Wasatch Community Gardens Blog

I love the yearly plant sale put on by Wasatch Community Gardens. Even though we don't have a lot of space in our container garden we still end up coming home with a dozen plants.  The nice thing about that is we can use some of those plants as mother's day gifts and still benefit from them. I love the heirloom varieties of tomatoes. This year we picked up a Black from Tula, and a Ukrainian Purple, which we will probably keep for our little garden. We may pass on the Green Zebra, the Japanese Black, and the Kellog's Breakfast Orange. However I really like the Kellog's, so we may have to keep that one instead. What are your favorites?

Editor's Note: This is a guest post from Aspen Orton For many people, living through the winter months with a smile on their face can be a trial, if not nearly impossible. Not being able to traipse around outside with the grass between your toes and fragrant dirt under your fingernails can drop endorphin levels like the temperature in January. One way to beat back the winter blues is to start your own garden in your kitchen; yes, that’s right, your very own garden in the center of your home. Not every plant flourishes in the winter, inside or out. Herbs, by nature, are naturally resilient and can thrive just about anywhere, including the kitchen.  Herbs are also very low maintenance and can turn even the blandest meal or soup into a family sensation. A few winter herbs that don’t seem to mind the snow outside and the heater at full...

Hey, while we are talking about tomatoes (how to eat all those green ones, why they didn't produce well this year, etc.), I thought I'd talk a bit about what my wife, Karen, and I have found to still be eat ripe tomatoes in January.  First, we find it important to leave the stem on green tomatoes by cutting them off with clippers when harvesting them for storage.  Pulling the stem off often compromises the attachment, allowing other life forms a place to gain access and spoil the tomato earlier.  Second, we spread them out on multiple sheets of newsprint in a cool place so that they do not touch each other.  Sure they might ripen sooner in a warmer place, but then they are gone sooner. Plus, most of thelife forms that cause fruits to spoil multiply more quickly in warmer places, and will spread rapidly from tomato to tomato, especially if stored in a sack.  The ability to see all of...

So I learned something new recently. As I have mentioned in past posts, I live in an apartment, and have a small container garden out in back behind our place. And as I mentioned we tried to grow tomatoes there this summer. We got one, and then nothing until the end of the summer when we had an explosion of tomatoes. I didn't think they were going to get ripe before they all froze; that is how late they all came on. So, while talking to one of the farmers at the Sugar House Farmers Market I mentioned our tomato troubles. He asked if we had a couple of tomatoes, then nothing, and then an explosion of tomatoes. I was blown away that he knew exactly what I was talking about. Apparently I wasn't the only one with that problem this year. What happens is that there is a build up...

I have about a billion green tomatoes and Mother Nature isn’t exactly co-operating with me.  Over the course of the next couple days it will become time to clear out the summer bed and put it to rest with a good helping of compost. I have two options.  Feed the green tomatoes to my chickens {which they will love and isn’t exactly terrible because I will still enjoy them in egg form} or use them up quickly. Honestly, feeding them to the chickens sounds easier, but the Six Chicks will still love to peck the plants I tear out, so I really should get on it and make something delicious with those little green girls. [caption id="attachment_574" align="alignleft" width="182"] Fried Green Tomatoes Recipe By ezrapoundcake.com My first thought was, of course, Fried Green Tomatoes, but there’s only so much frying this family can handle.  Plus, I wanted to get adventurous and...

I am not talking about a garden grown under a cloche or in a green house; I’m talking about a garden grown totally exposed to the elements!  Of course, if you plan to “eat” food during the winter, then you will have to protect the plants from the cold.  But, if you only intend to get a huge head start on everyone else, including the bugs, then starting a early spring garden this fall is worth a try. Every year I start a garden plot of cold hardy veggies for harvest in the late winter or early spring.  Oh sure, occasionally that plot will fail, but most often it works great.  Last year’s early bed was outstanding!  By the time everyone else was just starting to plant their spring veggies my early bed was completely packed tight with veggie leaves growing over a foot high. Most gardeners think that it is...

No matter how many hours of  time you've generously given to Wasatch Community Gardens in 2010, be it 30 minutes or 300 hours, we want to see your lovely face at our Annual Volunteer Banquet to say thank you! Come in costume (or not) and bring a friend (or just yourself) to the annual volunteer banquet on October 28th at 7:00pm at the First Unitarian Church on 596 S 1300 E. We will have prepared some amazing soups, an epic slide show and will have lots of fun (we always do, don't we?). If you didn't know already, it's due to your help that all of our events run smoothly, our programs are possible and our gardens are beautiful. Seriously! There is only so much a small staff of a humble non-profit can do, and with your help we are able to teach more, weed more, harvest more, empower more, and...

Some of you know I inherited a chicken a few months ago.  She and all her egg-mates got attacked by a vicious wiener dog and she was the only survivor.  Her owner, my cousin, decided one bird wasn't worth keeping around so I offered to take her under my wing. At first she got along just fine with my other girls, but I think they became jealous {or hormonal} because they started attacking her when they began laying. Anyway, when she first came home we thought she was a leghorn.  But then she kept growing and growing and growing and didn't lay any eggs.  Turns out she was a Cornish Cross and at over 10lbs, she was getting dangerously large for her legs.   Long story short, {and sparing all the details} I learned how to transition her from eating my garden and lounging around the yard to the dinner table....

Hey, with fall rains comes 'shrooms poppin' up everywhere! Will they kill you if they eat them? Maybe. But, some of them are really great to eat. My wife, Karen, and I have been picking, eating, and preserving mushrooms for years. Sometimes they even come up in your gardens and lawns. What do you do? What we did is learn to correctly identify one "easy" mushroom, and then learned another. Now we realiably (=we're still alive) up to identifying over 30 species of fungi. It is easier than you think. North Americans seem to be "fungiphobiacs" - afraid of eating 'shrooms (actually afraid of anything), anyone recall the precurser South Park cartoon, "History of America"? If you can tell the difference between a deer and an elk, you can reliably learn to distinguish mushrooms, and discover an entire world of yummy, free food. I have provided a two page document for beginning...

The last time I went to the Tomato Sandwich Party, I was 8 or 9 years old. There's not a lot I remember about that afternoon 17 years ago...but I do remember the first time I tasted a tomato straight off the vine. At that time, I wasn't "into" tomatoes. Regardless of this fact, my mother guaranteed me that this garden-fresh tomato straight off the vine would be better than anything I could imagine. Believing my mother, I pulled the little yellow pear tomato off the vine, put it straight in my mouth and bit down. As the little pear tomato popped in my mouth, all I could think about was just how much it tasted like a tomato! There, in the middle of the Grateful Tomato Garden, I spit out that little tomato immediately...and then made gagging noises...and then continued to spit. All my mother could say was "how rude"...