Loved this video! I appreciate how you incorporated photos of the actual fruit or vegetable, as well as cooking photos. We moved 5 years ago to a family farm, Zone 6b, with lots of clay soil. I've been adding and amending new areas for 2-3 years (endless supply of leaves, twigs n sticks) and we purchase loads of top soil. I plan to learn your hay bales growing technique. I will look for videos. Keep up the great work.
How fun! Sounds like we are in similar places. We also connected with a local landscaping company and they brought all their collected leaves to our property, more than 100 yards! The straw bales are such a great option, can grow in them and then add that beautifully composted straw to your beds at the end of the season. Happy gardening!
Great video, Peter & Hilary! 🌱 It's always fun to hear about your gardening experiences and what worked (or didn't) for you. I’m especially excited about the new veggie varieties you plan to try for 2025 - can’t wait to hear how they turn out! I’d love to recommend trying tomato pepper strip if you haven’t yet - it’s been a real winner for us! Keep up the awesome work and thanks for sharing your journey! 🙌🌿
Hi Fellow Ohioian here and I'm glad I found you. I'm always looking for new things to try and you've mentioned a few that will be added to my list. Just fyi: "Jade" green beans have been my families favorite for at least 4 generations. They are the only variety that you can pressure can process- they won't turn to mush, and they taste delicious! Happy gardening!
Just discovered and subscribed to your channel. I'm really enjoying you sharing your experience with the different varieties of seeds. The garden looks beautiful. Every year we grow Celebrity Tomatoes for canning and fresh eating. They are disease resistant and very prolific. I highly recommend!
Thank you!! We have grown celebrity in the past, absolutely tried and true great tomato for sure. Super disease resistant and consistent. The only reason we stopped growing it is we generally have enough fresh eating tomatoes from the indeterminant vines we grow, so we have focused mostly on paste tomatoes to reduce the amount of cook down time (since celebrity is a juicier tomato). Perhaps we will try a few plants again this year =). Happy gardening!
Thank you so much for sharing your garden observations from last season and "best and worst" review. I just placed a seed order and took some of your feedback into consideration in my order. I garden in zone 7a, but am a bit challenged because of living on a smaller lot with lots of neighboring trees. I can get away with a Spring/Summer garden, but Fall seems to lack enough sun for a worthwhile crop much beyond lettuce and turnips. =) Would LOVE to hear more about the straw bale gardening. I noticed you mentioned in a reply to an inquiry below you would be posting on it, and I vote a "Yea" on that! Thanks again, and keep up the good work and sharing your journey.
You're so welcome, glad it was helpful! Strawbale garden video is definitely on the list, we will make it happen this year. Best of luck with your growing season!
This was awesome, I really enjoy your videos! I am gonna watch your ‘starting onions’ soon, I am gonna try walla walla sweets this year. I am from the northwest & love them! Your straw bale videos inspired me to try it this year. I just received my Baker Creek seed order, this is gonna be fun!🎉🐝🌸🍅🎉 May 2025 be good to you & yours & all gardeners!🎉
Thank you! So exciting! Yes, just about time to start onion seeds. We planted ours out mid March last year, hopefully another early spring 🤞. Best of luck with the straw bales and this years garden!
i can't wait to see what you guys do this year. where do you get your seeds from when you have to buy them? Are you guys going to make any seed starter videos, i hope so. i enjoy your videos, thank you for taking time to make them:)
Thank you! Appreciate the encouragement =). We get the bulk of our seeds from Johnny's Seeds but also a few other retailers (Burpee, Gurney's, Totally Tomatoes, Select Seeds) We will definitely make some videos as we start seeds. We are starting onions very soon!
Thank you so much! We don't have a spreadsheet but perhaps we can work on one this season...the majority of our seeds come from Johnny's Seeds but we also order from Burpee, Totally Tomatoes, Select Seeds and get some seeds locally. Thanks again for watching!
The cucurbitacin that gives cukes the bitter overtones and that can make some people burp is what actually attracts cucumber beetles, so burpless cucumbers are always going to have less problems with beetles. This def sounds like a variety I want to try... though not this year, since I already have all my seeds in zone 9b. I agree with you about the Jimmy Nardellos in general, but what I've found they're actually really good for is pickling. The thin walls let them really soak up the brine flavor but they keep enough sweet pepper flavor to be a really nice addition. Especially to bread and butter pickles.
