After being inspired by the kitchen garden at Anne Hathaway's cottage in England, as well as the grand gardens at Hampton Court Palace, my family decided to plant our own humble vegetable garden chez nous. It's been a fun year with a major learning curve and boy, did we learn a lot!
We learned that we can grow gigantic zucchinis, great tomatoes, pumpkins (on accident) and... WEEDS.
In today's video, I take you on a mini-tour.
This video was shot back in July (on my birthday!) and since then, we've had some updates to the garden.
I discovered that what I thought was a melon, is actually a spaghetti squash! (Note to self: label the vegetables next time).
The butternut squash is coming in nicely. We grow squash well here! I'm looking forward to making soups, pies, and casseroles with the squash once fall is here.
We have some watermelon coming in too!
We also had our garden weeded out. It looks a lot better now.
Thank you for joining me for today's video. I hope it brings you joy.
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On Monday's blog, Refuse to be Dumbed-Down DETOX, Woman of the House writes, I have strong opinions about children and pop music. We do not do them any musical favors by submerging them in that style and genre. It ruins their voices when they try to imitate what they hear and it takes time away from learning the music they should be learning, such as traditional children's songs and folk songs. It also develops their taste for pop styles and it's hard to cultivate in them a taste for good music. This quotation from J.S. Bach sums it up well: "The best method of instructing youth, therefore, is to accustom them to what is good. The right understanding of it follows in time, and can then still further confirm their attachment to none but genuine works of art."
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Thank you for joining me for today's video. I would love to know... do you grow fruits and vegetables? Do you have your gardens under control? What's your secret? What are the things you grow best in your area? Let me know and your comment could be chosen as comment of the week on The Daily Connoisseur.
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13 comments:
Our garden is crazy too! You should make Ratatouille! It's even better the second day. Bon appetit!
1 can (28 ounces) whole peeled tomatoes (or 8-10 fresh, chopped)
6 tablespoons avocado or extra-virgin olive oil
1 large eggplant (1 pound) cut into 1-inch pieces
Coarse salt and ground pepper
2 large yellow onions (1 pound total) diced large
1 head garlic cloves smashed and peeled
2 bell peppers (any color) seeded and diced large
2 large zucchini (1 pound total) diced large
1 bay leaf
1 tablespoon fresh marjoram or oregano leaves
2-3 tablespoons red-wine vinegar
Step 1 Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place tomatoes and juices on a rimmed baking sheet and use your hands to break tomatoes into 3/4-inch pieces. Drizzle with 2 tablespoons oil and bake until thickened, 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes.
Step 2 Meanwhile, in a colander, toss eggplant with 1 1/2 teaspoons salt. Let sit 20 minutes, then squeeze out excess liquid. In a large Dutch oven or heavy pot, heat 4 tablespoons oil over medium. Add onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until translucent, 5 minutes. Add garlic and cook until onions and garlic are soft, 5 minutes. Add peppers and cook, stirring, until crisp-tender, 4 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
Step 3 Add tomatoes, eggplant, zucchini, bay leaf, and marjoram to pot. Cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture comes to a simmer. Reduce heat to medium-low, partially cover, and cook at a gentle simmer until vegetables are tender but not mushy, 15 minutes. Season to taste with vinegar, salt, and pepper. Remove bay leaf before serving.
Hi Jennifer, We live near Griffith Park and everything I plant just burns up from the sun and dry heat! I've tried countless times with a vegetable garden ... although, I confess I'm not very vigilant with gardening. It sounds like you are a bit like my mother who can just push a stick into the ground and it will grow into a beautiful plant :)
D.
Hi Jennifer,
I enjoyed your garden tour. I was going to say that honeydew looked to me like a spaghetti squash, but I see you have discovered that on your own : )
I always draw a little map of my garden and label what I have planted on it, along with the date, in case something does not come up (so I can try again). Sometimes labels in the actual garden get chewed up by the lawn mower, moved by children, etc.
For future reference, I believe you are supposed to harvest your zucchini by cutting it with a knife, leaving a bit of the stem attached.
Maybe next year you can try to mix some flowers in with your veggies - some flowers are helpful in repelling insects that want to chew on the vegetables.
