Edibles

Spring Brings Fava Beans - to Eat!

Like Sophia, I grow fava beans in my garden over winter, but instead of using them just as a cover crop like many gardeners and farmers do, my family eats them. We can hardly wait for spring as we watch the pods getting bigger and bigger. The tall plants are elegant and the white flowers are like giant pea flowers with black spots. The flowers are edible, and taste like raw peas (try them in your salad). Favas like cool weather so they do well in winter in our temperate California climate, even with frost.

Enjoy these simple recipes

Winter Gardening

It's winter time, and time to start sowing seeds for a winter harvest!

I have already prepared my winter garden. I first aerated the soil by digging it all up and turning it over. Then I added two bags of Happy Frog soil conditoner, and a box of Azomite which enriches the soil with minerals, and thus the vegetables as well. I purchased them both at Common Ground. I then turned the soil once more and the was ready for my seeds and plants.

I have sowed cosmic purple carrots, orach spinach (a wild type of spinach), and also planted some dionasur kale seedlings I bought at the farmers market. Unfortunately, now that it is winter, their stand is not at the Mountain View farmers' market.

I have also sowed fava beans and buckwheat for the purpose of them being green manures. Buckwheat does best when sown in the spring however, so I am taking my chances. The fava beans enrich the soil with nitrogen when you turn the fava bean plants back into the soil once they are about 8-10 inches high. Buckwheat must be turned back into the soil before they mature or else they will reseed. It is best to turn them in around 5-6 weeks (when flowering) after they have sprouted. The flowers are great for the bees and other native pollenizers.

It is also the best time to sow wildflower seeds and native plants - they love the rainy season!

I am also planning on sowing dandelion seeds, lambsquarters (a wild type of lettuce), cosmo-savoy lettuce, and some wheatgrass so I can make some wheatgrass juice!

Happy Winter Gardening! :) 
-Sophia

  
Micro Farming in Suburbia

Once we installed a raised bed for growing vegetables we found that we could easily use a few more. We loved our backyard beds so much that we removed the front yard lawn and added three planting beds with a surrounding herb garden.

Beds make veggie gardening so easy: fill it with nice compost rich soil and the plants thrive. It's also simple to control weeds, which are few, if any. Planting flowers among the edibles makes for lovely beds, and also attracts pollinators. Some may repel critters you want to discourage, like the cabbage moth.

 Colorful Zinnas, grown from seed, in the front yard bed.

Herbs also make good companions to the vegetable garden and add diversity: the photo below shows flowering thyme and calendula near these front yard beds which were planted with squashes, beans, eggplant, and peppers.

As a result our garden is lively with different types of bees and resident hummingbirds buzzing around. Removing the lawns and creating diversity in our suburban habitat attracted a myriad of birds that enjoy foraging among the plants. It's quite a show- I keep the binoculars handy.

 A colorful summer harvest.

 Edible flowers make a lovely salad: nasturium, borage and calendula.

All this fun and beautiful food too!