Good to know! Really love those cucumbers. I'd say the only downside is they have very delicate flesh so if you get any pests snacking they scar easily. That's a good point about the Jimmy Nardello. We haven't tried pickling peppers but as we said one of our goals is to try and preserve more peppers so perhaps we will try it. The ripe shishitos (when red) were also sweet, similar to a Jimmy Nardello. Best of luck with your winter/early spring season! Jealous you get to start so soon!
@@TheGardenFamily I'm trying shishitos for the first time this year, hoping they'll be good for stuffing since the nardellos really aren't b/c of the thin walls. I do love my year round growing season here, I can grow some kind of veggies 365 days a year, but the low chill hours does limit my fruit options.
We are located near Ann Arbor, Michigan and always grew little watermelons, until I grew a variety on a whim that was developed here in Michigan called "Leelanau" watermelon. It has yellow flesh, and is large-ish, and SO incredible. It is like eating straight up candy. They grew well without issue, so if you decide to try a larger watermelom, this is a good one!
If you like roasted tomatillo salsa, you can roast the tomatillos, chili peppers, & garlic then freeze it. Before serving, thaw & add diced & rinsed white onion, fresh lime juice, & cilantro. Tastes like it just came out of the garden & faster than canning
It has been so much fun seeing what worked and did not work for you guys! I live in the deep South zone 8B so I need heat tollerant plants. I have great luck with peppers, tomatoes, beans and melons. I have to use container gardening where I live, so I am learning as much as I can about grow bags! Melons are out as they need to sprawl, so ground cherries might be a good fruit option, thanks for mentioning those!
Thank you! We are really excited about the ground cherries, maybe they will work for you too? Even though they seem so closely related to tomatillos I read they are self fertile so you should only need to plant one. Thanks for watching!
What a great recap of 24 and reveal for 25. I just found your channel recently. I garden in zone 6b also. I am interested in two specific topics and wonder if you go deep on these topics in any of your videos. First, how you plan out your growing season. You mentioned planting for late spring and fall harvest. Do you have a master calendar you will be willing to share? Also, I am interested in how you prepare straw bales for growing tomatoes. Have you covered this topic in depth in one of your videos. Thank you for such informative videos.
Welcome! Always nice to follow along with people in the same growing zone. We made a video last winter called "Timing is Everything" where we talk about a lot of the seed timings, including the fall. For fall brassicas (cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower etc) we usually aim to get them in the ground by mid Aug so we usually start them indoors early July. It can be hard to remember since it's the middle of the summer season! I definitely need to get a video out about the straw bale preparation as many people have asked about it. So we will put that on our list! Generally we start conditioning the bales in early April.
German here. When it comes to potatoes an storage we look at them as two types. Early summer types and storage types. The storage types are grown for a fall harvest. I don't know how you store your potatoes but the other thing that makes them last, is not to wash them until you cook with them and not to dry air. Perhaps this helps.
I enjoyed this video. I agree 100% about Jimmy Nardello, I really like the flavor of the pepper, but it just doesn't work great with the types of cooking that we do the most. I am actually trying San Joaquin jalapenos this year as well. Paquime is a medium heat jalapeno that did great for us last year...kind of nice to have a less hot one to mix in for salsas and some other recipes. We grow hotter ones, too, but I like to have different heat levels. Golden Glory zucchini is a reliable performer for us. Paul Robeson is a really tasty dark tomato, as good as Black Krim, but a little different. I also grew some dwarf tomatoes that I liked last year--Boronia and Purple Reign were great. Pozzano and Zenzei are two standout paste tomatoes with great yield, but they are indeterminates. Sungold is great. We like to grow about 3-4 different cherry tomato plants for the different colors and flavors. Sun Orange tastes just like Sungold but doesn't crack so much and the fruit are a bit bigger. I'm trying Rosella Cherry this year which has been getting rave reviews.
Yes about Jimmy Nardello! We really wanted to love this pepper but the reality was we didn’t use many of the peppers. I’ll have to look into Paul Robeson as I really like darker tomatoes, thanks for the tip! We are growing some micro dwarf tomatoes indoors right now but don’t have fruit yet, new experiment for us. Thanks for all the tips on your other favorites as well! Hope you’re gearing up for a great season!
