Your First Step for a Superfood Garden that THRIVES!

Tackling garden projects is always easier when you’re inheriting best practices and lessons learned from the garden experts and visionaries. This way you get to learn from all their successes and mistakes and avoid spending the time and money trying to figure it all out on your own. After all, we’re better together! That’s why Grow Your Own Vegetables created the Superfood Garden Summit… and it happens EVERY YEAR! 🥳

Join us for the 7th annual Superfood Garden Summit where 16 garden visionaries gather together to help growers all over the globe get more fresh food on their plate, It airs LIVE July 17-21st, 2023!

First, watch the video below!

💚 The LIVE Event starts soon, and once it does, it’s going to fly by! 

Get a head start: Register for the summit and download your Superfood Summit guide: It’s your first step to a successful superfood garden.

Become a Closet Gardener and Grow Greens Indoors Year Round

Growing greens year round means you you can enjoy fresh, organic food at your fingertips! That’s why Shannon started this beautiful closet garden to grow greens indoors. Plus she shares some hidden benefits that her doctors can’t explain… gardens really do HEAL!

Shannon asked how she might improve her yields. Watch this video to discover what she has already done and how she might tweak her system to improve her yields with tips on watering, “flies”, and lights.

Eating well and boosting your immunity is a year round lifestyle… it doesn’t have to stop just because it’s cold outside or there’s snow on the ground. Discover the secrets of successful indoor and outdoor winter gardens.

Learn More About Our Winter Gardening Course!

Are you a winter gardener? Share your magical adventures below!

Journaling for Joy: 3 Garden Journaling Myths BUSTED

Garden journaling is one of the most underused tools for gardeners. It’s also a tool that research shows can decrease anxiety, depression, and stress. That means that along with the joy you’re getting from gardening directly, you can further increase your state of joy simply by keeping a journal.

But if keeping a garden journal is so beneficial, why aren’t more growers doing it?

Objection #1: Time

Growers are busy with their lives and gardening tasks. Often, the assumption around journaling is that you have to do it every day or for a long period of time.

But one study revealed that the time it takes to receive the benefits of journaling are less than most people believe (1). In the study, people diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) showed significant decreases in depression scores when assigned to write about their thoughts and feelings for just 20 minutes over three consecutive days. A follow-up later also showed that the benefits continued four weeks after the individuals participated in the study. With just three consecutive days of journaling for just 20 minutes, individuals with a very serious depressive disorder decreased their depression scores.

Getting benefits from journaling doesn’t have to take giant amounts of time.

What do you think might happen if you wrote for three consecutive days for just twenty minutes each about the single biggest challenge you’re facing in your garden?

Objection #2: The avoidance of deep emotions.

When we bring deep emotions to the surface, it can often disrupt the flow of our daily lives and productivity. But what if the journaling process could shed light on the logic you’re currently using that may be holding you back from realizing your full, vibrant, incredible self?

In a study titled, ‘Self-writing as a tool for change: the effectiveness of a psychotherapy using diary,’ (2) findings demonstrated that daily diary writing can encourage personal reflections and changes, capture micro-transformations, and shed light on argumentative logic used to represent self and problems occurring for the individual. Other studies show that when people write about emotional trauma, there is a marked improvement in their physical and mental health (3).

If you journaled every day about your garden, how many micro-transformations could be brought to your attention?

How much more clearly could you see how far you’ve come on your garden journey?

And how much could your mental and physical health improve?

Objection #3: Growers often feel like journaling won’t really improve their gardening results.

An in-depth examination into the ‘Use of Reflective Journaling to Understand Decision Making’, (4) a myriad of insights emerged when psychotherapists and other clinicians practiced reflective journaling about their cases. Insights were not only gained for the individual therapist, but for the therapies they were using to support their patients as well.

By reflective journaling about our gardens, you gain insights into your individual decision making about your garden. And by sharing your insights with other growers, leaps in gardening methods are possible as well.

