Continue reading »]]> Everyone seems to associated carrots with the color orange. The orange carrot is the most common colored carrot. However it’s not the only colored carrot. You can find carrots that are white, yellow, red, gold, and purple. Sometimes you find them in specality grocery stores or the farmer’s market, but they aren’t always easy to find. Why would you bother? First, I think it’s fun to grow different colors of vegetables. If you have kids, even the more fun. Second, the flavor varies in each colored variety. It may not be so much on their own, but when you cook up a mix of a variety of colors, the flavor differences shine and just make for a more complex side dish (I looked cooked carrots!). Also the color is so visually appealing!

Last season, I grew some different colored carrots in my garden and I am planning the same this year. I have looked at different seed catalogs and I find that Johnny’s Selected Seeds seem to have the best selection, I plan on buying my carrot seeds from them. Here is a list of what they have to offer.

White Satin
These carrots are pure white in color.

Yellow Sun
These carrots are a bright yellow color. They grow a little bit shorter (6-7 in) than the other varieties listed here. They also have a rather blunt end, meaning the carrot is mostly the same thickness throughout, which is a plus for even cooking.

YellowPak
Another yellow that is more of a solid yellow, not quite as bright, but still beautiful. Said to have a good flavor.

Rainbow
This is a variety that produces different colored carrots, ranging from almost white to a darker yellow. I grew these last year and they were alright, but I want to do a little more variety in color this year. But they are a good choice if you only plan to grow one variety. You can still get different colors.

Atomic Red
This is variety is at the top of my list to grow this season. They are a beautiful red color. They are said to have a strong flavor. Typically the more orange a carrot the stronger the flavor and when you reach red, then it’s really strong. They recommend cooking these carrots to deepen color and improve the flavor.

Purple Haze
These carrots are purple on the outside but orange on the inside. The purple color will fade when cooked. For raw eating they get an “A” for presentation.

Deep Purple
These carrots are as purple as purple can get. Their color will fade some when cooked, but not completely.

Have fun this year. Give a try at growing some different colored carrots. Great for the eyes and for the tongue.

Continue reading »]]> I love looking at the new seed catalogs and see what kinds of neat things they have come up with now. Yesterday, I spoke about the white strawberries you could buy from Burpee. Today’s unique discovery is Flowering Brussels Sprouts. They are a combination of kale and Brussels sprouts. They grow on a stalk just like any other Brussels sprout, except the sprouts open up like flowers to resemble like mini kale.

Johnny’s Selected Seeds are the offering these for the first time this year. You get the seeds as part of their Kaleidoscope Mix, which includes 3 different colors. The drawback to these flowering sprouts is that they aren’t as cold tolerant as their kale and Brussels sprouts counterparts.

I am not planning to try these myself this year. I am going to try growing Brussels sprouts for the first time this year, but I want to stick with some a little more traditional. I would love to give them a try sometime.

Continue reading »]]> It is that time of year again, when all the seed catalogs are being send out to get us gardeners excited about another planting season. I like to take some time in the winter to cover some of the new or unique items that I have stumped across. I am going to start with some new strawberry plants available through Burpee. They have a collection this year where you can get 3 strawberry plants and each plant produces a different color strawberry. You might be thinking, wait I thought strawberries were all red. However that is not the case. The most unusual of this collection is called a Pineberry. This strawberry is white with red seeds. I heard about these strawberries about a year ago. They aren’t very common, so your only way to find them might be planting a plant yourself. The plants themselves aren’t as prolific as other strawberry varieties which is why you aren’t likely to see them commercially sold anytime soon (if you do, they will come with a high price tag). The plants also produce small berries, seen as another negative in the commercial biz. Besides the unique color, they are suppose to have a unique pineapple-like flavor.

The more traditional looking strawberry that comes in this collection is called Elan F1. It bears fruit from July to October. So you can enjoy your strawberries over a longer period of time.

The third member of this threesome is the Purple Wonder. This is a Junebearing strawberry plant. Although looking at the picture, I might say these are more dark red than purple, but it’s still a nice contrast to have along with the traditional red and the white Pineberry.

