What’s Growin’ On

Read more about the article Bounty in Budapest

Bounty in Budapest

Traveling as a vegetarian has never been too much of a challenge for me.  Mostly because I eat dairy, so where there is bread and cheese, I am fine.  Recently, however, during the planning of our upcoming trip to Hungary to visit my husband's father, I began to worry about whether or not I would be able to eat in Budapest.  Rumor has it, and my husband confirms, that there are little to no vegetables to be found (which would explain why a salad is called a "vitamin salad" in Hungary).  Meat is either boiled or fried - deep fried ...

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Strawberry Harvest

Returning from any vacation is always a little bittersweet.  While there is an excitement to be home again, with all the creature comforts, there is the sadness of leaving behind the romantic notion of foreign travel.  With gardeners, there is also a fear in the back of the head that makes us worry whether our plants will be alive when we come back.  Ironically, I have found that most of my plants do better when I'm not around.

Yes, it's true - with the help of automatic irrigation, my zucchini plant has done better in the two weeks I've been ...

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Read more about the article Our Landscaping Project – Part 2

Our Landscaping Project – Part 2

We had a flurry of jackhammers and 3-foot deep trenches in recent weeks.  New plumbing (for proper drainage away from the house) and a sump pump were installed.  We also had irrigation to all the major watering areas installed. 

Here's something very nerdy and exciting: My raised bed garden now has drip irrigation in each of the raised beds, each with a separate zone and the capacity to set different watering times for each bed!  Fancy and possibly unnecessary, but we couldn't resist the chance to experiment with such a personalized watering system.  There is a spigot in each bed, with a ...

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Read more about the article Monster Green Onions

Monster Green Onions

Today I spent a good few hours cleaning up the summer garden, in preparation for our upcoming fall growing season.  Sometimes it takes these dedicated hours in the garden to notice things that haven't quite caught your attention before.  Like the massive green onions growing in the middle of the pumpkin patch that seem to have gotten away from me. 

When I say massive, I might be exaggerating, but most people walk by my plot and say, "nice leeks" when they see them.  I guess there's something about our American mentality of bigger is better that made me leave ...

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The Great Cannellini

Last night at the Santa Monica Library, where I was giving a lecture on organic vegetable gardening, someone asked what my biggest gardening mistake has been so far.  Well, there are about a hundred to choose from, but the one that stood out is a mistake that's going on in my garden right now. 

See, I knew what bush beans were, and I knew what pole beans were, but I didn't exactly know what "runner" beans were until now.  I planted Italian heirloom Cannellini beans about as far away from my trellis as possible, thinking that they were ...

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Read more about the article Our Landscaping Project – Part 1

Our Landscaping Project – Part 1

Some of you may know that we bought the house we live in a couple of years ago.  It took almost a year to renovate, and we finally moved in last April.  Now that we've been living in the house for a year - and tackling indoor projects as well as building the raised bed garden, it has come time to give some much needed attention to the outside of the house - namely the front and back yards. 

We have been scheming and planning for awhile now, and interviewing contractors.  We found a great landscape designer who could ...

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Read more about the article …3 Potato

…3 Potato

It's harvest time for potatoes.  For those of you who missed the previous entry about our potato growing project this year, click here to read all about it.  We continue here with part 2: potato harvesting.

It begins with a glance.  Just as one tries to avoid looking at roadkill while driving along the highway, a gardener tries to avert her eyes from dying potato foliage in the garden.  The anticipation is too great.  The promise of comfort food is too palpable to stave off the desire to investigate withering branches.  "Just a little longer," we say to ourselves, trying to ...

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Read more about the article Re-purposing a Lawn

Re-purposing a Lawn

Last week something happened to Sandy Young's front lawn.  It got smaller.  Or rather, part of it became a vegetable garden. 

Sandy had been wanting to decrease her carbon footprint for awhile and decided that she could save some gas money driving to and from the grocery store (even though she already drives a Prius) by growing vegetables on her front lawn.  She had been entertaining the idea of ripping out part of her lawn, and after taking a class from the Gardenerd Organic Gardening Series, she decided to put what she learned into practice.  

Sandy is a do-it-yourself kind of woman. She already ...

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Read more about the article Building a Compost Sifter

Building a Compost Sifter

Back in the middle of winter, we purchased a subsidized compost bin from the City of Los Angeles.  Our Bio Stack has been hard at work in the back yard, thanks to my husband's new fascination with composting.  When I say fascination, I mean obsession.  He's become obsessed with adding kitchen waste and yard trimmings to the compost bin at any opportunity.  Forget about waiting until there's enough for a layer of green or brown.  Anytime the kitchen waste bucket is half-full, it's "time to feed the compost bin".  It's cute actually.  My husband has never really been ...

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