Add Photo to Journal
|
|
| Photo Credit: Megan Bame |
| An attractive produce display creates curb appeal and helps your customers easily select what they want. |
There’s no doubt my husband and I have a large garden, by any standard – if it were much larger, we’d have to call it a field. Seriously, at 150-by-60 feet, we’ve got more than enough room to grow a bounty of vegetables to eat fresh and preserve for later the year. Even if we had a smaller garden, good weather and healthy plants would yield us more produce than we’d know what to do with. If you’re like us and overflowing in the fruit and veggie department, here are three options that’ll keep your extra produce from becoming compost.
Share it! You can bet that neighbors, family, friends and co-workers would be glad to take a few fresh fruits and vegetables off your hands every now and then. If they seem a little reluctant to try something different – like a unique veggie they’ve never tasted or prepared before – you might even present them with a recipe or two to go along with your harvest offering. And if you find yourself overrun by a particular crop, like tomatoes or cucumbers, consider donating your overflow to a soup kitchen, food pantry, nursing home or day care, where fresh, nutritious produce may be an infrequent treat. Growing extra to share your food is one idea the Garden Writers Association encourages through a program dubbed Plant a Row for the Hungry. As the name implies, vegetable gardeners are asked to intentionally plant more than they need, so they can share the surplus with service programs in local communities that feed the hungry. Whether you purposefully plant extra or simply find yourself with more than you can eat, look to share some portion of your garden with someone in need.
|