Ghetto Garden

Fresh fruits and vegetables are, in my opinion, the next thing to heaven. We are lucky in Rochester to be smack dab in the center of many farms. This allows both for lots of fresh produce at Wegmans (if you don't know what that is, ask any Rochesterian. You'll get an earful. It's like a cult.) and a ridiculous amount of cheap, local produce at the public market. This reminds me that I should probably do a post on the public market and how awesome it is - it was voted #1 in the US. But I digress.

My husband and I both love fresh produce so much that we have made several attempts over the years to grow our own. First we planted in the back of our yard, putting more and more elaborate fences (etc) around it to keep the dogs out. They took it as a challenge, and it only succeeded in keeping ME out. Last year, we planted a few tomatoes and some peppers in pots and put them on a table in our driveway. This was quite successful, so we moved the plan onward and upward into what we have named our "ghetto garden."

I had seen some cedar planters at Wegmans and asked Greg if he thought that would be worthwhile - we could plant lots of veggies in it and put it on the table instead of small pots. He suggested instead that we use the old kiddie pool that we used for our dogs a few summers ago but replaced due to some holes. These holes are now drainage, and the pool was the beginning of a rather bizarre garden.

 Old doggie pool with cucumber (not producing yet), cabbage (you know, for sauerkraut), romaine, green pepper (ONE pepper!), and tomatoes (producing quite nicely). Behind it you can see our corn (we have several ears!) and underneath, there are beans and a giant yellow squash plant.

 Cilantro, rosemary, celery plants, more tomatoes, basil!

Various hot peppers. Hot cherry peppers, habaneros, and I forget what else.

This wasn't quiiiiiite enough room to grow all the hot peppers Greg's little heart desires, so out front in our flower bed, we now have cayennes and kung pao. And there's some more cabbage and beans behind them.

If everything produces to our expectations, we'll have veggies coming out of our ears. And probably steam, too, since Greg LOVES to use those hot peppers. Last year he spent weeks drying and grinding up the extras, and I expect more of the same this year. In the meantime, I'm eating tomato sandwiches like they're going out of style. (They're not. I checked.) And I experimented and made a rather outstanding dinner for myself last night...

Homemade margherita pizza, using tomatoes and basil from our garden! It was as heavenly as it looks. So was the Red Velvet wine.

I love my ghetto garden! Now come on, cucumbers!!!!