You can buy the plants separately from Burpee for $9.99 or get all these plants in a collection for $18.99. I think it would be a fun collection to grow. I am not sure how much taste difference your getting (the Pineberry flavor could be good), but I think it’s visualizing appealing to eat a bowl of strawberries of three different colors. I am sure your kids would love it. This is why I love serving green beans and carrots together. Look at the picture on the right, doesn’t that just make you more enticed to eat your veggies?

If anyone has grown any of these varieties of berries before, please share with us your experiences in the comment section below.

Continue reading »]]> For all my readers in the Ann Arbor and surrounding areas, I wanted to share with you a great place to get seed potatoes. I am going to grow potatoes for the first time this year. I purchased three varieties this past week at the Downtown Home and Garden store located at 210 S. Ashley St. in downtown Ann Arbor. I picked out some Adirondack Blue ($2/lb), German Butterball ($2/lb), and Red Pontiac potatoes ($.65/lb). I choose these varieties because they are harder to find and more expensive. They also were selling these varieties for between $.65-$2 per pound: Irish Cobbler, Kennebec, Onaway, Red Norland, Russet Burbank, Superior, and Yukon Gold. They also will have fingerling and organic potatoes coming in soon. These prices beat the what I have seen in catalogs, where most potatoes were going for between $3-5 per pound, and that’s not including the shipping. So if you live near Ann Arbor and want to grow some potatoes, I highly recommend you get your seed potatoes from Downtown Home and Garden. They also have their seed packets for 25% off. They have seeds from companies like Burpee, Johnny’s, Seeds of Change, Renee’s, and the Cook’s Garden.

Check out my earlier post for other sources for buying fingerling potatoes and to learn why you shouldn’t grow potatoes you buy in the store.

Continue reading »]]> Beans are one of the simplest things to grow. I recommend them as the first vegetable for a first time gardener. But once you have mastered the bush bean, it’s time to move on to pole beans. They aren’t hard to grow at all, but they are a step up from bush beans, as you have to provide support for them to grow on. Why bother growing pole beans? Check out my reasons below.

Reasons for Growing Pole Beans over Bush Beans
1. Space
Since pole beans grow verticially they take up a lot less space than bush beans do.

2. Easier to Pick
Once again that vertical growth makes the bean easier to get it without having to bend over and search through the leaves.

3. Taste?
I have heard many people say that the pole beans simply taste better than bush beans.

Sources to Buy Pole Beans
Below you will find a list of some great sources you can get pole bean seeds from. There are a lot of options out there, so it’s good to do some research before you buy.

Johnny’s
1. Fortex (7-11″) $3.95/packet
2. Garden of Eden (broad, flat pods, 6″ long) $3.95/packet
3. Marvel of Venice (Yellow, Italian style, 8-9″ long) $3.95/packet
4. Northeaster (Roma-type bean, grows to 8″ long) $3.95/packet

Burpee
1. White Half Runner (4 1/2″ long) $3.95/2 oz packet
2. Blue Lake (6″ long, stringless) $3.25/2 oz packet
3. Fortex (anywhere between 6 to 11″ long) $5.50/2 oz packet
4. Kentucky Blue (7″ long) $3.95/2 oz packet
5. Kentucky Wonder (8″ meaty pods) $3.25/2 oz packet
6. Romano (6″ stringless, flat pod) $3.25/2 oz packet

John Scheepers Kitchen Garden Seeds
1. Blue Lake (4-7″ long) $2.95/packet of about 150 seeds
2. Emerite Filet (filet or haricot vert bean that is also a pole bean) $4.95/packet of about 60 seeds
3. Tamara (flattned, oval, Romano-type bean, can grow to a foot long) $3.95/packet of about 50 seeds
4. Purple Podded (5″ to 7″ long and purple!) $3.45/packet of 75 seeds
5. Orient Wonder (can grow to as long as 36″!, but best at 18″) $4.45/packet of 175 seeds

Continue reading »]]> While doing some research this morning, I came across Planet Natural’s website. They are a company that sells natural and organic products for your home, lawn, and garden. They sell only heirloom seeds. What is the big deal about heirloom seeds? They have been used for years because of their quality. They might have great flavor, or grow well or are beautiful to look at. They have not been genetically engineered in any way. You are not likely to find anything grown from heirloom seeds in your grocery store. The grocery store is out to make money, so they want the best looking, longest shelf life, most productive, cheapest produce they can get. Flavor does not usually make the list. If you ate grocery store tomatoes your whole life you would never know the difference between them and home grown heirloom tomatoes.