Hi Carol! I'm not a professional chef but love cooking, especially fresh from the garden. We plan on putting up a couple cooking videos this year...look for a seed-to-pizza video in late summer! -Hilary
I’m new to your channel and love your garden set-up and content. Keep it coming please! A fantastic determinant paste tomato is Roma Supremo. Large and great disease resistance. Paisano I would have loved but they had bacterial spot so I had to toss the seeds. I just bought Brandyboy seeds so I’m happy to see your review. Try Principe Borghese. They’re not for fresh eating but flavour intensifies when dehydrated or cooked in a sauce. Super prolific and I add them to my romas for a big flavour boost. Jimmy Nardello is our favourite pepper. Great tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasted. Freezes well. Carmen is also a fantastic grower in my South Eastern Ontario season. 14 or more large peppers per plant when bells never do well for me. I haven’t tried Unagi but they keep catching my eye. Our go-to parthenocarpic is Diva. I’ve grown them up a tomato twine with clips and also on a fence panel. Indestructible and so prolific they’re like trying to give away zucchini. I ended up dehydrating them and making cucumber powder for dressings and Thai soups. I do the same with Dunja zucchini. It makes great Amish Squash Flour for using as a thickener instead of cornstarch. Wishing you a great gardening season in 2025!
@@Jowe.537 thank you for the encouragement and all the recommendations! We wrote down some of your suggestions and will take a look. We grew Carmen last year with good success but wanted to try a more traditional bell shaped sweet pepper as they work better in many recipes, hopefully we aren’t disappointed with the switch. As we said, Jimmy Nardello grew well and was prolific but we didn’t end up eating many of the peppers as the very thin walls and variable shape made them more difficult to use in our recipes. Hope Brandy Boy works for you like it did for us 🤞. Happy gardening!
Great information! I'm in zone 5 and I grew the Belstar broccoli which was great! Also, the Crimson sweet watermelon was the best tasting watermelon. Good luck and I will be following you. Would love to see Hillary cook some of these veges.
@@PLD244 we’ve heard Belstar is a good variety, we will see about ordering it to compare with Emerald Crown this year! Crimson sweet looks good (although Hilary’s not a huge watermelon fan 😂). We will try and add some cooking / preserving into this years videos as well!
I have some favorite tomato's worth trying. A beefsteak type red is the Abe Lincoln 1923, Sun Sugar cherry is slightly better than Sungold to me, Romeo is a large great paste tomato, Orange Russian 117 is an oxheart bi color and Indiana Red is a good oxheart also. I am in Indiana and source the majority of my seeds locally from a reputable seed seller.
@@douglassullivan9684 thank you for the suggestions! We are always looking to try new varieties and especially coming from people in similar growing climates!
Great video! I’d try the yellow tomatillos from baker creek Chupon de malinalco. So good with the traditional tomatillos in salsa. They’re a little sweet.
Those sound great Renee! Writing them down. I think we could handle 3 tomatillo plants...just need to find better support for them compared to last year!
@ I’ve been toying with putting a cattle panel horizontal hooked to T posts. They can grow up and through the squares. They definitely need room but I love making salsa verde!
You should try honey nut squash by Baker Creek because they are a small little butternut squash that is extremely tasty and sweet. They are the perfect size to cut in half and each person has a half a squash to have. They also produce quite a few little squash as well
Just an FYI for you... German Queen heirloom I am going to try again this year last year was awful for tomatoes here in Northern Kentucky too much rain and then drought conditions through the summer. German Queen is a large sandwich size slicing tomato low acid extremely meaty I was impressed with how meaty it was and what attracted me to try it is it's low acid claim.
Yes, it was a somewhat strange year with the drought in the second half of the summer. Haven't tried German Queen, let us know if it works for you this year! For low acid we like Mr. Stripey, it's a large yellow tomato with red striping that is quite tasty!
First time this year I'll be trying broccoli seriously. By chance i ordered sun king. but ill see how it'll do here since im alot milder in climate. Ill be trying some sprouting types. Like montebello, purple , santee, red fire. A shame you other pumpkins dont grown well some maxima and pepo types are really good. Its always exciting trying different varieties.
Well I hope Sun King works better for you than it did for us! I was thinking more about it and it may have been the cold that got it to bolt if it is made for a more temperature climate. We plant our broccoli out in early April and often get temperatures below freezing in the early season. We are trying some other pumpkins this year but squash vine borer are very bad in our area so we will see...for bush squash like zucchini we can keep them netted but not something large like a pumpkin. Best of luck this season!
