Show me your garden!

[neatokimmo]

Our garden is starting to produce. Nothing makes me happier than picking pounds and pounds of organic package free produce from a $1 seed packet. It is the ultimate budget helper.

This is our third year so I am still a newbie. We are very good at growing radishes, cucumbers, tomatoes, and lettuce. That’s about it. This year we branched out to other things and I hope we make it work so I have more variety. My goal is to grow 365 pounds of vegetables this year, about half of what we eat for dinner. In a perfect world I’d grow like 1000 pounds and go vegan. A girl can dream.

So let’s talk garden. What you’ve done right or wrong and how much money are you saving?

These are our Philadelphia white radishes. It’s the first time I’ve ever grown radishes and they are so easy. The leaves are milder than collars, almost a kale flavor. The radishes are crazy spicy hot. I dice and cook a piece of bacon, then slice and fry the radishes and tops. Very good!

 

[Jaime4004]

I love my garden. And I'm also a lazy gardener. My favorites are the things I plant once and they pop up every year - asparagus, strawberries and raspberries. I also love planting potatoes, another easy one. Besides that, I do tomatoes, peppers, hot peppers, onions and herbs every year to get a good supply of salsa and pasta sauce. Green beans are easy too. I plant a lot of other things that sometimes work out, sometimes get eaten by critters. Deer are mostly stopped with a deer fence but the groundhogs would just lift it up and walk in, eating everything in site. We relocated them last year, hoping none come back this year...

 

[imbatman]

*raises hand* Another lazy gardener.

Tomatoes are super easy here, as are zucchini. They super produce and it gives me enough to can the tomatoes for the winter (I use a pressure cooker to make that part speedy). I shred and freeze the zucchini.

Even lazier, I go to the farmer's market. I love supporting our farmers.

 

[Queen of the WDW Scene]

Planting is taking place today so won't see much for a bit...

 

[neatokimmo]

I love my garden. And I'm also a lazy gardener. My favorites are the things I plant once and they pop up every year - asparagus, strawberries and raspberries. I also love planting potatoes, another easy one. Besides that, I do tomatoes, peppers, hot peppers, onions and herbs every year to get a good supply of salsa and pasta sauce. Green beans are easy too. I plant a lot of other things that sometimes work out, sometimes get eaten by critters. Deer are mostly stopped with a deer fence but the groundhogs would just lift it up and walk in, eating everything in site. We relocated them last year, hoping none come back this year...

You have a good variety. We are putting in an asparagus bed as soon as possible. I think I might splurge and get crowns when they are back in stock so I can pick it sooner. Waiting two years is going to be hard.

 

[neatokimmo]

*raises hand* Another lazy gardener.

Tomatoes are super easy here, as are zucchini. They super produce and it gives me enough to can the tomatoes for the winter (I use a pressure cooker to make that part speedy). I shred and freeze the zucchini.

Even lazier, I go to the farmer's market. I love supporting our farmers.

As of right this minute, we don’t have squash bugs and I have beautiful zucchini plants. I have two blooms, that makes me really happy. Last year we lost every single plant.

 

[neatokimmo]

Planting is taking place today so won't see much for a bit...

We are still planting containers. Our neighbors have been spring cleaning and putting them at the road for pickup. I have collected over 150. Half are little but those are great for herbs.

 

[Tygerlilly]

I'm super late doing mine, but I'm hoping to at least get some tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers this season. My goal is to try and produce enough to get some spaghetti sauce and salsa made up and canned (never tried that before, so it's an all new adventure for this girl).

 

[neatokimmo]

I'm super late doing mine, but I'm hoping to at least get some tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers this season. My goal is to try and produce enough to get some spaghetti sauce and salsa made up and canned (never tried that before, so it's an all new adventure for this girl).

Our paste tomatoes didn’t sprout, I am going to try again. I’d be thrilled to can a bunch of sauce.

 

[imbatman]

As of right this minute, we don’t have squash bugs and I have beautiful zucchini plants. I have two blooms, that makes me really happy. Last year we lost every single plant.

Me too, but ours was from a drought. We were fined if we went over our water allotment. So, no veggies last year.

Our paste tomatoes didn’t sprout, I am going to try again. I’d be thrilled to can a bunch of sauce.

