Vegetables
Can You Grow Food Indoors?
Author Kim Roman says, yes, you can. In her new book, How to Garden Indoors and Grow Your Own Food Year Round (Creative Homeowner, 2022), Roman gives encouraging and pragmatic tips for how to grow food indoors using hydroponic and soil-based systems. A gardening teacher and expert in square-foot gardening, Roman lives in Maryland (USDA…
Read MoreAsk a Master Gardener: Veggie Garden Clean Up
Hello and happy pumpkin spice season to those of you who celebrate! (I definitely do.) This summer went by quickly, but what could be better than pumpkins, hooded sweatshirts and fall colors? How about potato leek soup with frost-kissed leeks from the garden, or an entire stalk of brussels sprouts? I hope you’re savoring harvest…
Read More4 Zucchini and Summer Squash Varieties to Try
It’s late summer, and even though I’ve never been to your garden, I can predict this: it’s full of zucchini. If there’s one thing we can bond over as northern gardeners, it’s our ability to grow zucchini and summer squash in profusion. Every year it’s the same … we plant those seeds, then wait for…
Read MoreSlow Food Movement
The Slow Food Movement encourages deeper thinking around food. It links the pleasure of food with a commitment to community and environment. When we reconnect with systems that produce our food, we have an opportunity to make our current food system more equitable and sustainable. An important piece in changing the food system? Education. Slow…
Read MoreJuly Garden To Dos
July’s to-do list always starts with scouting for squash pests for me. Both squash bugs and squash vine borers usually show up right around the beginning of the month. Squash bugs lay coppery metallic eggs on the undersides of leaves—they’re easy to remove with duct tape. Then I put the duct tape in a bucket…
Read MoreAdd a Cold Frame to Extend the Season
While northern gardeners often use cold frames to give seedlings a jump start in spring, adding a cold frame to your garden can be helpful in fall, too. Positioned to catch the sun and keep vegetables warm, these beds can add weeks to your harvest season for greens, root crops and more. Cold frames…
Read MoreTips for Growing Garlic (and a Recipe)
This article first appeared in the September/October 2020 issue of Northern Gardener. Plant garlic this fall and thank yourself later as you enjoy fresh pesto, quiches and other garlic-filled dishes next summer. Growing garlic is easy and fun. Plant the garlic cloves outside in October so roots can develop before the ground freezes, and then…
Read MoreVegetables to Plant for a Fall Harvest
While northern gardeners typically think of March, April and May as the time for planting, July and August are also a great times to plant vegetables for a fall harvest. Many vegetables grow quickly enough that you can replant them for a succession planting or replace them with some quick growing plants. What can you…
Read MoreGrow Lettuce Longer: Tips for Extending the Season
Salads are a favorite meal in our home, which made growing lettuce a priority when space was carved out for a vegetable garden. It quickly became a favorite vegetable to grow, too. Homegrown lettuce, harvested and eaten straight away, is much more flavorful than greens from the grocery store. It is also a quick crop,…
Read MorePlant Profile: The Humble Radish
It’s springtime and that means it’s time to talk about one of the best (and sometimes overlooked) vegetables: the radish. As gardeners, we praise the merits of peas and pole beans and carrots and lettuce yet fail to truly appreciate the wonder of the humble radish. Radishes are found in a delightful array of colors…
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