The Big Brandy is a great tomato to try. If you like Brandywine, but don't want the problems with heirlooms. I only plant heirlooms. But this tomato has good flavor and are big.
Good to know! We really liked Brandy Boy which is another hybrid Brandywine-like tomato and were surprised it still had really good flavor (unlike many of the "hybrid heirloom" types that seem to be sold by many seed sellers. Maybe we will try Big Brandy and see which of those hybrids we like more! We still really like Black Krim, German Johnson and Mr. Stripey heirlooms as well for flavor.
@@mariaallevato6121 thank you! You can absolutely do straw bale gardens anywhere but in a hotter, dryer location I’d suggest two things: 1) drip irrigation on a timer and 2) cover the sides of the straw with something (we use logs and woodchip). Otherwise they can dry out easily. Best of luck!
I like Sarah’s Choice melon as well as the squirrels therefore I’ll just get mine at the farmers market. Have you tried Diva cucumbers? They are usually my favorite.
haha, darn squirrels! So far they haven't gotten any melons but we did have a raccoon eat a bunch of them. We haven't tried Diva but they look good! Thin skin like the Unagi we have grown to love, also parthenocarpic but maybe not gynoecious?
Hi Mary, most of our seeds came from Johnny's Seeds (@JohnnysSeeds) but we also have seeds from Burpee, Totally Tomatoes and many flowers from Select Seeds
Do you mean grow them close together? If that’s the question than yes, there is no problem doing this. If they cross pollinate it doesn’t affect this years fruit, only the seeds. So if you saved seeds you could get further hybridization. That being said, tomatoes have a “perfect flower” that pollinates itself most of the time so even if they are close together the chance of cross pollination is low
If you don’t like hot, hot peppers, Baker Creek has some really neat peppers that are just like their hot counterparts, but sweet no heat. They have the sweet bonnet instead of hot scotch bonnet .nadapeno no heat jalapeño. Also orange and red lesya sweet pepper. And then sweet Hinata no heat.
They also have orange spice, brown lemon, spice and pumpkin spice jalapeños, which range from dark orange to pumpkin orange, yellow and brown instead of your traditional green
They also have orange spice, brown lemon, spice and pumpkin spice jalapeños, which range from dark orange to pumpkin orange, yellow and brown instead of your traditional green
We were laughing that the theme of our video was "we can't tolerate spice!" We do like spicy food, I swear! Those look really neat, we are trying that sweet (spineless) habanero, perhaps we will try a few others!
We keep toying with Amish paste but haven't tried it yet. With our set up we grow most of our paste tomatoes as determinant plants in straw bales so that's the one thing that has kept us from growing it (it being an indeterminant paste tomato). Perhaps we will find a spot for one this year however!
When did you plant your Brussel sprouts in garden? And when did you harvest? Also did you start seeds indoors? I grew some for the first time in 2024 and started indoors planted out in May and when they finally were getting some sprouts they got afids really bad Help???😂
We started our brussel sprouts indoors in June, planted out in July. We harvested on Thanksgiving day (we had a really nice Fall season here). I’ve found it better to start fall brassicas indoors since it’s so hot out when they need to be started mid summer. Initially we had shade cloth over the younger plants as well. Hope that helps!
I’m new to your channel and love your garden set-up and content. Keep it coming please! A fantastic determinant paste tomato is Roma Supremo. Large and great disease resistance. Paisano I would have loved but they had bacterial spot so I had to toss the seeds. I just bought Brandyboy seeds so I’m happy to see your review. Try Principe Borghese. They’re not for fresh eating but flavour intensifies when dehydrated or cooked in a sauce. Super prolific and I add them to my romas for a big flavour boost. Jimmy Nardello is our favourite pepper. Great tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasted. Freezes well. Carmen is also a fantastic grower in my South Eastern Ontario season. 14 or more large peppers per plant when bells never do well for me. I haven’t tried Unagi but they keep catching my eye. Our go-to parthenocarpic is Diva. I’ve grown them up a tomato twine with clips and also on a fence panel. Indestructible and so prolific they’re like trying to give away zucchini. I ended up dehydrating them and making cucumber powder for dressings and Thai soups. I do the same with Dunja zucchini. It makes great Amish Squash Flour for using as a thickener instead of cornstarch. Wishing you a great gardening season in 2025!