Ultimately, studies on journaling have brought to light benefits ranging from improvements in mental and physical health to gaining insights on our decision-making processes. And while more research is needed to discover just how much time is needed and specific methods that may prove more beneficial, current studies show that you can get benefits from journaling without dedicating your life to becoming a writer.

References:

1. Krpan, K. M., Kross, E., Berman, M. G., Deldin, P. J., Askren, M. K., & Jonides, J. (2013). An everyday activity as a treatment for depression: The benefits of expressive writing for people diagnosed with major depressive disorder. Journal of Affective Disorders, 150(3), 1148–1151. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2013.05.065 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3759583/

2. Faccio, E., Turco, F., & Iudici, A. (2019). Self-writing as a tool for change: The effectiveness of a psychotherapy using diary. Research in Psychotherapy: Psychopathology, Process and Outcome, 22(2). https://doi.org/10.4081/ripppo.2019.378 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7451300/

3. Smith, M. A., Thompson, A., Hall, L. J., Allen, S. F., & Wetherell, M. A. (2018). The physical and psychological health benefits of positive emotional writing: Investigating the moderating role of type D (distressed) personality. British Journal of Health Psychology, 23(4), 857–871. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjhp.12320
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6174944/

4. Cook, J. M., Simiola, V., McCarthy, E., Ellis, A., & Stirman, S. W. (2018). Use of reflective journaling to understand decision making regarding two evidence-based psychotherapies for PTSD: Practice implications. Practice Innovations, 3(3), 153–167. https://doi.org/10.1037/pri0000070
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6426332/

Crystal Meserole
GYOV Instructor and Harvest Club Support

Crystal owns and operates a one-woman wholesale commercial living microgreen operation in the mountains of western North Carolina. After working and managing local restaurants for over a decade, she saw the need for chefs to have access to more affordable, organic food for the delicious creations they craft for our communities.

Crystal hopes to stand as a clear message to anyone who thinks they can’t grow: You can. Anyone can. With the right system, mindsets, and mentor, everything becomes possible.

Masterclass on YouTube:

Spirit Gardening

Have you gained insights from journaling about your garden? Do you experience more joy when you’re journaling? We’d love to hear! Share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below!

How to Plan for the Future of Food: Seeds, Soil and our Health

By now, most of us are aware that our food systems are teeming with unsustainable practices–practices that gradually diminish our ability to feed ourselves and future generations.

Are you hungry for solutions and to contribute more and more positively to sustainable food systems?

One of the best steps you can take is to grow your own food! It’s so important, we named our whole organization after it 😉

Why grow your own food? Here’s some ways to start making a difference today for generations to come:

🥕 Growing your own food improves food security! Food shortages are increasing and the cost of food is on the rise. Growing even a fraction of your own produce makes you more self-sufficient.

💰 Growing your own food saves money! You will save thousands of dollars on grocery bills annually while improving the quantity and quality of foods you eat!

🍆 Growing your own food provides better nutrition! Most produce loses at least 30% of its nutrients just 3 days after harvest. Spinach loses 75 – 100% of its vitamin C content in 7 days after being picked. When you grow your own fresh food you get 100% of the nutrients.

❤️ Growing your own food can help prevent disease! Evidence shows fruits and veggies contain compounds that can help prevent cancers, heart disease, and stroke that vitamin supplements cannot replace.

🥗 Growing your own food improves the quality of food! You can grow thousands of varieties of fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts, and grains that you will never find in any grocery store. The variety in flavors, taste, and enjoyment of your food will skyrocket.

🧠 Growing your own food improves mental health! Prescribed medication for mental health issues has recently reached an all-time high. Gardening naturally promotes happiness. Contact with serotonin-boosting soil microbes and Vitamin D from the sun fights depression and anxiety.

🌳 Growing your own food improves the environment! Homegrown food has a zero carbon footprint. Transporting food from farms to tables contributes 19-29% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Commercial agricultural production accounts for 80-86% of total food system emissions.

