No vegetable garden; still thinking of homegrown
Melody | Wednesday, 28 March, 2007 at 6:56 AM
This weather in NC has been amazing lately. Balmy, then sometimes a smidge too warm, even. But something has shifted in my mind. The warmth of spring and approaching summer makes me start thinking about food. The healthy kind, that is. Garden fresh goodness.
Of course, I don't actually have a garden. A few years ago I tried my hand at it and grew some lovely tomatoes, and usually I'm pretty successful with the herbs, too. Sis and hubby had a gargantuan veggie garden for the past few years. (I'm told with their newest project - growing a whole person, not in the ground - they're not planning to till huge plots of land and plant rows and rows of veggies this year...who can blame 'em?) The photo here reflects some of their crop. Aren't those carrots a hoot?
There's no space here for a garden, anyway, but maybe tomatoes and herbs will be doable. You can grow things on a patio, no? I sure hope so. If not, there's always the farmer's market. And generous friends with too much. (Isn't that the best? Walking into an office or social function and having someone gesture to a table laden with farm-fresh tomatoes and saying, "We have way too much. Help yourself!"
Any suggestions, thoughts, recommendations for container gardening for yummy things to eat? Anybody else have any lofty plans to grow their food this year?
Reader Comments (5)
What are you talking about, growing food? Doesn't it just show up at the store, magically packaged by the food fairy?
Hey...I have an idea. You asked on your blog for some input about things you might take up so that next time you're called upon to tell others something they don't know about you, you could spring something big on 'em. (Or something.) My vote is that you secretly try and grow some stuff. Like herbs or tomatoes or something. Really and truly. Wouldn't that be a hoot??? And wouldn't it surprise everybody!? Including you, I know... I'm just sayin...
Oh, Melody -- have I got an exciting answer for you! Instead of growing the veggies yourself, support a local farmer who will grow them for you. It's called community-supported agriculture. I wrote about it a few years ago at the paper, and Shawn and I bought a share in a farm out in W.V. two seasons ago. Basically, each week, you get a bag of fresh, seasonal veggies that were picked THAT MORNING, and you can usually get things like an egg share or a fresh-flower share as well. The price was right, and often times, the farmer will send you a weekly e-mail with recipes and other things. Here's a link to the story I wrote, along with a Web site that will point you to local CSA farms in your area. There are quite a few around there.
Local Harvest (search for CSAs)
Gazette.net (written by moi)
I hope you're excited about this!
Wow, Sean! I've finally taken the time to peek at these links and just had no idea. Your article is very informative...quite explained things to me, and really resonated with some of my thoughts on how things should be. (Those same thoughts I usually ignore when I just pick up something quick at the supermarket.)
And perhaps even more exciting is the discovery of just how many CSA options there are in my local area. Here's the Local Harvest results for this area, specifically.
Truthfully, given my history with commitment-aversion, I'm more likely to just get back in my groove of picking up produce at the farmer's markets in the area, which I love. And maybe grow one or two things myself. But I'm going to put this in the back of my mind as something to give serious consideration to one day. Thanks again for sharing the concepts with my readers!
Well, in the spirit of full disclosure, we only did it for one season. We had a couple of reasons, the first of which is that it did become a pretty big commitment to drive into Upper NW and pick up the veggies. There was also a drought that year, and we certainly heard about it each week in the e-mails from our farmer -- he had a really tough season, and he ended up transferring a good deal of that stress to us. Still, for the first time in my adult life, I had a real connection to the food that I put on my table (I kinda grew up on my grandparents' farm, so I had too much connection then, especially when they put the cow and pigs down every year).
For some people, especially those who lean progressive like so many in your area, CSA is the route to go (as you can tell by the number of options!). And if we get one that delivers closer to our house in the city, we might even do it again.