Loved this video! I appreciate how you incorporated photos of the actual fruit or vegetable, as well as cooking photos. We moved 5 years ago to a family farm, Zone 6b, with lots of clay soil. I've been adding and amending new areas for 2-3 years (endless supply of leaves, twigs n sticks) and we purchase loads of top soil. I plan to learn your hay bales growing technique. I will look for videos. Keep up the great work.
How fun! Sounds like we are in similar places. We also connected with a local landscaping company and they brought all their collected leaves to our property, more than 100 yards! The straw bales are such a great option, can grow in them and then add that beautifully composted straw to your beds at the end of the season. Happy gardening!
Great video, Peter & Hilary! 🌱 It's always fun to hear about your gardening experiences and what worked (or didn't) for you. I’m especially excited about the new veggie varieties you plan to try for 2025 - can’t wait to hear how they turn out! I’d love to recommend trying tomato pepper strip if you haven’t yet - it’s been a real winner for us! Keep up the awesome work and thanks for sharing your journey! 🙌🌿
Thank you! For the tomato you were referring to, where can we find it? Thanks again!
You are a lovely hardworking family😍😍😍
God bless you abundantly 🙏🏻
Thank you so much! 😊
Love your videos! Kudos for inspiring others to garden 👍 Thank you for sharing your experiences 🙏
Thank you! Appreciate the comment and the encouragement!!
Hi
Fellow Ohioian here and I'm glad I found you. I'm always looking for new things to try and you've mentioned a few that will be added to my list.
Just fyi: "Jade" green beans have been my families favorite for at least 4 generations. They are the only variety that you can pressure can process- they won't turn to mush, and they taste delicious!
Happy gardening!
Oh- also- I love Johnny's salanova line of lettuce. I grow it indoors in a greenstalk planter all winter long.
It's soooo good! =)
Well hi! Nice to have you on board. Glad to hear Jade worked well for you, hopefully the same for us! Happy gardening!
Just discovered and subscribed to your channel. I'm really enjoying you sharing your experience with the different varieties of seeds. The garden looks beautiful. Every year we grow Celebrity Tomatoes for canning and fresh eating. They are disease resistant and very prolific. I highly recommend!
Thank you!! We have grown celebrity in the past, absolutely tried and true great tomato for sure. Super disease resistant and consistent. The only reason we stopped growing it is we generally have enough fresh eating tomatoes from the indeterminant vines we grow, so we have focused mostly on paste tomatoes to reduce the amount of cook down time (since celebrity is a juicier tomato). Perhaps we will try a few plants again this year =). Happy gardening!
Thank you so much for sharing your garden observations from last season and "best and worst" review. I just placed a seed order and took some of your feedback into consideration in my order. I garden in zone 7a, but am a bit challenged because of living on a smaller lot with lots of neighboring trees. I can get away with a Spring/Summer garden, but Fall seems to lack enough sun for a worthwhile crop much beyond lettuce and turnips. =)
Would LOVE to hear more about the straw bale gardening. I noticed you mentioned in a reply to an inquiry below you would be posting on it, and I vote a "Yea" on that!
Thanks again, and keep up the good work and sharing your journey.
You're so welcome, glad it was helpful! Strawbale garden video is definitely on the list, we will make it happen this year. Best of luck with your growing season!
Thank you for the inspirational videos.
We really appreciate that, happy gardening!
Really love your reflections on your gardening year!
Thank you! Appreciate you taking the time to comment =)
This was awesome, I really enjoy your videos! I am gonna watch your ‘starting onions’ soon, I am gonna try walla walla sweets this year. I am from the northwest & love them! Your straw bale videos inspired me to try it this year. I just received my Baker Creek seed order, this is gonna be fun!🎉🐝🌸🍅🎉 May 2025 be good to you & yours & all gardeners!🎉
Thank you! So exciting! Yes, just about time to start onion seeds. We planted ours out mid March last year, hopefully another early spring 🤞. Best of luck with the straw bales and this years garden!
i can't wait to see what you guys do this year.
where do you get your seeds from when you have to buy them?
Are you guys going to make any seed starter videos, i hope so.
i enjoy your videos, thank you for taking time to make them:)
Thank you! Appreciate the encouragement =). We get the bulk of our seeds from Johnny's Seeds but also a few other retailers (Burpee, Gurney's, Totally Tomatoes, Select Seeds) We will definitely make some videos as we start seeds. We are starting onions very soon!
