Search Results for: label/seeds/page/7/2011/04/making-it

475 results

2011 in Review: The Garden

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
20 Comments
It̵7;s was a difficult year in the garden. A lead and zinc issue screwed up my winter vegetables garden plans. At least we managed to find some river rocks and put in a path. I found this photo from December 2010. I was certainly a lot more organized that year. For 2012, I̵7;m putting in raised beds to deal with the heavy metal issue and we̵7;ve already planted more native plants. But most importantly one of my New Years resolution...

Continue reading…

More on our gardening disasters

Mrs. Homegrown
Gardening, Mistakes, Thoughtstylings
15 Comments
We need to put the heart back into our garden. (Our Heart of Flax from way back in 2011) I thought I̵7;d chime in on the subject of this year̵7;s garden failures. Before I do, I̵7;d like to thank you all for your kind advice and commiseration that you left on Erik̵7;s post. First, I will agree that it really, truly has been a terrible year in the garden. Sometimes Erik gets a little melodramatic when it comes to the crop failure...

Continue reading…

My Favorite Lettuce Mix

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Seeds, Vegetable Gardening
7 Comments
...ding in the photo above, we need to eat some more salads soon. There̵7;s never been pest problems save for the edible, and aggressive, fennel seedlings you can see amongst the lettuce (memo to self: cut down fennel before it goes to seed this year!). And, at the risk of repeating myself, I pretty much grow Franchi seeds exclusively. It̵7;s a family run Italian company that dates back to 1783. This year I grew their “Misticanza All...

Continue reading…

Polyculture

Mr. Homegrown
Permaculture
11 Comments
Here at SurviveLA we are experimenting with something called polyculture in the the garden. We read about it first in the worthy permaculture guide, Gaia̵7;s Garden, by Toby Hemenway. Polyculture is the practice of planting a community of interrelated, interdependent plants, mimicking in your garden (in our case a raised vegetable bed) the complex relationships that are found between plants in nature. In the case of food crops, a polycultu...

Continue reading…

What to do with all those hot peppers: Harissa!

Mr. Homegrown
Food, Gardening, Recipes, Vegetable Gardening
13 Comments
Lyn, a reader in Canada with way too many hot peppers on hand, asked us what we thought we should do with them. We have the same problem here this year, an overabundance of very large, hot Italian Long Peppers. Thumbing through some recipe books we realized that we had all the ingredients to make Harissa, a spicy Moroccan condiment. The recipe is simple and quick. We cut open five of our hot peppers, discarded the seeds, and combined them in a f...

Continue reading…

Michael Tortorello on Urban Homesteading

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
4 Comments
...;The wonders of permaculture plus a jab at aerated compost tea. “Finding the Potential in Vacant Lots” Recent boom and bust cycles have left us with a lot of room to grow stuff. “Food Storage as Grandma Knew It“Tortorello actually tracked down some folks who have functioning root cellars. “The Spotless Garden“On aquaponics. Don̵7;t name those fish! “Making Flowers Into Perfume“ Build that still...

Continue reading…

Using Kosher Salt for Making Pickles

Mr. Homegrown
Food, Food Preservation
19 Comments
...t for fermented pickles, you must weigh out the proper amount.Weigh out 73⁄4 ounces (220 grams) of flaked salt, and you will have the equivalent of 1 cup of canning and pickling salt. This same publication also notes how easy it is to find pickling salt and how hard it is to find kosher salt. It̵7;s just the opposite here in Los Angeles. So what kind of salt do you use for pickling and fermenting? What̵7;s the easiest to find where you l...

Continue reading…

Saturday Linkages: Making Things and Herding Ducks

Mr. Homegrown
Saturday Linkages
1 Comment
...// lloydkahn-ongoing.blogspot.com/2012/08/inspir ed-by-sunray-kelley.html#.UCwiEif7Ek0.twitter  … Cooking and Preserving Canning 101: Learning to be Flexible http://www. foodinjars.com/2012/08/cannin Step Up the S̵7;more: 7 Ideas for Campfire Treats by Chris Rochelle: Chocolate Cake Baked in an Orange http://www. chow.com/galleries/315/ step-up-the-smore-7-ideas-for-campfire-treats-by-chris-rochelle/7324/chocolate-cake-baked-in-an-orange  …...

Continue reading…

A tasty Italian chard: Bieta Verde da Taglio

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
2 Comments
A few folks have written to ask what we̵7;re growing in our winter vegetable garden and we̵7;ve been late to reply. Since we̵7;re in USDA zone 10 and seldom get freezing weather here in Los Angeles, we can grow year round. One of my favorites this winter has been a Swiss chard variety from Italy called Bieta Verde da Taglio or “Green cutting chard”. Verde da Taglio has thin stems and thick leaves. It ain̵7;t as pretty...

Continue reading…

Nasturtium “Capers”

Mr. Homegrown
Food, Foraging
1 Comment
Nasturtium grows like a weed here at the SurviveLA compound. We don̵7;t water it, though if we did we might have a larger crop. The nice thing about Nasturtium is that the entire plant is edible – both the leaves and flowers have a strong peppery flavor and the flowers brighten up the Spartan salads we chow down on in the late spring. Once you plant this stuff, at least here in Los Angeles, the thousands of seeds it produces guarantee...

Continue reading…