Want to join us and be a part of building a resilient food system? Then this event is for you … those of us that are hungry for solutions and how we can contribute more and more positively to this system.

We’d like to invite you to the 2022 Future of Food Summit, hosted by our friends at Back to Eden.

On November 4-7, you can join over a dozen conversations from food and garden experts including New York Times best-selling authors, activists, award-winning filmmakers, doctors, market gardeners, and farmers.

At the Future of Food Summit, we will look to the future through the future of seeds, soil, food, and health.

The stellar lineup of speakers includes food and garden experts including New York Times best-selling authors, activists, award-winning filmmakers, doctors, market gardeners, and farmers. Through having such an array of internationally renowned voices (some with decades of experience in their field!), this event offers a uniquely thorough perspective.

The videos from this event will be available for you to stream from November 4th through the 7th for free when you register through this link. You will be emailed the details to access the event! When registering you will see two ticket options; the free pass provides access to the content during the 4-day event, PLUS there is a paid ticket that gives you the option to lifetime access to all the presentations!

>>> To learn more about the speakers, see the full speaker lineup, and register for the event click here!

We’d love to see you there!

This article contains an affiliate link. If you click and take action, Grow Your Own Vegetables LLC may be compensated. We only recommend events and products that we love and that we know can be helpful to you as a gardener.

Masterclass on YouTube:

Vegetables & Herb Plants 101: Plant Biology and Lifecycle

Did you attend the summit? Please come back and share your take-a-ways!

Your 7 Step Food Preservation System

Turn your garden harvests into meals!

GYOV founder Stacey Murphy developed our Harvest-into-Meals food preservation system that gives you strategies for eating fresh year-round, whether it’s out of your garden or from the farmer’s market.

Having a food preservation system helps you:

• Manage the harvest you have coming in without overwhelm or waste
• Enjoy garden-fresh nutrition year round
• Take the guesswork out of meal planning
• Plan to preserve your favorite staple foods
• Open up time and energy to enjoy other activities

Like any new skill, learning to manage harvest takes time and energy upfront. But as you incorporate a food preservation system into your routine, it becomes second nature with time.

>>> Want to learn about your food preservation options? Check out our “5 Methods to Preserve Vegetables at Home” blog post.

Step 1: Set food preservation goals

The first step in creating a food preservation system that works for you is setting goals. Goals that work for you and your lifestyle are all about…YOU! So put away those “shoulds” and focus on what you actually want.

The best kind of goals create habits, especially if it’s a daily habit or a weekly habit. Habits make accomplishing your goals automatic, just like brushing your teeth.

Be realistic about your time and energy

Whatever kind of garden space, time, and energy levels you’re working with, be realistic about what kind of food preservation system will work for your lifestyle. If you have a busy life with lots of priorities, your plan should be enjoyable and easy to execute in the time you have. If your time is flexible and you’re looking to take on a new project, be realistic about how much you can take on at once without burning out.

Set a variety of goals

• Set some small goals that you know you can accomplish (ex: I want to learn how to lacto-ferment vegetables). Easy wins create momentum!
• Set some stretch goals so that if you manage the small goals, you have something to stretch for (ex: I want to lacto-ferment 20 quarts of sauerkraut from my own cabbage).
• Differentiate between rate-based goals (ex: I want to can two quarts of tomatoes per week) and overall goals (ex: I want to can all of the pasta sauce I need for a year).

Set Questions for reflection

How many hours per week can you commit to preparing and preserving food?

• Do you have friends or family who can help with prep work?
• What materials or supplies do you need to get started?
• What kind of preserved food excites you?
• In your garden, do you want to grow food specifically for preservation? Or do you want to grow easy foods you enjoy and figure out how to preserve them later?

Step 2: Quantify your goals

After you’ve set realistic goals for your food preservation system that align with your values and lifestyle, it’s time to do the math. If you plan to grow vegetables in your garden specifically for preservation, this step is crucial for your crop plan.

