The "Speedy" Vegetable Garden

For those of you who are kind enough to take time to read my "ramblings", you know that I absolutely love to grow vegetables.

So, when I heard of a brand new book called, "The Speedy Vegetable Garden", I just knew that I had to read it.

The publishers at Timber Press, were kind enough to give me a copy of the book to review and I must say, that I have already dog-eared more then 15 pages of things that I want to try in my garden.

What I really like about the book is that its focus is on growing vegetables and harvesting them within a relatively short time frame.

For example: I love to grow carrots.  But, I often get impatient and harvest a few carrots when they are still rather small.  Well, according to "The Speedy Vegetable Garden", very young carrots are sweet and delicious.  

So, I went out into my garden and harvested some young carrots and enjoyed their delicious sweetness in my dinner salad.  I love this idea because I can spread out the harvest of my carrots - I can enjoy some while they are about 6 weeks old and the rest later.

Another project that I am anxious to try is making sun-dried tomatoes using cherry tomatoes, which ripen much more quickly then large tomatoes.  

I also learned that very young radish leaves make great micro greens for salads.

I was also inspired to start another gardening project - growing potatoes in containers.

If these potatoes were in your kitchen, you'd probably throw them out.  But, seed potatoes are supposed to have sprouts growing ;-)

The last time I grew potatoes - I was a college student and we had each been given a piece of farm land to plant vegetables.  Since french fries was among my favorite foods at the time, I made sure that I included potatoes in my vegetable plot.

This time, I bought an inexpensive container with holes on the bottom for drainage, some seed potatoes and potting soil.  I filled the pot with 4" of potting soil, added 3 seed potatoes (they are really small potatoes), and then added 4 more inches of soil.  

I must keep them well-watered, but not soggy.  I will apply fertilizer as well.  Soon, green leaves will appear and I will cover them with more potting soil.  This cycle will repeat itself (adding more soil once leaves appear) until the soil reaches the top of my container.  In just 8 - 12 weeks, I will be harvesting my own potatoes.

I can hardly wait!

I encourage you to read "The Speedy Vegetable Garden" by authors Mark Diacona & Lia Leendertz.

Maybe your copy will become as dog-eared as mine ;-)

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