OVERVIEW
Here is a step by step summary of the vegetable gardening process that I’ve experienced.
Week 1. Choosing space for your new garden. Where: A balcony, rooftop, a small plot?

Garden Location

Choosing a space for your vegetable garden.

In this first week we will analyze where the best location for your garden could be. Depending on your living situation it might be a patio with containers—or perhaps you have a backyard which will give you a greater amount of space. There’s also the option of joining a community garden program in your neighborhood where you can get your own gardening plot. Ideally we are looking for a location that gets sun and has access to water.

Week 2. Selecting Seeds.

Seeds

Nutrition, Planning and Selecting Seeds for Your Vegetable Garden.

I evaluated what vegetables would be nutritious and that I like to eat. Some vegetables need special things like trellises. This would have required additional time in my first year of learning about a vegetable garden—so I decided to stay with simple crops in the beginning. Some vegetables were things that I could buy at the local farmers market very inexpensively and so I decided to postpone planting those in the beginning too.

That got me down to a selection of vegetables that I could grow easily and enjoy by simply going into my vegetable patch before making a nutritious dinner and picking them fresh, on the spot. Plus, I could grow vegetables that I couldn’t get where I was living like English parsnips and Asian greens and herbs. And then there are novelty vegetables like red and purple carrots, striped Italian beets—and fiery hot peppers from places like North Africa and Vietnam.

I have learned to be cautious about how much I plant at once. Suddenly having 30 lettuces ready to harvest isn’t terribly efficient. Carrots and beets are a bit more forgiving because they can be harvested slowly over a number of weeks. Herbs and spices, fruit trees, and peppers are also forgiving because they have an extended window for harvesting.

I had to discipline myself to plant a fewer number of seeds for each individual crop—but plant more frequently—say only 10 or 12 lettuce seeds, but every month or so.

So over several years I was able to add a little to my garden area each year and expand upon my list of vegetables. During this time I have regularly grown:

The majority of these vegetables have done very well. However, some don’t where I live, because of the humidity: For example I don’t have much luck with tomatoes. They get a mildew or a fungus and just don’t do well. But I do get a first flush of cherry tomatoes on each plant which are absolutely delicious. So I try and replant every 3 months.

This assortment of vegetables allows me to go to my garden at 6 o’clock in the evening and pick most everything that I need for a salad, or a soup or a side dish. I have enough unusual vegetables, spices, peppers and fruit trees that I can cook international recipes that I enjoy.

Week 3. Soil Part 1.

Compost	Soft open texture, nutrients—and the importance of worms for making compost!
	Over many years, my vegetable gardens have been strictly organic. No synthetic fertilizers, no chemical pesticides. This week we will evaluate which soil amendments you have available for your planting beds. Having a compost pile is a great benefit. Other amendments that are easily available for me are chicken manure and worm compost.

I really didn’t have a measuring stick for fertilizing my crops. So a friend suggested that I buy an inexpensive soil testing kit just to get a bench mark about where I was. I then was able to do some research to find out what types of organic soil amendments might balance out my soil health.

So, this week we will be learning how to provided nutrition for your plants and explore how you can have healthy, plant friendly soil too.

Week 4. Soil Part 2.

Planting Beds	Double digging to fluff up the soil
	This week we will actually dig and form our first planting bed. Since this may be the first time a bed has been made in your garden, it may require some extra work. So start small. Each month you can form additional beds.

Week 5. Planting.

Planting Plugs	Planning and Planting Seeds and Seedlings.
	After I prepare my soil—I can do one of two things:

1. Plant seeds directly in my garden beds. I can plant rows of root crops (beets, carrots and radishes) and green onions and mesclun directly into the soil in the planters. No need to start these kinds of seeds in a seed tray and then transplant them.
2. Transplant seedlings from seed starting trays or from a nursery into my garden beds. But my other seeds are all started in plastic seed trays with individual cells (my favorite size has 51 cells—each about 3 inches deep) filled with peat moss. I simply plant the seeds the depth recommended on the seed packet. Typically, 4 to 6 weeks after germination, the ‘plugs’ are ready to transplant directly into the containers.

Week 6. Sun & Water

Water	Learning how to gauge sun and water.
	Watering is a constant. Sometimes, if it’s hot, dry and sunny, I have to water every day. Compost mixed into the soil absorbs water and also creates air pockets in the soil which allows moisture to accumulate. So this can reduce the frequency of watering. Simple mulch on the soil surface also helps to reduce evaporation.

Week 7. Insect Vigilance.

Insects

Practice insect vigilance-organically.

I haven’t really had that many problems with insects. We have an insect that we call a roly-poly (pill bug or armadillidium vulgare). It’s a small oval shaped insect with about 100 legs and when you disturb them, they curl up into a perfect sphere. They like to chew on new growth so they’re very hard on new seed sprouts. I simply have to keep an eye out for them and pick them out of the containers by hand. I’ll tell you about several other ‘secret’ tricks I use in Week 7.

Aphids can occasionally be a problem—you just need to keep your eye out for them so you can nip them in the bud.

Cabbage moths are another problem. You can suddenly have caterpillars on all of your cabbage plant leaves that begin eating them very rapidly. They can denude a cabbage plant in a few days. So likewise, you need to keep a vigilant eye out for them and clean the eggs off of the leaves before they can become caterpillars. You can also put netting over susceptible plants to keep the cabbage moths from laying eggs in the first place.

Week 8. Making Nutritious, Delicious Meals from the Garden.

Harvest

Nutrition, Meal Planning, Harvesting and Succession Planting.

I’m a pretty busy guy—but I also like to cook. It’s a way for me to relax and unwind in the evening after a long day. Cooking is also healthier than eating out at restaurants! However, with my limited spare time I find that sometimes I become guilty of not paying attention to what’s available in the garden. So I might prepare several evening meals—only to discover that I haven’t been using (for example) lettuce—and all of my lettuce is beginning to go to seed.

I will share resources that I use for planning nutritious meals using recipes keyed to plants that are ready to harvest. After cooking with your kitchen garden for a year, you will have a much better sense of seeds to buy next year—and the timing/quantities of what to plant.   So a personal goal of mine for this year is to develop a super simple system so I am aware of what vegetables I need to be incorporating into evenings meals. White board on the fridge maybe?