Thursday, April 19, 2012

Spaghetti Garden

As upset as I was about having sad, purple tomato seedlings staring up at me from their spot in the window sill, I had other things that needed to be done for the day - like figuring out what to make for dinner.  Therefore, before transplanting my tomatoes I needed to decide on that.  Opening up the cabinets, I saw something that gave me an idea not only about what to make for dinner, but also what to do with my transplant location.

A jar of spaghetti sauce!!!

No, really.  Think about it.

Spaghetti for dinner.  That's the easy part.  Anybody can figure out that's what I was thinking of.  It's a quick dinner, too, so I didn't have to worry about my time being limited.

But what does this have to do with my transplants? 

Well, spaghetti sauce isn't just tomato, after all.  It's also mixed with things like basil, garlic, oregano, chives... the list goes on.

"I'll plant a Spaghetti Garden!"  I squealed.  My daughter looked at me in confusion for a few seconds, trying to figure out why I was yelling at the cabinet, then burst out with a song that had something to do with noodle flowers and meatball trees.

Clearly, she takes after me...

My ultimate goal has been to create an edible landscape.  Naturally, a section whose purpose is to provide necessary components for a single meal, or at least the majority of one, would be perfect for that.

So I grabbed a large flowerpot that had been sitting in front of the garage since I moved here.  One side of it has a large, gaping hole on the top which was either created by me smacking my car into it (very possible), or was already there when we moved here (also possible).  Regardless, since the hole is at the very top, the flower pot is perfectly usable.  I placed one of my tomato seedlings at the center.



I then planted two rows of chive seeds on the left, and two rows of basil seeds on the right.  At the top I plan to plant oregano seeds, as well, but I haven't bought any oregano seeds yet, so that'll have to wait until I go to the garden center again.  Both herb sections have very short rows, of course, but herbs grow so quickly when pruned that I'm not worried about having enough to go around.

Here's a look at how I planned out the sections:



One may question how I plan to make spaghetti sauce using this garden if I don't have any garlic.  Well, chives are actually a pretty decent substitute as long as you use the proper amount.  Of course, there's always the possibility of planting garlic in anouther location.  As a root vegetable it may be less sensitive to black wanut toxicity, so could actually be planted in the ground.  Tomatoes, on the other hand, are not tolerant of black walnut, so must be in a container in my yard.

I'm looking forward to homegrown spaghetti sauce!

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