Ran across this video and wow such great information. Just subscribed to your channel 😊
@@carmenhester1992 so glad it was helpful! Welcome aboard! 😊
Loving your channel. Excellent editing! Do you happen to have a spreadsheet with these varieties and where you order them from?
Thank you so much! We don't have a spreadsheet but perhaps we can work on one this season...the majority of our seeds come from Johnny's Seeds but we also order from Burpee, Totally Tomatoes, Select Seeds and get some seeds locally. Thanks again for watching!
The cucurbitacin that gives cukes the bitter overtones and that can make some people burp is what actually attracts cucumber beetles, so burpless cucumbers are always going to have less problems with beetles. This def sounds like a variety I want to try... though not this year, since I already have all my seeds in zone 9b.
I agree with you about the Jimmy Nardellos in general, but what I've found they're actually really good for is pickling. The thin walls let them really soak up the brine flavor but they keep enough sweet pepper flavor to be a really nice addition. Especially to bread and butter pickles.
Good to know! Really love those cucumbers. I'd say the only downside is they have very delicate flesh so if you get any pests snacking they scar easily. That's a good point about the Jimmy Nardello. We haven't tried pickling peppers but as we said one of our goals is to try and preserve more peppers so perhaps we will try it. The ripe shishitos (when red) were also sweet, similar to a Jimmy Nardello.
Best of luck with your winter/early spring season! Jealous you get to start so soon!
@@TheGardenFamily I'm trying shishitos for the first time this year, hoping they'll be good for stuffing since the nardellos really aren't b/c of the thin walls. I do love my year round growing season here, I can grow some kind of veggies 365 days a year, but the low chill hours does limit my fruit options.
We are located near Ann Arbor, Michigan and always grew little watermelons, until I grew a variety on a whim that was developed here in Michigan called "Leelanau" watermelon. It has yellow flesh, and is large-ish, and SO incredible. It is like eating straight up candy. They grew well without issue, so if you decide to try a larger watermelom, this is a good one!
Great to hear! We will have to try it. Thanks for the advice!
If you like roasted tomatillo salsa, you can roast the tomatillos, chili peppers, & garlic then freeze it. Before serving, thaw & add diced & rinsed white onion, fresh lime juice, & cilantro. Tastes like it just came out of the garden & faster than canning
What a great idea! We actually just got a deep freeze in the garage for Christmas so it will be much easier to preserve things that way. Thanks Amy!
It has been so much fun seeing what worked and did not work for you guys! I live in the deep South zone 8B so I need heat tollerant plants. I have great luck with peppers, tomatoes, beans and melons. I have to use container gardening where I live, so I am learning as much as I can about grow bags! Melons are out as they need to sprawl, so ground cherries might be a good fruit option, thanks for mentioning those!
Thank you! We are really excited about the ground cherries, maybe they will work for you too? Even though they seem so closely related to tomatillos I read they are self fertile so you should only need to plant one. Thanks for watching!
What a great recap of 24 and reveal for 25. I just found your channel recently. I garden in zone 6b also. I am interested in two specific topics and wonder if you go deep on these topics in any of your videos. First, how you plan out your growing season. You mentioned planting for late spring and fall harvest. Do you have a master calendar you will be willing to share? Also, I am interested in how you prepare straw bales for growing tomatoes. Have you covered this topic in depth in one of your videos. Thank you for such informative videos.
Welcome! Always nice to follow along with people in the same growing zone. We made a video last winter called "Timing is Everything" where we talk about a lot of the seed timings, including the fall. For fall brassicas (cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower etc) we usually aim to get them in the ground by mid Aug so we usually start them indoors early July. It can be hard to remember since it's the middle of the summer season! I definitely need to get a video out about the straw bale preparation as many people have asked about it. So we will put that on our list! Generally we start conditioning the bales in early April.
German here. When it comes to potatoes an storage we look at them as two types. Early summer types and storage types. The storage types are grown for a fall harvest. I don't know how you store your potatoes but the other thing that makes them last, is not to wash them until you cook with them and not to dry air. Perhaps this helps.
