Tip of the Week: Hip Vegetables
Posted in Gardening Tips on July 6 2009, by Sonia Uyterhoeven
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Sonia Uyterhoeven is Gardener for Public Education. Join her each weekend for home gardening demonstrations on a variety of topics in the Home Gardening Center. |
Have you ever observed the popular kids in school? They look stylish seemingly without having made an effort, are confident and outgoing, and always seem to surround themselves with beautiful people.
Vegetables are no different. Some of them are born with style while others struggle to cast off their utilitarian image. Some just have a universal appeal, others are easy to grow and never disappoint, while a select class can transform any second-rate chef into the next Jacques Pépin.
An Internet survey of the most popular homegrown vegetables in the country resulted in the following Top 10: tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, onions, beans, lettuce, carrots, sweet corn, radishes and cabbage. (Reading the list just made me hungry.) How were the choices made?
Not surprisingly, tomatoes were at the top of the list—close to 90 percent of the population includes tomatoes in their vegetable garden. Both tomatoes and peppers are incredibly prolific—if you have space for only one plant you will get a nice harvest.
Tomatoes and peppers are also easy to buy as transplants at your local garden center or farmers market. The choices are always exquisite: Do you want an F1 Hybrid or an heirloom? Would you like a sweet pepper or hot pepper? What color would you like the fruit to be this year… yellow, purple, red, orange, or green?
Onions in fourth place surprised me although they are easy to grow either from seed or from transplants. I pick up my transplants at the Union Square Market in Manhattan early in the season and just pop them into the ground. Scallions get pulled up and tossed into the salad early in the season, followed by cipollini (they usually take around 60 days to harvest), and then finally the late-season bulbing onions.
Beans are a treat because they are so easy to grow and great for a beginner. For my bush beans, I usually try and do two sowings, one in early May and another in the middle of the summer for a later harvest. The fine French beans such as ‘Fin de Bagnol’ are delicious and ‘Blue Lake 274’ is not only prolific and reliable but also very tasty.
Pole beans climb up my trellises and adorn my garden all summer long. My favorite pole bean is a classic called ‘Kentucky Wonder Pole’, although other heirloom varieties such as ‘Purple Podded Pole’ and ‘Rattlesnake Snap’ have an aesthetic edge
Cabbage came in 10th, landing in only 30 percent of the nation’s gardens—clearly the German contingent stepped in at the last minute to make a push for their beloved sauerkraut.
So what are the criteria for a vegetable’s popularity? I think what you grow is probably an individual decision, but you most likely have your reasons. Here is a guide for making your own choices
- Choose vegetables your family likes to eat.
- If you are a beginner, choose vegetable that are easy to grow.
- Think about yield: Given your space, will it be worth the effort to grow one tomato that produces a rich harvest or two cabbages that will provide you with enough cole slaw for several good meals.
- Consider taste. The amount of space it takes to grow sweet corn is disheartening, but the taste of fresh sweet corn is worth its weight in gold.
- Do you have the space? What is feasible given the size of your plot?
- Are the vegetables readily available from transplants in the garden center; sometimes a head start is more appealing than sowing seeds.
- Are you making choices due to a lack of imagination (e.g. it’s just the first thing that pops into your mind)?
If you find yourself answering yes to the last question, come visit The Edible Garden at The New York Botanical Garden this summer and take home some new and interesting ideas for your own home garden.
