Eat what you grow, grow what you eat.
This week the challenge reached nearly 97 participants and growing.
Belinda’s Simple Life shares with us another tasty zuke recipe made with homegrown and local ingredients. Thanks for continuing to share such great recipes.
Only one participant to highlight this week. Did I miss anybody or ya’ll just busy growing and plantings.
And that’s great….
Not only is this challenge meant to share meals and recipes, but we’d like participants to keep track of what they are growing, harvesting (in lbs per square foot), preserving and saving on store bought food. Write, post about your homegrown experience.
Care to share what’s in growing in your VICTORY GARDEN?
Let’s sow the seeds of victory this spring!
Our victory garden is still in the seedling and planning stages. We have onion, a large variety of tomato plants, garlic, lettuce, and parsley growing indoors right now.
We hoped to be planting peas this weekend, but with the 3-5 inches of new snow that is falling as we speak, we maybe off by a week or so.
We will be planting the full gamut of fruits and veggies as soon as we can work the ground and fill our beds with what is mostly frozen compost right now
[Reply]
Greetings Devin
Thanks for sharing your Victory Garden project. Wow, still snow! Amazing.
Sending thawing vibes your way.
Happy Spring!
Anais
[Reply]
We are growing 15 kinds of tomatoes to try this year. I bought all my seeds this year, but I’m keen on finding some great varieties to settle on for canning, drying and fresh eating. Then I will start saving seeds from year to year.
Most years we freeze gallons and gallons of tomatoes for cooking, but by the end of the summer our family will be living off the grid. I have been incredibly inspired by the book Preserving Food without Freezing or Canning: Traditional Techniques Using Salt, Oil, Sugar, Alcohol, Vinegar, Drying, Cold Storage, and Lactic Fermentation.
It changed the way I think about food preservation.
-robin
http://www.beautifuleachday.blogspot.com
[Reply]
There’s nothing growing in our garden yet here in MN, but this summer the girls and I are getting a community garden plot. We are really excited! The girls are big, big veggie eaters so hopefully this will make a dent in our grocery budget.
I think of you guys everytime Cheyenne sneaks a pint of cherry tomatoes behind the couch and eats the whole thing like it was candy or Bella eats an entire cucumber in a sitting. I’m pretty sure you’re yummy veggies are the reason they learned to like them so much.
[Reply]
We aren’t frost free until mid June, and even when the days are 60+ the nights will drop below 20f (high altitude). It can be hard to find spring crops. I’ve lost peas in late May to frost! But I’m a glutton for punishment, so I plant and replant if needed.
I make up for a short growing season by planting winter wheat in most of my beds. It’s done by mid to late June (just in time for planting summer crops) and I can take a cutting for the goats before it takes off in the spring. Plus it protects the soil. I just took my first cutting of wheat grass for my girls. Which is then turned to milk (and eggs, the chickens love it too) for us.
There are a few green things for us.The garlic is taking off so I can lightly harvest garlic greens. My “walking” onions are keeping us in green onions (they are usually ready to harvest in February).
I built a passive solar greenhouse last fall (the kind that heats your house) and there is just enough room to grow a few things all winter. I have peas, carrots, turnips, beets, lettuce, and radishes to harvest as needed. I also have my seedlings going in there. It’s only 16 feet long and 3 feet deep but it gives us some fresh stuff. Free heat and winter veggies, can’t complain.
I love spring!
[Reply]
I love the idea of the victory garden, especially since we are in a constant state of war, and yet there’s never been any sacrifices made by people, like those made during WWII. Anyway, we’re doing what we can with what we have here in Napa…and as I “reclaim” our nieghborhood by walking and talking with folks, a lot of people are frustrated with their unfree Lives and interested in more self-sufficiency.
I just harvested/foraged from a nieghbor’s combination navel orange and eureke lemon tree, about 200 lbs. of excellent organic fruit!! It was all going to waste! It’s sinful and should almost be a crime!! I always have my eye out for “waste” like that! I donated some to the local food bank, and have also shared the bounty with other neighbors. I’m blessed to have in my backyard, 3 excellent old English walnut trees, a very old mission fig, (which I take cuttings from to make new trees since the old one is in bad shape), and I still have to crack about 50 lbs. of those wlanuts from last Fall’s harvest…We just enjoyed some dried fig/walnut concoction I made…it kind of resembled a cliff bar style thing! Everyone liked it! I’ll share that recipe in a future posting. Bye for now, got to get into the greenouse to plant more seeds….
Ken
[Reply]
I ordered a victory garden packet from Heirloom seeds and they just arrived, I got busy right away starting my seeds and right now I have Black seeded simpson lettuce, spanish onions, brocoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts, dill, lemon balm, lavender, and colius started indoors, next week I am starting my tomatoes, peppers, summer savory, thyme,oregano and sweet marjoram. we are getting our raised beds ready and will be sowing some seeds directly into them as soon as they are ready!
we are stiil eating the things I put up from last year..peaches, applesauce, apple butter and spaghetti sauce but our supplies are dwindling!
I love reading your blog and I like to visit often, you are so inspireing! Thank You for all your efforts!
Annie
[Reply]
We’re moving this spring and it’s driving me nuts that I can’t do my usual spring planting! I live in an apartment in the urban East Bay. We are fortunate to have a 12′x14′ little yard. Every year I stuff it to the gills with anything that will grow in our hot, part sun environment, including zucchini, peppers, sunflowers, whatever. I always have a full herb garden going and even though I know it’s going to be torn out when we leave, I’ve gone ahead and put in tomatoes, lettuce and violas. We even have a couple of Coturnix quail back there and enjoy listening to their chatter throughout the day.
I love seeing that more and more people are planting and making use of the space they have. It’s amazing what you can grow in a small space!
[Reply]
Yesterday we got 6 inches of wet snow, today I transplanted seedlings into bigger pots. That’s Spring in Wisconsin! I love watching the little peppers, eggplants, and tomatoes pop up from seeds. In a couple of weeks I’ll start the next batch of seeds, and will set up the cold frame to begin hardening off some of these babies so they can survive outside. Last weekend I pruned grapes and my peach tree. I was very happy to see green wood – they made it through the winter!
Thanks for the lovely, inspirational photos. As always, your site is a favorite.
[Reply]
We finally at the first little meager fruits of our labor: a few herbs. (Pictures on my blog.) But even if it is just a little smidgen, it is always very exciting to eat something you grow yourself!
[Reply]
I have just got some tomatoes started from seed thanks to inspiration from you site. I bought seed for peas, basil, and lavendar as well but realized that I don’t have the funds to make enough raised beds for everything I bought so I am hoping to start them later. If they don’t work out it will have been a neat experiment. I also have two baby chicks in a birdcage in my living room until they are big enough to go outside. I bought pullets so my family should start enjoying some home raised eggs this summer. Two hens won’t completely supply our familys needs but I am hoping to be able to start another pair of chicks just as soon as these are big enough for an outside pen. Two is all I can handle in the house at one time. Working on our little “city farm” in baby steps.
[Reply]
I love the idea of the hundred foot challenge.
We are moving towards winter here in NZ, so it will be interesting to see how we manage with keeping us feed over a slower growing season.
We have spent about 20 months here proparing to be a self suffiecient as possible, and are almost on target to be 80% homegrown by the end of the year.
This is very exciting.
[Reply]