“Eat your greens.” How many times did you hear that as a child? If I had a dime for every time I sat in front of a cold plate of broccoli in
protest as a kid, I’d be a wealthy woman. Now, that has all changed.
I love Swiss Chard! I admit, the residual resistance to wilted green things put me off trying Swiss chard until someone gifted me with a bouquet of it a few years ago (yes …
At the end of the LA Garden show earlier this spring, my booth neighbor and fellow Gardenerd, Nysha Dalgren of Ardenwoods Edibles let me choose a plant or two to take home. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to try something new, and a the tiny tendrils of a Christmas Lima Bean plant were calling out to me.
When I got home, I tucked the plant in behind a …
It might seem crazy to grow something in the garden specifically for one dish, but when it comes down to it, there’s something to be said for seeing a meal
through from start – as in seedling – to finish. This is the case of our poblano peppers.
We grew poblanos for one reason and one reason only – to make chile rellenos. Not that I even knew how to make them, but it was about time to learn.
…
Now that summer has come to a close (not that you could tell with all the hot weather we’ve been having lately), harvest season is upon us.
As part of our harvest plan, we built a solar food dryer in order to alleviate some
congestion in the freezer.
We’ve over our heads in leeks right now. The fridge is full, and the freezer is already full of batches …
You’ll find them in Indian food, hearty soups, and as a ubiquitous staple of the salad bar at Soup Plantation, but you might not know how good they really are until you’ve cooked them yourself.
Garbanzo beans, also known as chick peas, are usually undercooked when you buy them canned, and certainly don’t hold a lot of flavor on their own (kind of like tofu), but they are a great base for
many dishes and very satisfying to grow.
We experimented with growing garbanzo beans in our test …
Recently I finished teaching another round of classes at Santa Monica College’s Continuing Education Program, during which the students
planted a few seeds in plastic pots to take home with them. They planted either carrots, green onions or radishes (small plants that would do well in 6″ pots). They eagerly awaited for the
first signs of sprouting and enthusiastically reported back in the third or fourth week of class, “I have carrot sprouts!” I love seeing …
This is my second year growing quinoa, and it occurred to me that I hadn’t documented the process yet. So – without further delay…
How to grow quinoa:
The first thing you need to know is that while quinoa seed heads are covered in saponin (a natural soap that keeps birds from eating them), the seeds that you plant are somehow going to be
completely appetizing to birds in …
This past Saturday, August 7, was our very first Summer Potluck and Seed Exchange.