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Thursday, May 14, 2009

A Garden for Canning or Food Storage

Thought that I write a post about using my SFG to produce bunches of produce for canning... or food storage!

Do you have a copy of Mel's first edition published in 1981? There's a lot of good stuff in there! This older version is a great companion to Mel's new book!

Here's an idea of what to do if you want to have veggies for food storage (See page 31 of Mel's 1981 SFG book)

Crop .............# of Plants...Harvest...Spacing
Bush Beans......144............35#............4"
Carrots.............256............30#...........3"
Corn (tall, late)...16.............24 ears.....12"
Corn (short, early).25.........25 ears.......9"
Onions...............256...........25#...........3"

I really want to fill up my food storage shelves with beautiful jars of yummy veggies from my garden!

So I'm planting whole 4x4 boxes of:
-wando peas (this variety doesn't mind the heat)
-bush beans
-corn
-carrots
-onions (for the root cellar)
-potatoes (for the root cellar)

I've got 40 Roma tomato plants growing inside... started them mid April.... before I totally understood spacial requirements of determinate tomatoes. Each Roma will need a 3x3 section. So... I plan to build some long beds for these guys. (Oh my... so much TO DO!!! FUN!!!)

Happy Gardening friends... please DO leave your comments! I so enjoy reading them!

5 comments:

  1. Wow, the first book was published in '81? That's the year I was born. Does that make me young, or does that make this method old? ;)

    Great ideas here. Question, though. How do those spacing measurements work? I'm only used to the new method, so if he had a different way of explaining how many to put in each square I don't quite know it yet.

    40 romas?! Want to send some up my way? ;) What are you planning to do with all of those tomatoes? We made lots of sauce last year that was just divine! We had never had homemade tomato sauce before. We almost died right there when we first tasted it.

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  2. Have you considered a dehydrator to dry tomatoes? I dried hundreds of tomatoes last year out of my garden. You can grind them into powder and add water/seasonings to make tomato sauce or tomato paste, place them in the middle of a casserole and they will rehydrate as the dish cooks, or you can soak them in olive oil for a couple of hours and use whole on homemade pizza or cut up for sun dried tomatoes in your pasta dishes.

    I also just cut some dried tomato slices in four pieces and add them like that to soups and stews.

    I have found this extremely convenient and timesaving!

    Ain't square foot grand?

    I enjoyed stopping by your blog.

    Lisa

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  3. I heard there was a place online you could download the early version of Mel's book. Do you (or anyone) know about a way to download it from the web?

    Thanks
    Genene

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  4. Hi Lisa! What a great idea!!!! I never considered drying my tomatoes... but I can just see the powder going into my home made breads... into sauces... and ???

    What type of dehydrator do you recommend?

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  5. Hi Genene!
    No, I haven't ever seen it online. I picked up my 1981 version online from ebay for a few dollars. It's a big book... like a text book.

    It's a great addition to your library... and an excellent reference book.

    Mel has his books on his website at http://squarefootgardening.com

    Why not support his work by buying his book?

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