Garden Tour

We're kicking off National Garden Week with a tour of Cooking Light's garden. We’re working with a local farmer to grow a mix of hybrids and heirlooms—everything from arugula to watermelons.

Come July, this bed will be bursting with nearly 50 varieties of heirloom tomatoes. We’re awaiting the last frost date in mid-April before that pile of compost you see to the right gets worked into the soil and the seedlings are set out. Speaking of seedlings…

Here are some of the tee-iny tomato plants that have been sprouting away safely inside the greenhouse.

Here in the herb garden, the catmint, sage, lavender, and thyme you see in this picture will be joined by 8 varieties of basil, including this red-crested beauty.

And here is the swing overlooking the herb and tomato beds. Wish I was there right now.

Here in the root-veg bed, the Chiogga, Golden, and Bull’s Blood beets look like they’re coming along just fine. The onions (Red Marble, Cippolini, and Red Torpedo) are an experiment. Apparently, we should have set out seedlings last fall, but Farmer MaryBeth was able to find some still available back in February, so we’ll see if they form full bulbs. Cross your fingers.

The items I’m most excited for are the Paris Market carrots. (They’re the little feathery leaves on the left.) They’re reddish and round—more like beets or radishes than carrots. Since they don’t stretch deep down into the soil like traditional full-sized cousins, they can live happily in containers or shallow raised beds.

Picking the last of the radishes. Our Chinese Red Meats are coming along a bit slower than all the rest—Pink Beauties, Purple Plums, and White Hailstones.

With the radishes ready, it will soon be time to harvest a crop of leafy greens.

Or leafy reds.
 

And, in honor of Easter, what garden tour would be complete without a peep!