Perennial Vegetables

February 27, 2009

...out edible perennials until the publication of Eric Toensmeier’s excellent book, Perennial Vegetables: From Artichokes to Zuiki Taro, A Gardener’s Guide to Over 100 Delicious and Easy to Grow Edibles . We’ve got a few of the species Toensmeier mentions: artichoke, prickly pear cactus, stinging nettles, crosnes (more on those in another post) and goji berries. Edible Perennials contains growing information for each species offering something for ev...

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Why Lycra is a Bad Idea

Mr. Homegrown

April 1, 2009

Bikes

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Robert Hurst, author of the how-to book on how to ride a bike in the city, The Art of Cycling: A Guide to Bicycling in 21st-Century America says, “the thought of cyclists pedaling around in their standard everyday garb is heartening. The more riders who do this, the more obvious it will be to the general public that cycling is about straight utility in addition to recreation and exercise, an important point that has yet to penetrate the thick sku...

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Dookie in the Tomatoes

Mr. Homegrown

June 11, 2008

Gardening, Thoughtstylings, Vegetable Gardening

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...impossible for small family farmers to make a living. Read Joel Salatin’s book, “Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal” for more on how agricultural regulations are at the heart of our food safety problems. 3. Don’t wash produce until just before it is prepared. At it turns out, washing upsets the natural balance of harmful and beneficial bacteria present on fresh produce. Food microbiologist Keith Warriner has found that a beneficial bacteria calle...

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Borage (Borago officinalis)

Mr. Homegrown

March 30, 2009

Gardening, Herbal Medicine, Herbs, Vegetable Gardening

9 Comments

...pring after the last frost. Ours survived a winter outbreak of aphids, but is now thriving. We toss the flowers and leaves into salads as a flavoring. In fact we enjoyed a memorable borage spiked salad on a recent Greyhound bus trip to Las Vegas we took for a book appearance. Thankfully for our fellow passengers, we did not break out into a borage induced sweat. For more on the medicinal qualities of borage, including “dispelling melancholy” (usef...

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Our Footprint

Mr. Homegrown

March 14, 2009

Thoughtstylings

3 Comments

...e African would do a thousand times better. But anyways, many thanks to the nice folks at Low Impact Living and we’ll be using that hotel stay on our next book tour of San Francisco (travel via Amtrak and bicycle, for those keeping score)....

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