Cook What You Grow With a Tiny Garden

From Live Well Nebraska.

"We deserve a pat on the back.

In general, we’re doing a much better job of eating local. But we can do better. We can grow our own vegetables.

“Galloping Gourmet” Graham Kerr has had a long career as a cooking and nutrition teacher, but he admits: “I have cooked just about everything that grows, but I’ve never grown a thing I’ve cooked.”

Kerr decided to start a garden plot and write about it. “Growing at the Speed of Life” (Perigee, $27.50) takes readers through the first year in Kerr’s kitchen garden.

You say your back yard is too small for vegetable growing? Or, you don’t have a back yard?

That’s no excuse.

You can grow potatoes, tomatoes or salad greens in a bag of potting soil, and most vegetables can be grown in containers, according to Rodale columnist Jean Nick. You can salvage old containers to use as planters: bushel baskets, wooden boxes, washtubs, plastic bags, large food cans, leaky buckets, garbage cans with holes, an old wheelbarrow, reusable totes, or the kiddie pool.

Green onions, radishes or beets can even be grown in a cake pan. They are fairly easy to handle and provide adequate space for root growth, according to the Texas AgriLife Extension Service.

The size of the container will vary according to the crop selection and space available. The container should be at least 8 inches deep, and you can cut or drill holes in the bottom so excess water can drain freely.

Pots from 6 to 10 inches in diameter are satisfactory for green onions, parsley and herbs. For tomatoes, peppers and eggplant, you will find that 5-gallon containers are the most suitable size; 1 to 2 gallon containers are best for chard and dwarf tomatoes. Adding about 1 inch of coarse gravel in the bottom of the container will improve drainage. The drain holes work best when they are along the side of the container, about - to -inch from the bottom.

Good soil is the single most important ingredient for a good garden. And raised beds give you an immediate advantage over a regular garden because you can fill it with a blend of soil that’s superior to the native soil in your yard. Soil that’s loose, and rich with nutrients and organic matter, will allow the roots of your plants to grow freely and will ensure that they have access to the water and nutrients they need to sustain healthy growth.

The National Gardening Association says to use only sterilized potting soil. Garden soil can contain diseases and might not be well drained. Because you’re planting in such a small space, you’ll have to be conscious of watering and fertilizing regularly. Water with drip irrigation or by hand whenever the soil is dry 4 to 6 inches deep.

Fertilize every two weeks with a water-soluble fertilizer for vegetables, or add controlled-release fertilizer at planting time, supplemented with a water-soluble fertilizer when needed. For large containers, mulching with straw or bark conserves moisture. One thing to keep in mind is that black containers heat up in the sun, and the plant roots don’t like that.

The amount of sun or light on your growing area is probably the most important limiting factor, according to Gardeners.com, so check out the light situation first, remembering that you can move the containers around to catch the sun if necessary.

If the amount of sunlight is limited, try lettuce, cabbage, kale, leeks, spinach, swiss chard and/or mustard greens (also herbs such as parsley and chives). Root crops such as green onions, beets, carrots and turnips need more light but tolerate some shade. With full sun (at least six hours) you can grow snap beans, cucumbers, eggplant, onions, peppers, potatoes, tomatoes and squash.

Each year, seed companies come out with new vegetable plant varieties that are suitable for container gardens. Look for key words like bush, compact and space saver. Information on planting a small back-yard garden is abundant on the Internet, and many sites will provide detailed instructions along with how much soil to buy, or how long the planks should be for a raised garden bed.

If that’s too strenuous, take a trip to a nearby farmers market.

Four on the floor

Here are four easy vegetable projects to try, grown right inside a bag of organic potting soil or a reusable shopping bag.

To get started, buy a bag of organic potting soil and cut a few drainage holes in the bottom of it, then stand the bag where you want to grow your crop. (Put it in a watertight tray if you don’t want to stain the surface beneath.)

Or use the largest tote bag you can find, or sew one yourself using breathable landscaping cloth. If the bag is not made of cloth, cut holes into the bottom and some into the sides to create good drainage. Fill the bags with well-draining potting soil, not soil dug out of the garden.

At the end of the growing season, dump the bag of used soil into a raised bed or a more permanent container, or spread it in a corner of your yard that needs it.

