Mother Earth's Garden

Every year I can and freeze a ton of fruits and vegetables from my garden. There are some fruits, grains, and vegetables that can be kept for long periods of time without any extra preparation from you. Those are some of my favorites. You can extend your garden meals long into the winter if you include some of these long keepers in your garden plans.

Here are some of my favorite fruits and vegetables to grow for their long storage capacity:

• Pumpkins and winter squash will keep for most of the winter if you keep them in a cool dry place, and protect them from bruising. I still have a pumpkin in my kitchen that was harvested late last fall. I think I’m going to bake it this weekend to make some pumpkin muffins, or custard, and cookies.
• Some apple varieties will also keep for long periods of time. I had apples in my pantry until Christmas this year. They will start to get a little soft, but they’re still excellent for baking and frying.
• I like to harvest a few green tomatoes at the end of the season, when a hard frost is called for. I lay them on the counter in the kitchen and let them ripen slowly over the next few weeks. They don’t have quite as much flavor as summer tomatoes picked fresh from the garden, but they’re better (and cheaper) than their supermarket counterparts. There are some tomato varieties that work better for this than others. I was still eating tomatoes from my garden on sandwiches in early December last year.
• Potatoes, onions and sweet potatoes can also keep for several months fresh from the garden. Don’t wash them or scrub them until you’re ready to use them, or you may bruise them and cause them to spoil quicker.
• Cabbage, kale, and spinach are all cold weather crops you can harvest from the garden until winter sets in.
• Beans are also easy to dry and store through the winter, and will keep for quite a long time if they’ve been properly dried.
• Grains and corn can be dried and used through the winter. Some of my favorite grains to grow in the garden are quinoa and spelt. You can also dry your unused sweet corn on the cob and shell it later for parched corn. If you’ve never had parched corn you should try it. Parched corn is one of my favorite fall treats. It’s simply dried sweet corn kernels that you cook in hot oil until they “pop.” They don’t pop open like popcorn, but they do puff up. Speaking of popcorn, it’s another grain you can dry and store through the winter.

Make sure you keep some of these in mind when you’re planning your garden this year.

What’s your favorite tip for keeping the harvest well past gardening season?

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