Here at Anna’s Therapeutic Garden, red orach, parsley, loveage, argula, and sunchokes performs well, growing all mixed together with newly emerging kales, chards, sunflower, winter squash, while spinach and chards goes to seed (July 2022).
Not the type of food you usually eat? Oh. Well, maybe you missed Part I; please read it here.
Below, I’ve started a list of food I’ve found so far that do grow in this climate; including some alternate food crops (such as sunchokes and orach) that once upon a time used to be nutritious staples of another people in another time. Thru trial and error, I have verified these are easy to grow. 😉
Please note that some of these food listed here might have some of the following qualities such as being: quickly perishable, knobbly and uneven, prickly, a bit labor intensive, or even denounced as a “weed.” It is for those reasons that you probably haven’t seen these items at the supermarket. They are still quite edible.
In fact, these alternative produce can actually be very delicious, nutritious, and; grown on a small, more immediate scale, very do-able. At the least, grow-able. By that, I mean there are these
Perks of Growing Native:
- no building raised beds,
- no greenhouses
- no coverings,
- nor stakings,
- neither do I mess around with hail protectors,
- nor with any season extending gimmicks,
- & with no irrigation or timers either (so far).
The gooseberry — after emerging from the drought-tolerant, prickly shrub all scathed and victorious –jam? Delicious.
And sunchokes? after washing out its knobbliness, diced and cooked in butter…. Yum!
The wilting nettles, picked with gloves, and yet fast losing its sting as you make your way to the kitchen? Super nutritious!
With the caveat there may be occasional minor inconveniences as these, here is my the foods I grow List. Hopefully not all of these are new to you; but if they are, . . . give them a consider. 😀
Leafy (salad/potherbs)
Along with the usual cool weather greens:
- Swiss chard,
- spinach,
- kales,
- tatosi,
- Sorrel
- Lovage (leaves and stalks)
- Orach
- Nettle
- Parsley
- Rhubarbs (stalks only)
- Prickly Pear
Berries
- Gooseberry
- Raspberry
- Blackberry
- Elderberry
- Currant
- Boulder Raspberry
- Service-berry
An observation: It is the tart berries that seem to tend towards being drought-tolerant and less susceptible to being picked off by wildlife. And a suggestion: get used to cooking your fruits with sugar.
Roots
- Salsify
- Parsley
- Sunchokes, aka Jersusalem Artichokes
- Greater Burdock, aka Gobo root
- Maxmillion
& just about any Alliums
- Nodding Onions
- Shallots
- Garlic
- Chives
- Garlic Chives
Note that I like a variety of smaller alliums as they do not require as much space, time, and watering as standard onions.
Hope this little primer has given you some ideas of what you can grow and adapt into your diet in order to eat right where you’re planted.
And don’t forget—
There’s also the “Weeds”
Most of these are great in mixed salads.
- Lamb quarters
- Purslane
- Red Clover
- Chickweed
- Amaranth
- Dandelion
- Mallow
- Burdock
& Don’t forget Flowers Either
Not a major food category, but they are definitely the spice. What salad is complete without some colorful petals?
Some of my favorites:
- Calendula (yellow-orange)
- Borage (blue)
- Monarda (fuschia)
- Chives (pink)
- Garlic-Chives (white)
Every year I learn about and add a few more. Last year, for an example, a friend gifted me a native currant starter shrub. I’m excited to see how it grows, for having more tart berries that the birds won’t eat before they’re ready for harvest. 😛
If I’ve missed anything else that’s also super easy to grow around here, I’d sure like to know. Thoughts or comments, please say.
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