For example, if your overall goal is to grow and preserve all of your own tomatoes for pasta sauce for a year, you need to figure out:

• How much pasta sauce you eat in a year (in quart jars)
• How many tomatoes it will take to make that much pasta sauce
• How many tomato plants you need to grow that many tomatoes (tip: overestimate here to account for loss)

It’s okay to estimate in the beginning! You’ll use what you learn this year to create a more specific plan next year.

Step 3: Track your garden harvests

The third step of your Harvest-into-Meals food preservation system is to create or adjust your crop plan for the next growing season so that you’re growing for preservation. To do that effectively, you’ll need to create a harvest log.

Keep a harvest log

A harvest log is a list of crops you’re growng. Every time you harvest, you note the amount of each crop by weight or by bunch. This empirical data comes straight from your garden and gives you a clear picture of how much harvest you can expect from your plants and your space. Start simple with one or two of your staple crops.

Harvest once a week & batch tasks

Make it a weekly event: harvest your produce, log your harvest, and plan what to do with it. You can see everything that’s available for the week (see Step 4) and create your meal plan (see Step 5) in just a couple of hours.

A note for the farmer’s market

Even if you don’t have your own garden, you can note when different crops become available at the farmer’s market. And look for sales. For example, at the end of a tomato season, farmers may have discounted boxes of tomatoes perfect for preservation.

Step 4: Divide up your harvest

You want to use or preserve all of your harvest each week. Naturally, some may end up in the compost bin, but dividing up your harvest will help you reduce waste.

What you preserve:

First, separate out all of the best-looking produce. That’s what you’re going to preserve! When you preserve food, it has to be blemish-free. Blemishes increase nutrient loss and can introduce bad bacteria.

What you eat:

Those tomatoes with blemishes? Those are what you’re going to cook or eat raw this week! Just cut away bad sections and incorporate the good bits into your meal plan for the week.

What you compost:

If anything is blemished and damaged beyond edibility, or if it has mold growing on it, that goes into the compost. When you compost, yucky vegetables go back into your garden as nutrients.

Don’t have a compost bin yet? Toss food scraps outside instead of putting them in the trash. Food scraps don’t biodegrade in landfills–but they do contribute to methane emissions and climate change.

Using scraps:

You might want to keep certain food scraps and do something with them. You can make apple cider vinegar out of apple cores and peels. As long as they look good and aren’t moldy, you can also cook vegetable scraps into stock for soups.

Step 5: Plan meals for the week

Could you commit two hours to meal prep each week? This little bit of structure could lead to lots of creativity. Plus, strategically planning your meals ahead saves you time and energy in the long run.

If you can successfully plan one week of meals at a time, you can conquer the whole year.
-Stacey Murphy

Questions for reflection:

• What does a well rounded meal look like for you?
• What do you eat when you are in a hurry?
• How many meals are you eating on the run?
• How can your loved ones help?

Step 6: Preserve according to your goals

Step six is the preservation step, so you’re going to spend some time here. This is where you take all the planning that you’ve done and you actually do each process.

>>> Need some ideas? Check out…

Step 7: Create a preservation log

Then the seventh step in your preservation system is to create a preservation log. A good preservation log is going to tell you:

• What you preserved and when
• How much you have on hand vs what you already ate
• Progress on your rate-based goals

The most important goal of your preservation system is to make everything visible. Things disappear quickly in the back of your refrigerator or shelves, and you forget about them.

Ideas for keeping your preserved items visible

• Keep a dry erase board on your fridge for reminders
• We read left to right, so orient your “eat by” food dates left to right
• Add drawers and label lids
• Tiered shelving

Your log might be your pantry itself, where you just have everything labeled very clearly. Or you might want to create a paper log or a digital log. However you track so that you can follow along. You can improve your system for next year so that you can reset your goals.

Let’s do this!

Learning to preserve your own food can be a big project or just a few simple steps–it all depends on your lifestyle! Either way, having a food preservation system in place will simplify your process and turn new skills into lifelong habits.