Your Garden…Your Medicine

Hello Girlfriends….Doc here

Now that we have grown and worked the land to gain a healthy harvest I felt it time to share with you all of the benefits of eating healthy food as medicine. Did you realize the three vegetables we planted the green pepper, tomatoes, and basil are all loaded with healthy vitamins and health giving nutrients. Did you also know that they are good for curing some of your ailments?

How about if we dive into some of their health giving benefits.

Let’s start with Green peppers.

A fresh green pepper is low in calories and contains 0 grams of fat and a good supply vitamins and minerals. Their mildly sweet flavor makes green bell peppers versatile enough to include a wide variety of nutritious recipes such as salads, roasted green peppers, and antipastis.

May The Planting Commence

So last month we prepared our soil and learned all about the healthy bacteria in the soil and how to amend it if needed. The freeze warnings have passed so it’s now safe for us to proceed with our healthy garden.   Are you ready to get started?

Food gardens can be grown easily in containers, a small 4×4 raised bed, or a small portion of your garden. Place the containers, or plant the garden starters or seeds where they will get even sun and shelter from prevailing winds.

The first step is preparing the soil for your seeds, or small plant starters – but we’ve already covered that last month. When starting a garden sometimes it is best in a cooler spot in your garden or on your patio.  As an aside you can start a garden in the cooler months of spring or fall. Anytime of year will work as long as your plants are not in direct hot sun which will wilt the leaves.

Grow Your Non Toxic Garden Today

As with all new adventures, sometimes it takes a little planning.  While we are pretty excited to start gardening, the potential for frost has left us in our planning stage until April 10th, but as the saying goes – “proper preparation prevents poor performance”, so that is what we are shooting for!

Before we get started, I want to talk some dirt on dirt. Just like your gastrointestinal system , the soil that grows your food is a microcosm of bacteria and yeast….or at least it used to be .  In the days prior to industrial farming , farmers would rotate their crops, growing different types of plants at different times of year , letting the fields rest at least once yearly . The livestock would roam the fields after harvest.  By having a “life cycle “, important nutrients that were lost at different times in the crop rotation would be replaced . Also being replaced were the bacteria that populate plant roots that help plants resist disease and insects .  Some of these bacteria then find their way to onto our skin at the time of harvest and then later into our GI system.  These are what we call ‘good bacteria.’

What’s the dirt on dirt?

As with all new adventures, sometimes it takes a little planning.  While we are pretty excited to start gardening, the potential for frost has left us in our planning stage until April 10th, but as the saying goes – “proper preparation prevents poor performance”, so that is what we are shooting for!

Before we get started, I want to talk some dirt on dirt. Just like your gastrointestinal system , the soil that grows your food is a microcosm of bacteria and yeast….or at least it used to be .  In the days prior to industrial farming , farmers would rotate their crops, growing different types of plants at different times of year , letting the fields rest at least once yearly . The livestock would roam the fields after harvest.  By having a “life cycle “, important nutrients that were lost at different times in the crop rotation would be replaced . Also being replaced were the bacteria that populate plant roots that help plants resist disease and insects .  Some of these bacteria then find their way to onto our skin at the time of harvest and then later into our GI system.  These are what we call ‘good bacteria.’