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Freezing fruits and vegetables to extend your harvest
There is a fine line in a productive summer garden where the harvest goes from plentiful to growing “out your ears.” Of course, you can give extra produce away or donate it to a local soup kitchen, but another option is to freeze the abundant harvest. I grew up on a rural farm where food preservation was a way of life. From snapping green beans for canning to washing blackberries for freezing, we learned to help from a young age. Here are tips to help you get started with freezing produce at home.

Companion planting is the idea that certain plants attract beneficial insects and fix soil nutrients in the edible garden. It’s not a dog-eat-dog world out there; it’s a bug-eat-bug world that forms the food chain that feeds us.
Fresh fruit picked off your own trees is a hot horticultural pursuit these days. Homeowners envision delectable apples, pears, peaches, plums and cherries dripping from their trees. Well, truth be told, there’s a lot of work that goes into those beautiful fruits. Bumps and blemishes from an army of fruit tree pests are the reality of the orchardist.

When I want to get a room full of gardeners engaged in a lively debate, I bring up the topic of tomatoes. A question that transforms shy, reserved types into outspoken, opinionated verbal wranglers is this one: “Is the tomato a fruit or a vegetable?”
>> read “Tomato: Fruit or Vegetable?” #Fruit #Misc #Unusual #Vegetables
With surprising regularity, some poor schlep of a volunteer from a community garden – abuzz with visions of plump, perfect sweet cherries, heirloom apples, and sugar plums dancing in his or her head – will email me with a simple question that they expect will have a simple answer. The question is always some variation on this: “What apples, pears, and peaches would you recommend for a community orchard?” I wish I could see the looks on their faces when they get a big old heaping serving of attitude.
>> read “Sweet Native Fruit Trees That Won’t Leave You Bitter” #Fruit #Natives #Trees
Anyone who has ever grown a backyard tomato knows that there is no comparison to the flavor and quality of a freshly grown tomato compared to one purchased at the supermarket. While tomatoes are arguably the king of the vegetable garden, they can be challenging at times because this tropical fruit can be finicky. By far, tomato problems exceed those of any other vegetable. Whether that is because they just have more problems or because of how popular they are, they are definitely not easy to grow. Here I will outline what I see as the top 10 issues that can lead to tomato failure in the garden.
>> read “The Top 10 Reasons Your Tomatoes Fail” #Advice #Edibles #Fruit #Vegetables
While on a food and native plant pilgrimage to Austin, Texas, I was offered a small plate of charred, wrinkly green peppers sprinkled with sea salt. The waiter said that the peppers were called shishitos and that they were native to Japan. Within a few minutes, I had devoured the entire plateful and was clamoring for more. These odd looking little peppers were seriously addictive.
>> read “Shishito Peppers” #Edibles #Fruit #Vegetables
Branch out and try something new in the vegetable garden
It’s that time of year again. The 2017 winners of the coveted All-America Selections Vegetable Awards, which recognizes only the tastiest, easiest-to-grow vegetables, have been announced. The AAS’s mission is “to promote new garden seed varieties with superior garden performance judged in impartial trials in North America.” I am growing these new varieties this year because, although they may be short in stature, they are heavy on harvest and big on flavor.
>> read “2017 New Varieties” #Fruit #New Trends #Vegetables
If you have ever seen a beautyberry in fruit, you are not likely to forget it. The brilliant, iridescent purple berries that cluster along the stems of Callicarpa dichotoma and C. japonica in late summer and fall will stop you in your tracks.
>> read “It’s All About the Berries” #Fall #Fruit #Shrubs
Vaccinium corymbosum
Gardening in 2016 should be inspirational and eclectic and fun! What better plant to add to your garden than one that exhibits four seasons of interest and produces fruit for your cereal bowl! No more boring gardens stuffed with static plants that are not earning their keep – plant a new blueberry to spice it up.
>> read “Perpetua Blueberry” #Blue #Edibles #Fruit #Hot Plants
When the summer fruits start appearing in the farmers’ markets, everyone goes into a frenzy. We love the sweetness of strawberries, raspberries and currants, but many of us are daunted when growing our own. The good news is that it’s not very hard, and you can actually incorporate some of them right into the landscape. Most of
>> read “Small Fruits to try in the Midwestern Landscape” #Edibles #Fruit
With the cold winter behind and the warm, humid summer just about here, I begin to dream of the tropics, and with that, the full-flavored, juicy fruit whose sweet fragrances fill outdoor markets and lone fruit stands on the side roads. Sadly though, with the economy not cooperating and the present fashion to have stay-cations, I have decided I could and would have both. Thus began my search for the ever-elusive tropical fruits that I could grow in my Kentucky backyard garden.
>> read “Growing Tropical Fruit in the Midwest” #Edibles #Fruit #TreesNew from our Bloggers:
Featured Books for Missouri

A complete guide to simple container gardening designed for anyone who has ever killed a plant. It includes illustrated instructions to create gorgeous, fool-proof container gardens that even you can't kill!
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Enhance your health naturally with herbs from your own garden. Even if you've never gardened before, you can care for yourself and your family using time-tested herbal remedies harvested from your own medicinal herb garden. Master Gardener Dorie Byers offers simple growing instructions for more than 20 versatile medicinal herbs such as garlic, chamomile, and echinacea. You'll also find recipes and tips for using the herbs for first-aid and preventive health care.
>> more information