I enjoyed this video. I agree 100% about Jimmy Nardello, I really like the flavor of the pepper, but it just doesn't work great with the types of cooking that we do the most. I am actually trying San Joaquin jalapenos this year as well. Paquime is a medium heat jalapeno that did great for us last year...kind of nice to have a less hot one to mix in for salsas and some other recipes. We grow hotter ones, too, but I like to have different heat levels. Golden Glory zucchini is a reliable performer for us. Paul Robeson is a really tasty dark tomato, as good as Black Krim, but a little different. I also grew some dwarf tomatoes that I liked last year--Boronia and Purple Reign were great. Pozzano and Zenzei are two standout paste tomatoes with great yield, but they are indeterminates. Sungold is great. We like to grow about 3-4 different cherry tomato plants for the different colors and flavors. Sun Orange tastes just like Sungold but doesn't crack so much and the fruit are a bit bigger. I'm trying Rosella Cherry this year which has been getting rave reviews.
Yes about Jimmy Nardello! We really wanted to love this pepper but the reality was we didn’t use many of the peppers. I’ll have to look into Paul Robeson as I really like darker tomatoes, thanks for the tip! We are growing some micro dwarf tomatoes indoors right now but don’t have fruit yet, new experiment for us. Thanks for all the tips on your other favorites as well! Hope you’re gearing up for a great season!
I can't wait either. It's snowy, gray, and cold today! I always enjoy your videos. Is Hillary a chef?
Hi Carol! I'm not a professional chef but love cooking, especially fresh from the garden. We plan on putting up a couple cooking videos this year...look for a seed-to-pizza video in late summer! -Hilary
I’m new to your channel and love your garden set-up and content. Keep it coming please!
A fantastic determinant paste tomato is Roma Supremo. Large and great disease resistance. Paisano I would have loved but they had bacterial spot so I had to toss the seeds. I just bought Brandyboy seeds so I’m happy to see your review. Try Principe Borghese. They’re not for fresh eating but flavour intensifies when dehydrated or cooked in a sauce. Super prolific and I add them to my romas for a big flavour boost.
Jimmy Nardello is our favourite pepper. Great tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasted. Freezes well. Carmen is also a fantastic grower in my South Eastern Ontario season. 14 or more large peppers per plant when bells never do well for me.
I haven’t tried Unagi but they keep catching my eye. Our go-to parthenocarpic is Diva. I’ve grown them up a tomato twine with clips and also on a fence panel. Indestructible and so prolific they’re like trying to give away zucchini. I ended up dehydrating them and making cucumber powder for dressings and Thai soups. I do the same with Dunja zucchini. It makes great Amish Squash Flour for using as a thickener instead of cornstarch. Wishing you a great gardening season in 2025!
@@Jowe.537 thank you for the encouragement and all the recommendations! We wrote down some of your suggestions and will take a look. We grew Carmen last year with good success but wanted to try a more traditional bell shaped sweet pepper as they work better in many recipes, hopefully we aren’t disappointed with the switch. As we said, Jimmy Nardello grew well and was prolific but we didn’t end up eating many of the peppers as the very thin walls and variable shape made them more difficult to use in our recipes. Hope Brandy Boy works for you like it did for us 🤞. Happy gardening!
I hate when my potatoes “chit” everywhere 😂
Great video, guys! ❤🌱
@@NicoleSmithGardening 😆😂🤣 thanks Nicole!
Great information! I'm in zone 5 and I grew the Belstar broccoli which was great! Also, the Crimson sweet watermelon was the best tasting watermelon. Good luck and I will be following you. Would love to see Hillary cook some of these veges.
@@PLD244 we’ve heard Belstar is a good variety, we will see about ordering it to compare with Emerald Crown this year! Crimson sweet looks good (although Hilary’s not a huge watermelon fan 😂). We will try and add some cooking / preserving into this years videos as well!
Thank you for the wonderful video, very informative. I usually plant the China Jade cucumber, they are prolific and delicious.
@@davannhuynh4279 you’re welcome! I heard China Jade was good, perhaps we will compare. Thanks for the suggestion!
I have some favorite tomato's worth trying. A beefsteak type red is the Abe Lincoln 1923, Sun Sugar cherry is slightly better than Sungold to me, Romeo is a large great paste tomato, Orange Russian 117 is an oxheart bi color and Indiana Red is a good oxheart also. I am in Indiana and source the majority of my seeds locally from a reputable seed seller.
@@douglassullivan9684 thank you for the suggestions! We are always looking to try new varieties and especially coming from people in similar growing climates!