Potatoes

Potatoes are hardy, so it’s safe to keep the bag outside as long as the nighttime temperature doesn’t drop much below freezing.

Cut open the top of the bag. Tuck two small potatoes about 4 inches deep into the potting mix. If you live near a garden center, you might be able to buy “seed” potatoes; if not, or if you are looking for variety, try using a couple of small organic potatoes from your supermarket (potatoes that are already sprouting are ideal). Water to keep the soil moist but not soggy. Feed with a liquid organic fertilizer or compost tea (the liquid from soaking compost in water) every few weeks.

When flowers start to pop up on your plants, pull out a few “new” potatoes by rooting gently around in the soil with your fingers. Or harvest the whole lot any time, before the plants start to turn yellow. Harvesting is easy: Just tip over the bag onto a sheet of plastic and pick out the fruits of your labor (no digging required). If you have space, you might want to start a new bag every few weeks from very early spring through early summer, to extend your harvest.

Tomatoes

Prepare your grow bag as noted above, then insert two or three tall, sturdy sticks into the potting mix along one edge of the bag. Push them down to the bottom (be careful not to tear the bag). They should stick out of the top of the bag by 3 or 4 feet.

Plant a single tomato seedling near the center of the bag, leaving just the plant’s top four leaves and growing tip peeking out of the soil. The buried stem will send out masses of roots, and your little plant will really take off.

Tomatoes do not like cold weather, so wait until nighttime temperatures consistently stay above 40 degrees before you move your bag outdoors. Should a late frost threaten, toss an old sheet over the stakes to protect your tender sprouts. Water and feed as for potatoes. Use twine or strips of cloth to tie the vines to the sticks so the plant will grow upward.

Salad greens

Lay the bag on one of its flat sides and poke drainage holes all over the top. Flip it over onto the now-holey side, smooth the bag fairly flat, and use a sharp knife or scissors to cut out a rectangle about two-thirds the size of the top of the bag.

Plant lettuce, spinach, radish or other seeds in the exposed soil mix, following their packets’ instructions. Water and feed as for potatoes.

Harvest just the outside leaves of the plants to extend your yield. As the plants keep growing, you can keep harvesting. Or plant a seed or two when you remove a whole plant, so you’ll reap another round of greens. You can start growing greens (and radishes, too) in very early spring, as soon as the nights don’t drop much below freezing. Greens appreciate some shade in the heat of summer, so during the hottest months, you might want to move your salad bag to a shady spot.

Sweet potatoes

Sweet potatoes require a long growing season, about 100 to 140 days, and they need lots of soil space to grow. Fill the largest tote bag you can find with well-draining potting soil, not soil dug out of the garden.

The plants themselves are produced from cuttings called slips. You can make an unlimited number of slips from a single sweet potato bought at a market or organic food store. Start making them in early spring, about a month before the last frost in your area, so you can meet the plants’ long-season demands. Simply stand the potato in a jar of water so about a third to a half is submerged. Set it in a sunny windowsill, where it will form little shoots and leaves within a few weeks. When the shoots are about 6 inches long, carefully twist or “slip” them off of the potato.

Some gardeners put these slips into water or very wet sand to produce roots before planting, but the rootless slips can be placed directly into soil. The trick is to keep the soil moist (not soggy) and the bag or pot out of the hottest sun until the plants are established.

About two or three slips are all you need for a typical tote bag. Don’t forget that sweet potatoes are tropical and do not like cold weather or frost. Wait until well after all danger of frost in your area has passed before setting the plants outdoors.

Just before the first frost in the fall, turn the bag over onto a plastic sheet, or dig out the tubers.

Source: Rodale.com

Starting from seed:

Once you decide which herbs and vegetables you would like to plant, start your seeds in plastic shopping tote bags. They work as a natural greenhouse, trapping sunlight and moisture, which gives your seeds what they need to start growing.

Assemble your collection of seeds, and decide how many tote bags you’re going to need.

Pour some fresh potting soil into the tote bag, then plant your seeds. Water and fertilize as you normally would.

Hang in a dry, sunny spot.

When your plants are big enough and it’s warm enough outside, move them outdoors and replant them in a raised bed."