I have been neglecting my garden for the past few weeks. Okay, let’s be honest: I’ve been neglecting it for the past six or seven months. Sure, there have been little flurries of activity here and there — I built new raised beds and planted a bunch of potatoes — […]
Remember last spring when I planted my garden and we played Name That Brassica? Everyone was so excited about the “Early Purple Sprouting” broccoli. But it never produced. Okay, that’s not fair. My broccoli never produced florets — the part we usually think of when we think of broccoli. (They’re actually the […]
“What kind of potato is this one?” my 4 year-old nephew asks, holding up the last bag of seed potatoes. I check the label. “Butterfinger,” I tell him. We’ve already planted four other varieties, examining the different colors and shapes of Yukon Gem, All Red, Purple Majesty, and Rose Finn […]
“How will we feed a global population of 11 billion?” It’s the biggest challenge facing food system stakeholders: how to feed the earth’s rapidly growing population, ideally without destroying the environment in the process. In the discussions and the media, talk of “a second Green Revolution” comes up regularly. But should […]
(But first, test your soil for lead. Here’s how.) Fertilizer packaging always reminds me of that scene from James and the Giant Peach. You remember: the old man gives James a bag of tiny green magic crystals, James drops the bag, the crystals disappear into the ground, and suddenly the barren old […]
“I recommend eating dinner before the lectures, because you’re going to hear a lot of things that will put you off your appetite.” — Michael Pollan, introducing Edible Education 101 Michael Pollan kicked off this year’s Edible Education 101 lecture series with a talk on the rise of industrial agriculture. […]