I can never get tomatoes to go. I buy the started plants and go from there. This is the first year I've used starter zucchini. I have a bunch of blossoms, so that means lots of zucchini bread!!!

 

[OrangeBirdGirl]

We're pretty lazy gardeners. We have a very small maybe 2' x 4' section. Years past we've had good luck with various peppers, especially Thai chili. This year none of the hot style peppers as I have so much from years past. Tried bell peppers this year; 1 each of red, yellow and green. Then 3 Asian beans (they somewhat look like green beans) not sure what these will taste like as never tried before, but plants looked good at greenhouse.

 

[loves to dive]

I'm too lazy to grow vegetables and since we live in a subdivision they would have to be in containers. I do have a nice rose garden though. I put in a new bush every year. I had it up to about 7 bushes then our dumb neighbor planted some diseased ones and it ran to my garden so I had to dig every single one of them up and start over the next year. Now I have about 7 in there. This was last year when they had just started blooming

There are different color blooms on a few of the buses because our bumble bees are happy. That is a big ole butterfly bush in the background.

 

[EscalatorKid]

I just planted my peppers and tomatoes. I have sweet banana peppers for my mom, jalapenos, habaneros, and hot Hungarian wax banana peppers. I make jalapeno jelly and refrigerator pickled peppers each year and they're delicious.

I'm fortunate to live in an area with a very large produce market that has a lot of local produce in the summer and fairly good quality suppliers in the winter. They also have good quality meats and deli counter, so I don't have to venture too far for most things, so my garden is pared down to the minimum. I do buy my plants from this store's greenhouses as well. $20 in plants in May and I get several harvests in very late July, August and September.

Also, I live in the Buffalo-Niagara region so our growing season is very short. I get whatever I don't grow at Farmer's Markets and the local Produce store.

 

[neatokimmo]

I am 2-3 days away from my first cucumber picking. I am very excited

We are letting our last few white radishes go to seed. Our red radishes sprouted, then didn’t produce the ball part. I am thinking about pulling the greens for salads and trying something else there.

 

[neatokimmo]

I spoke too soon, look at what I found in the bottom of our raised bed!

I weigh all the stuff we pick so I can figure out the biggest bang for our space.

 

[AnnaS]

We have some vegetables. DH does the planting/is the gardner. We have the long Italian squash (Cucuzza/I call it the baseball bat), tomatoes, eggplants, string beans (two varieties), cucumber, lettuce, herbs (plenty of basil). I am not sure if he planted any peppers this year. Some he plants seeds and some are plants bought. We also have fig trees (they died after this winter/cut them/started to spruce up again at the bottom). I need to ask him if he can plant asparagus (maybe next year if it's too late).

 

[leahgoogle]

I have 2 small raised beds each 4 foot X 4 foot. I just planted last week so nothing is ready yet. I have great luck with green beans, radishes and carrots. I haven't been successful with cucumbers or zucchini. Not sure why. Maybe not enough water?

 

[Tygerlilly]

I make jalapeno jelly and refrigerator pickled peppers each year and they're delicious.

Would you share your recipes? Those both sound really good!

 

[neatokimmo]

I have 2 small raised beds each 4 foot X 4 foot. I just planted last week so nothing is ready yet. I have great luck with green beans, radishes and carrots. I haven't been successful with cucumbers or zucchini. Not sure why. Maybe not enough water?

Our cucumbers love water. We got the ten pound mark this morning, five of that was today.

 

[EscalatorKid]

Would you share your recipes? Those both sound really good!

I use Ball's jalapeno jelly recipe:

https://www.freshpreserving.com/jal...no-recipe---ball-fresh-preserving-br1247.html

As for the peppers, I'll dig out exact ratios tomorrow, but it is basically just white vinegar, filtered water, canning salt, and white sugar. I stuff the jars with pepper rings and several garlic cloves each (halved, sliced, or whole). I boil the vinegar mixture and ladle into the jars. (I've also poured the vinegar mixture into a bowl of peppers and then filled jars. Either way.)

I put lids and rings on and store in the fridge. No processing and the peppers stay relatively crisp. They say they're good for three months, but I've eaten them for about nine months after processing.