselves.
Some fruit trees previously thought to be too difficult to keep through the winter may now be planted outside. Fig trees may grow more successfully with lessor no cool weather care. Peaches, nectarines, and cherries will have a better chance of setting fruit.
The Zone reclassification means that our last-frost date edges towards the beginning of May and the first-frost date more towards the end of October. I have long planted annuals outside starting on May 1. Cold-weather crops like kale, swiss chard, peas, lettuces, and beets, can be seeded as early as April 1.
Essentially, gardeners can move everything up a few weeks and hope to have a slightly extended season in the fall too. Sweet potatoes become a more likely success. It may be possible to fit in more succession plantings of beans.
Personally, this rezoning will not change my garden habits much as I am already accustomed to pushing the planting dates a bit. I may, however, finally plant our very overgrown potted fig tree outside this year.
How will the new Zone affect you?
Most annual vegetables send out flowers. It's their way of ensuring their own reproduction. The home gardener must manage flowers, tending the ones that will develop into fruits we want and removing those that distract the plant from its functions.
Leave the flowers on these plants, as they develop into vegetables:
tomato
cucumber
pepper
eggplant
peas
beans
squash, including zucchini, acorn, and pumpkin (a special case, as the blossoms are edible but if you eat them all, no squash will grow)
Remove the flowers on these plants, as their desirable leaves will bitter if flowers are allowed to bloom:
greens including spinach, kale, mustard, bok choi,broccoli raab, and lettuces
radish
herbs including basil, cilantro, thyme, and mint
Harvest from these plants before they go to flower:
broccoli
cauliflower
brussel sprouts
These flower stems are edible in addition to their root. If you do not remove these, the plant may use energy producing flowers at the expense of making root bulbs:
garlic (picked as curlicue scapes shown above)
onion
The delicate potato flowers may be picked or left on the plant. Marie Antoinette is said to have enjoyed these beauties in her hair. They may pull a slight bit of water and energy from growing tubers, but I enjoy leaving their blooms in the garden.
Of course, you may grow these flowers as edibles:
sunflowers
nasturtium
violet
These lists are by no means exhaustive. Which flowering vegetables have I forgotten? Which do you have questions about?
Many of our plants have set flowers and baby vegetables are beginning to appear!
This is an exciting time to be a gardener. All the work starting the seeds, prepping the soil, planting the seedlings, and weeding are starting to pay off.
There is anxiety too. I am struggling to keep something (a squirrel I think?) from eating the flowers off the zucchini plant. I have seen it send out flowers many times but none stay around long enough to go to fruit.
My peas are a lost cause this year, it seems. Despite being covered in bird netting, sparrows have mowed down the leaves such that they never climbed their beautiful trellis. Only the peas in Lil's garden have set out a few pods.
What's going on in your garden?
The sun calls me outside; the bitter cold pushes me right back down into this chair.
Satsumas are acceptably tasty, but they are no garden picked pea, no sun ripened tomato, no dreamy sweet kale.
The dirt is frozen so I can not work it. My fingernails are dangerously clean.
Soon I will take up painting the walls of my house. The minerals will stick to my skin. The colors will change. I will occupy my mind until soul satisfying work begins again.