If you are looking to buy some heirloom seeds for your garden this year, check out Planet Natural’s website. They have a great selection with everything from peppers to kale to melons. And the best part is that all heirloom seeds are shipped for FREE!

Continue reading »]]> I received a catalog from John Scheepers Kitchen Garden Seeds this evening. I wanted to share something I discovered – yellow edible pod peas. These are snow peas. They are the flat peas that you can eat pod and all. Yellow split peas are readily available, but I have never seen a fresh yellow pea. The variety is called “Golden India Edible Pea Pod”. It is an heirloom variety. The vines can grow to 6′ tall, so they need some kind of support. No matter what heights the peas I am growing are suppose to grow to, I always give them support. Not only are these peas are unique color, but the flowers that appear before the peas are two-toned purple. Growing these would be a beautiful addition to my garden. Plus I like to grow different varieties of peas in the same area, and if I had yellow peas it would be easy to tell which peas are which.

Besides just the appearance outdoors, I live different colored vegetables for indoor use (that is cooking). I love making up a medley of carrots and green beans. The two contrasting colors makes the dish more appealing. Even more so when I add in some yellow wax beans. So a mix of green and yellow peas would look good on the plate.

If you wish to purchase these peas, click here for the Kitchen Garden Seeds catalog.

Another option is to buy them from Planet Natural’s website. They offer free shipping on heirloom seeds.

Continue reading »]]> If you are looking to just buy purple (or blue) potatoes, check out my page on where to buy them. This post is only about where to buy seed potatoes for your own garden.

Here in America, we see the white flesh potato as the norm. The all-American Russet is white fleshed. The popular red skins are white fleshed. But white isn’t the only color potatoes come in. Blue and purple are two such colors. These are some beautiful spuds inside and out. Wouldn’t they look great just picked from your garden. Today I am going to tell you where to buy them and answer the question, does color matter when it comes to nutrition?

Where to Purchase Seed Potatoes
One of the cool things about growing your own vegetables is that you get to play around. How fun would it be to pull some blue potatoes out of the ground and serve them up to your friends! Here are a couple sources for these potatoes.

Johnny’s
1. Adirondack Blue (5 lbs) $19.65 (I grew this variety last year)
2. Adirondack Red (a potato that is red on the inside too) (5 lbs) $19.65

Burpee
1. All Blue (10 mini-tubers) $18.95
2. Purple Majesty (10 mini-tubers) $18.95

Seeds of Change
All Blue (2 lbs) $11.00

John Scheepers Kitchen Garden Seeds
All Blue (10 mini-tubers) $11.95

Are Purple/Blue Potatoes More Healthy?
First off, I am not a health expert, so I am only reporting what I have heard. What I have heard is a lot of debate. Dark colored fruits like blueberries and acai berries are being called superfruits for their antioxidant power. So I was wondering if this is also true for dark colored potatoes. The general consensus is that the colored flesh brings more nutrients than a white flesh potato. The white flesh potatoes lack any carotenoids including beta-carotene, which is famous for giving carrots their orange glow. But are purple and blue better than yellow or gold fleshed potatoes. The jury is still out on that one.

Health benefit talk aside, purple and blue potatoes are just fun to grow. So this summer, why not serve some homemade purple potato chips along with your Ribeye fresh off the grill.

