From the Garden
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How to Plant, Grow, and Harvest Broad Beans, Fava Beans
Broad beans, also called fava beans, are a cool-season crop. The broad bean is a bushy, hardy annual that can grow from 3 to 4½ feet (.9-1.3m) tall. The broad bean has square stems with leaves divided into leaflets. Broad bean pods are 6 to 8 inches (15-20cm) long and contain 4 to 6 flat, […] More
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How to Plant, Grow, and Harvest Mizuna
Mizuna is an Asian leafy green well suited for salads or salad mixes such as mesclun. Mizuna can also be used in stir-fries and soups and added to other dishes at the end of cooking. Mizuna is similar to mustard greens though milder flavored—a bit peppery, tangy, and with a light cabbage flavor. Mizuna is […] More
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How to Grow Cucumbers That Are Not Bitter Tasting
Cucumber plants that are stressed during the growing season may produce fruit that is bitter flavored. Commonly a lack of water or temperatures too cold or too hot cause cucumbers to bear bitter-tasting fruit. But some cucumbers may have a slightly bitter flavor by nature. Cucumbers contain organic compounds called cucurbitacins that can cause fruit […] More
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How to Grow Bitter Melon
Bitter melon is a favorite in Asian and Southeast Asian cooking. It can be stuffed with pork or shrimp and steamed or pickled or curried and served with meat or in soup. Bitter melons are—as their name suggests–a bitter and mouth-puckering acquired taste—something like the acquired taste of a grapefruit or very dark chocolate. The […] More
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Chinese Vegetables: Cool-Season Varieties
Chinese vegetables, sometimes called Oriental vegetables, favored in Chinese and Asian cooking are easy to grow. They are tasty, vigorous, and highly adaptable. Most are fast-growing and suitable for small gardens and containers. Chinese vegetables can generally be broken into three groups: those easy to grow in temperate regions with cool and cold winters, those […] More
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Vegetable Garden Quality, Yield, Savings Comparisons
How do you put value on your vegetable garden and the crops you grow? It depends upon what you want in return for the time you spend and the space your garden requires. Fresh vegetables. If you want a steady supply of fresh vegetables for the table, make small successive planting over several weeks or […] More