Gardeners design and plant their food gardens around what will be cooked and eaten at home. Using favorite family recipes for inspiration, a gardener easily can choose food plants the harvest of which will be used in the kitchen for dishes the family enjoys.
Tomatoes Peppers Garlic Cilantro Basil
A popular mix of plants; tomatoes, peppers, onions, garlic, cilantro and basil together make one sizable kitchen garden. From salsa to fixings for pizza, these vegetable and herb plants span the growing season and the range of popular family favorites.
Garlic cloves are planted as a bulb in soil that has been deeply amended with organic matter. Planted in fall, the garlic is harvested the following year when the green shoots have turned brown.
Tomatoes and pepper plants are warm season crops whether grown in the ground or in containers. Tomato and pepper plants are heavy feeders, as they need regular and thorough watering and fertilizing. Dwarf varieties fit into smaller spaces but full-sized tomatoes and peppers can be just as easily grown in containers and make better choices for cooking recipes needing the meaty contents.
Cilantro and basil take the least amount of space in a garden. Herbs grown in pots on a sunny windowsill indoors leave room outside for other bigger plants. Growing smaller vegetable plants in containers lets gardeners extend their kitchen garden with more variety.
Eggplant in Containers Cabbage in the Ground Zucchini Climbing
Jere and Emilee Gettle recommend a minimum planting of eggplant, peppers and tomatoes even for container gardens, in The Heirloom Life Gardener. Recipes useful for eggplant run the gambit from cake to eggplant Parmesan. Traditional eggplant needs space to grow so using a large container, for example a bushel basket, is not excessive. There are dwarf varieties like Hansel and Gretel, producing purple and white colored eggplants respectively, which will grow in smaller spaces.
Cooks like bell-shaped pepper plants for stuffing but prefer larger varieties for standing up in a baking dish. Miniature bell peppers are also used for stuffing and canning. As in Lucina’s Miniature Stuffed Peppers recipe reprinted in the 2012, Seed Savers Exchange Catalog from the new memoir, Gathering: Memoir of a Seed Saver by Diane Ott Whealy. The recipe uses the cool season cabbage vegetable and miniature sweet bell peppers.
Cabbage plants grow well in early spring and when replanted in fall, nicely end the growing season. Succession planting, replacing spots where cool season crops like cabbage and lettuce plants were growing with warm season crops such as peppers and tomatoes for the summer, is a good strategy when space is limited. Using the cabbage harvest for canning recipes will extend enjoyment of the harvest into winter.
Take advantage of space above a garden by growing vining food plants, add zucchini or squash plants to the garden and train the plant vertically up a trellis. Zucchini is a main vegetable ingredient in ratatouille and lasagna, as well as can be fried and served with marinara sauce.
Fruit Trees Provide Ingredients for Pie Recipes
From the cold North Country to low desert gardens, fruit trees are grown and harvested for the endearing pies and galette recipes made with fresh fruit. Case in point is the peach tree, Prunus persica. A singular peach tree can be the basis of a yummy dessert; the tree also gives structure to a garden design.
A small garden can be made with one Prunus persica ‘Redhaven,’ a tall sunflower plant like Miriam, purple phlox and leafy Swiss chard. A large barrel container growing blueberry plants or pumpkin vines extends the variety of fruits for pies into the fall holiday season.
No matter where fruit trees are planted, pruning them at the correct time of year and protecting the developing fruit from birds by covering the trees with netting should be an expected part of yearly plant care.
Favorite Recipe Collection to Build up a Vegetable Garden
A gardener looking for uniqueness in designing his vegetable garden should look no further than his collection of kitchen recipes. Over time, the garden can be made larger or succession planting techniques employed to cover many of the family’s dining-meal favorites.
A quick dip for artichokes is made by stirring up mayonnaise, balsamic vinegar, cracked black pepper and salt. That is, if one needs an excuse to grow the beautiful perennial foliage plant from which the artichoke is harvested.
Permission received for all photos used in this article.
Chris Eirschele - Chris writes on plants grown and gardens explored; she is a member of the Garden Writers Association.
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