What vegetables do you enjoy gardening?

[gary350]

We think potatoes are the best vegetable in our garden it can be cooked many different way. Watermelons & tomatoes are very good. Carrots look good in salad or stew but actually don't have much favor I guess that is why salads always have salad dressing to add flavor. Broccoli is good but I can't grow it in TN. Cabbage is good I love coleslaw. Asparagus has zero flavor I assume that is why it is served with sauce to trick you into thinking it taste good. Wife said, asparagus taste like grass with cheese sauce on it. I like sweet peppers on salad it makes the salad look more beautiful. Green beans are very good cooked is stew other wise it taste like nothing. Corn is very good & sweet if picked at the correct day. Cucumbers make the best sweet bread & butter pickles other wise good for nothing. Beets are good only when grown & eaten at max flavor. Blackberries are very good too. Navy beans make the best BBQ beans. Onions & garlic are good in many things, sandwiches, salads, stew, more. I love fried squash but refuse to grow it because it attracts 1000s of stink bugs to the entire garden.

 

[Steve Wood]

I grow salad. Tomatoes, lettuce, peppers, cucumbers, garlic, etc.
Used to grow many more veggies but we didn't use enough so I stopped.
Still grow enough 'salad' to give lots away.

 

[Sluggy]

Mainly garlic, carrots, onions, chilli peppers’ and a small amount of potatoes but when I visit the supermarket and see the prices on the shelf I sometimes think is it financially worth while then I think to myself what a wonderful day when I see my seeds sprouting to life.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

Mainly garlic, carrots, onions, chilli peppers’ and a small amount of potatoes but when I visit the supermarket and see the prices on the shelf I sometimes think is it financially worth while then I think to myself what a wonderful day when I see my seeds sprouting to life.

They must have cheap supermarkets round your way, seems expensive to me
Asise from that think of all the chemicals you avoid, things like potatoes and onions get sprayed multiple times before harvest.

 

[Sluggy]

As you say OB free from chemical sprays but local coop prices - carrots 0.44p for 0.5 kilo, onions 37p each, garlic 37p each and potatoes 85p for 1.5 Kilos. My garlic crop is a complete failure this year. Goodness knows what the farmers are being paid for their crops!

 

[phillyterp85]

First time gardening this summer. My in-laws got my son a planter box with some tomatoes and banana peppers. He’s been enjoying it a lot so we got a 2nd box and planted eggplant in that one. So far so good! Picked our first tomatoes and peppers yesterday.

 

[Meadowlark]

Welcome @phillyterp85

 

[phillyterp85]

Welcome @phillyterp85

Thank you! Excited to see what the summer brings with our harvests.

 

[gary350]

I enjoy growing things that are a challenge to grow.

15 years ago I grew an 8 lb. sweet potato. I also grew 25 lbs. of sweet potatoes from 1 plant. We never eat sweet potatoes so I stopped growing them.

I finally learned best way to grow carrots. I grew 4000 carrots once we ate lots of carrots and gave most of them away. If I ever grow carrots again 50 will be enough.

1 year I grew 500 very nice big onions but now 125 good onions are enough.

This year I grew 425 lbs. of potatoes in a 90 ft row. Next year if I grow potatoes it will only be about 50 lbs. of white potatoes.

When I lived in Arizona I grew 12 lb. Napa cabbage. AZ winter weather was perfect but can't grow Napa in TN weather is always wrong.

Cucumbers & squash attract 1000s of stink bugs the only way to get a good crop is grow 75 plants harvest all we need in a very short time like 1 week the pull up and burn all the plants other wise the entire garden becomes infested with millions of stink bugs.

This year the only crops I grew are, garlic, onions, tomatoes, potatoes, melons, peppers, corn. None of these plant attract stink bugs in TN except tomato plants about August 1st. At the moment tomato plants are producing about 75 ripe tomatoes every day. Wife said, we are stocked up full with tomatoes give the rest away. 2 years ago 4 plants died early we learns to plant more than 4, 8 is good, 12 is better. This year 24 plants were too many. 4 pack of plants cost $2.50. 2 packs of tomatoes had the wrong tags.

 

[phillyterp85]

Caprese salad with my homegrown tomatoes and basil! I gotta say, the tomatoes really do taste better than the store bought ones. Much more tender, and sweeter.

 

[Meadowlark]

Caprese salad with my homegrown tomatoes and basil! I gotta say, the tomatoes really do taste better than the store bought ones. Much more tender, and sweeter.

Join the rest of us who believe the same as you...they just taste better.

 

[Martin Mikulcik]

I finally learned best way to grow carrots.

When I lived in Arizona I grew 12 lb. Napa cabbage. AZ winter weather was perfect but can't grow Napa in TN weather is always wrong.

Cucumbers & squash attract 1000s of stink bugs the only way to get a good crop is grow 75 plants harvest all we need in a very short time like 1 week the pull up and burn all the plants other wise the entire garden becomes infested with millions of stink bugs

Do tell more about how you grow carrots.

We've gotten good napa cabbages most years in Murray Kentucky, started in the spring in the greenhouse

I haven't heard of stink bugs being a major pest, maybe you don't have good natural predators, but squash are tricky to grow because of the vine borer and rainfall patterns, except for butternut, which are quite reliable

Cucumbers like water, especially when hot and maybe some lime where you are

 

[phillyterp85]

Join the rest of us who believe the same as you...they just taste better.

From what I’ve read, the ones you find in a grocery store get picked while they are still green, and then ripen off the vine. And so they don’t develop the same level of sweetness and tenderness compared to being able to get to their full ripeness while on the plant and then eaten fresh.

 

[DiggersJo]

Pretty sure that's not the case here. We often get bog (is that okay for the USA?) standard baby plum tomatoes and they have been Sweetele from Morocco throughout the winter and all summer and to be honest they have been superb! Okay I've had better in that time, but I can't know them. What's the tar on the Caprese? Balsamic?

 

[Meadowlark]

From what I’ve read, the ones you find in a grocery store get picked while they are still green, and then ripen off the vine. And so they don’t develop the same level of sweetness and tenderness compared to being able to get to their full ripeness while on the plant and then eaten fresh.

That plus they are treated with all kinds of insecticides, fungicides, and who knows what other cides and they are usually grown with synthetic chemical fertilizer...all of which in my experience detract from the taste.

A tomato if picked when it first turns color (called the breaker stage) will ripen and taste just as good as one left to ripen on the vine in my experience and actual testing.

I pick mine at the breaker stage to avoid birds (especially mockingbirds) and insects which attack the red. Picking even minutes before the breaker stage as commercial growers do by picking green without question results in diminished taste.

Here is what AI says about this:

"Tomatoes begin producing ethylene, the ripening hormone, once they reach the breaker stage — when the fruit first shows a blush of color (even 10% pink). At that point:
The tomato is physiologically mature

• It will continue ripening off the vine
• Flavor compounds (sugars, acids, aromatics) continue developing internally
• Texture softens normally

This means a tomato picked at first color can ripen off the vine with the same flavor as one left on the plant."