The Fruits of Our Labors

This summer was my first shot at organic vegetable gardening. Surprisingly, the best performer so far has been the peas. I say surprisingly because I planted them (well, Nature Grandma planted the peas) late in the season (May 1). This is one of those veggies that 1/2 of my family likes and 1/2 hates when frozen, but fresh--we all love them!

I have loved trying our hand at gardening. Nature Kidz get to see what their food looks like before it's wrapped in plastic at the grocery stores, and they get to play with their food. Opening the pea pods is fun and the "packaging" is edible too!

Next year plans are to expand our raised-bed planter to add at least 2-3 more planter boxes. Even as I am still enjoying our current harvest, I look forward to next year's planting season with lots of lessons learned this year!

Something to Read: In Defense of Food

I heard the author, Michael Pollan, on NPR's "This Splendid Table" today. After seeing "Food, Inc." Friday night, I was excited to hear Pollan's interview. Pollan was featured in Food, Inc. and had a very engaging persona. He was no less interesting in the interview (and you can listen to that interview at This Splendid Table's website). He had a great quote, and I paraphrase, but he basically said that up until the 1970's we had a "Ford" economy, meaning that the economy treated workers like Henry Ford approached his workers: "I'm going to pay my workers enough so they can ALL afford my cars." Makes sense, right? Well, Pollan says, nowadays we have a "Wal-Mart mentality"--that is, "I'm going to pay you so little that all you can afford is our food/products." Now, that is in a nutshell why I hate Wal-Mart. Well put, Mr. Pollan.