Continue reading »]]> There is nothing I like better fresh out of the garden than beans. The tenderness and flavor cannot match what you get in the grocery store. In my search for the perfect beans there is one thing I always rule out, growing meaty beans. That is beans that tend to grow large seeds rather quickly. I have tried different bush bean varieties with varying results. Some have been good, and some not so much. Last year I grew filet beans, also called haricot verts or French beans (not French cut beans, that is a style of slicing green beans). These beans are naturally thin and are string less. You can buy them in some specialty grocery stores, but you are going to pay an arm and leg for them. So that is another great reason to grow them yourself.

Last year I grew some filet beans for the first time. Unfortunately I had a lot of problems last year to be able to fully review all the varieties I grew (I had 3). The combination of my garden flooding right after planting and a couple week visit by some Japanese beetles, pretty much wiped out most of my crop. One variety I grew (Concador) was completely wiped out. The other two I grew were called Tavera (Green) and Velour (Purple). The Velour did well, produced a lot of pretty purple beans with a good flavor. The Tavera which I grew right next to the Velour, did not do very well. The plants just didn’t produce much, especially when compared to the Velour. I plan to bring back the Velour this year and try another green filet bean variety. I also might want to try the pole filet beans sold by Renee’s Garden (see below)

Below you will find a list of options available from various seed companies.

Johnny’s
1. Maxibel (7″ Green) $3.95/packet
2. Tavera (4-5″ Green) $3.45/packet
3. Velour (4-5″ first Purple filet beans) $3.45/packet
4. Concador (4 1/2 – 5″ yellow) $3.45/packet

Burpee
1. French Filet Stringless (Green) $3.95/packet
2. Triumphe De Farcy Bush (Green) $3.95/packet

Renee’s Garden
1. Rolande (Green) $2.79/packet
2. Emerite (Green Pole) $2.99/packet
3. French Gold (Yellow Pole) $3.99/packet

John Scheepers Kitchen Garden Seeds
1. Maxi (Green Bush) 150 seeds for $3.75
2. Soleil (Yellow Wax) 180 seeds for $3.95
3. Roc d’Or (Yellow Wax) 75 seeds for $3.75
4. Nickel (Green) 160 seeds for $3.95

Continue reading »]]> Where to Buy
Recently I received a couple seed catalogs in the mail. One of the first things I looked up was their prices on fingerling seed potatoes. Fingerling potatoes are a gourmet treat, that sell in the store for a gourmet price. They are great for boiling in a pot of water and rock salt. You surely would be “eating like no one else” if you grew your own fingerling potatoes this year. And you could tell everyone you got gourmet food growing on your property!

There are several places to purchase the seed potatoes or tubers. The Burpee catalog offers three options: Russian Banana (10 mini-tubers for $18.95), Swedish Peanut Fingerling (10 mini-tuners for $18.95) or their Fingerling Potato Collection which features Russian Banana, Rose Finn Apple, and Swedish Potatoes for $44.25 for 10 mini-tubers each for a total of 30. Another option comes from Johnny’s Selected Seeds. They offer French Fingerling ($12.60 for a pound) and Russian Banana ($12.65 for a pound).

Why Not to Plant Grocery Store Purchased Potatoes
Now you might be thinking, why would should I pay $12.60 for a pound of fingerling potatoes, when I could go to the store and buy them for $3 or less a pound and just plant those? Aren’t these tubers or seed potatoes just like the potatoes that starting growing eyes in my pantry? Well you could just plant store bought potatoes. However potatoes are susceptible to a lot of diseases. The ones you buy from the seed companies and nurseries that are certified seed potatoes are going to be disease free. That doesn’t mean they are disease resistant, just that when you plant them there isn’t any sign of disease. Grocery store bought potatoes have not been tested, so there is a good chance you will have a problem and your entire crop will fail, like the famous Irish potato famine. Also grocery store potatoes may have been treated to stop the growth of “eyes”. I have read of growers you have grown both grocery store and seed potatoes and that all have said their crops do better if they plant certified seed potatoes.

When to Buy
You can buy them as soon as the seed catalog have them available, usually by the first of the year. Some places won’t ship you the potatoes until April, so they will be in time for spring planting. If you live in a warmer climate, Johnny’s offers February shipping, but you must act by Friday, January 14, 2011.