Hi Jennifer,
You are doing all right, gardening involves a lot of experimentation. Please keep in mind that a veggie agarden will never look landscaped. Some veggies will grow more than others and every year will be different. However, if you really want to develop a tidier look, in winter time draw a planting scheme , placing the varieties you want in the most appropiate spot: tomatoes need sun and plenty of water while artichokes need shade. Zucchinis, cucumbers, melons and squash will take over large areas, while garlic and green onions won’t. Eggplants need also plenty of water, so maybe in one of the planters group these 2 and water that planter more often. Mint, rosemary, parsley, dill and other herbs-use containers. Mint tends to take over, also. I bought a spiralizer and all the zucchinis I grow end up as spaghetti that I freeze. I add a bag of zucchini pasta to soups as thickening agent or cook them as regular spaghetti. Healthy and delicious! With the extra tomatoes, I make my own fresh salsa. What we don’t get to eat, goes into the freezer. The cucumbers-I pickle them in brine, in summer time they’ll be done in 3-4 days. I could not believe that the 4 artichoke plants did so well in our climate and for a month, we picked 2 every day and had them for dinner. I just steam them and are delicious. They need to be planted more like 4 ft apart, in a shady spot. Their flowers are breattaking. Eggplants are also interesting, they don’t allow weeds to grow next to them because they use up all nutrients from the soil. You’ll need to rotate them in different spots every year, so the soil doesn’t get depleated. Peppers are pretty easy to grow. On those sticks you bought, try green beans. The tomato plants grow big and need a substantial support. They also need to be trimmed once a month of the extra branches, otherwise the plant will mostly feed the leaves rather than the fruits.
Enjoy gardening, it’s a process that will bring a lot of fun moments to your family!
Hi Jennifer. I really enjoyed this garden video. Your garden looks a bit like mine, but bigger. We also had surprise pumpkins this year, but I am not sure we'll actually get anything from it, since the gophers have been enjoying the plant a little too much. Have you heard of the Back to Eden gardening method? It is a low maintenance system created by a gardener who is a Christian. He gleans practical wisdom from Scripture in surprising ways to grow simply beautiful gardens. We tried it this year and last year and did almost no weeding and very little watering. There is a great (free) documentary about it on youTube. I highly recommend it!
Wow! Considering you were playing it by ear, I'd say you got a bumper crop! I know next to nothing about growing vegetables but this year we did a container garden for tomatoes (we did not fare as well as you) but we staked the tomato plants using twine (that might work for your twirly things) next year.
As for weeds in general, for my flower beds I just started using Preen (I don't think it would be a good idea for a vegetable garden, but you never know until you look into it). Before the weeds germinate you spread the Preen, water it and it pretty much keeps the weeds away for about 4 months (I was skeptical but it seems to work and doesn't damage the flowers/plants)!
Hi Jennifer, I enjoyed your garden video. You will get better every year and soon you'll know exactly what works best for you. Keep a few notes so you can remember what worked, what didn't over the years. You did really well this year considering it was your first spring in your new house and you are pregnant!!! Since you live in CA have you thought about planting a citrus tree?? I think my own lemon tree would be amazing but I live in SC and the winters are too cold. Thanks for sharing your garden.
Hi Jennifer,
Your children might get a kick out of the classic story, Too Many Pumpkins, by Linda White. They will be able to relate!
Every day, after harvesting what is ready, I take a picture of the bounty on my phone, keeping the pics in a "Harvest" album. So much fun! I live in Southern California and have found it necessary to water extra during our heat wave.
Kudos to you for taking the time to make a garden. Your kids are learning so much, including the concept of where their food actually comes from! Louise
Ladies, You have given me such great advice! The ratatouille, spiralizing the zucchini (we have even MORE zucchini now and they are enormous!), potting the mint, etc. I really appreciate all of your feedback and have enjoyed reading about your own gardens. Honestly, even since I posted this update on the blog, we have so many more veggies now. The pumpkins are numerous and enormous. The butternut squash is coming in fast and our watermelon is very large. It's been so rewarding to do this and I know next year will be even better now that we have learned from many of our mistakes. Thank you for watching. I'll see you tomorrow for a fun French perfume post.
With love,
Jennifer
I give you and your family credit! What an extraordinary experience to plant a garden and reap such a harvest on the first try! The surprise pumpkins will be so much fun to carve and decorate and the pumpkin seeds will be tasty treats for everyone (I usually soak them in slightly salted water before baking in the oven. They are so good).
It was wonderful seeing how your husband started the process with the raised planting beds and I really enjoyed reading the comments from others so I may actually try one next year since Roger's Gardens and Armstrong Nursery are close by to where I live and the former offers classes for small garden plots and patio or container herb gardens, too. I'd say you get the Greengrocer award in your area and thank you for the garden tour!
Creating a vegetable garden is not so easy. I created one with the help of my husband. I tried to follow the layout and division but it wasn't as easy as it sounds in an articles. I planted tomato and potatoes at first and then i moved to other options. When i see your struggle with vegetable garden planting, i recalled the time when i was doing the same. all the best
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