Great video! I’d try the yellow tomatillos from baker creek Chupon de malinalco. So good with the traditional tomatillos in salsa. They’re a little sweet.
Those sound great Renee! Writing them down. I think we could handle 3 tomatillo plants...just need to find better support for them compared to last year!
@ I’ve been toying with putting a cattle panel horizontal hooked to T posts. They can grow up and through the squares. They definitely need room but I love making salsa verde!
@ that’s a good idea! We make really big cages with cattle panels but the problem seems to be how much they sprawl around…
You should try honey nut squash by Baker Creek because they are a small little butternut squash that is extremely tasty and sweet. They are the perfect size to cut in half and each person has a half a squash to have. They also produce quite a few little squash as well
Those look great, thank you for the suggestion!
Just an FYI for you... German Queen heirloom I am going to try again this year last year was awful for tomatoes here in Northern Kentucky too much rain and then drought conditions through the summer. German Queen is a large sandwich size slicing tomato low acid extremely meaty I was impressed with how meaty it was and what attracted me to try it is it's low acid claim.
Yes, it was a somewhat strange year with the drought in the second half of the summer. Haven't tried German Queen, let us know if it works for you this year! For low acid we like Mr. Stripey, it's a large yellow tomato with red striping that is quite tasty!
First time this year I'll be trying broccoli seriously. By chance i ordered sun king. but ill see how it'll do here since im alot milder in climate.
Ill be trying some sprouting types. Like montebello, purple , santee, red fire.
A shame you other pumpkins dont grown well some maxima and pepo types are really good.
Its always exciting trying different varieties.
Well I hope Sun King works better for you than it did for us! I was thinking more about it and it may have been the cold that got it to bolt if it is made for a more temperature climate. We plant our broccoli out in early April and often get temperatures below freezing in the early season. We are trying some other pumpkins this year but squash vine borer are very bad in our area so we will see...for bush squash like zucchini we can keep them netted but not something large like a pumpkin. Best of luck this season!
Where did you purchase your seeds from? I would like to get the cucumber a MMB d paisano you mentioned.
We bought the Unagi cucumber and many of our other seeds from Johnny’s seeds. Best of luck!
The Big Brandy is a great tomato to try. If you like Brandywine, but don't want the problems with heirlooms. I only plant heirlooms. But this tomato has good flavor and are big.
Good to know! We really liked Brandy Boy which is another hybrid Brandywine-like tomato and were surprised it still had really good flavor (unlike many of the "hybrid heirloom" types that seem to be sold by many seed sellers. Maybe we will try Big Brandy and see which of those hybrids we like more! We still really like Black Krim, German Johnson and Mr. Stripey heirlooms as well for flavor.
Your straw bale growing looks amazing! Do you think it would work in hot, windy, dry Colorado? Or does it need your wetter summers?
@@mariaallevato6121 thank you! You can absolutely do straw bale gardens anywhere but in a hotter, dryer location I’d suggest two things: 1) drip irrigation on a timer and 2) cover the sides of the straw with something (we use logs and woodchip). Otherwise they can dry out easily. Best of luck!
I like Sarah’s Choice melon as well as the squirrels therefore I’ll just get mine at the farmers market. Have you tried Diva cucumbers? They are usually my favorite.
haha, darn squirrels! So far they haven't gotten any melons but we did have a raccoon eat a bunch of them. We haven't tried Diva but they look good! Thin skin like the Unagi we have grown to love, also parthenocarpic but maybe not gynoecious?
Where do you buy most of your seeds?
Hi Mary, most of our seeds came from Johnny's Seeds (@JohnnysSeeds) but we also have seeds from Burpee, Totally Tomatoes and many flowers from Select Seeds
Jade bush beans are sooo yummy. I approve 😂
Oh good! They looked like a nice classic green bean :)
Did you by chance mix the heirloom and hybrid cucumbers and tomatoes? Is that possible or no?
Thank you.
Do you mean grow them close together? If that’s the question than yes, there is no problem doing this. If they cross pollinate it doesn’t affect this years fruit, only the seeds. So if you saved seeds you could get further hybridization. That being said, tomatoes have a “perfect flower” that pollinates itself most of the time so even if they are close together the chance of cross pollination is low
If you don’t like hot, hot peppers, Baker Creek has some really neat peppers that are just like their hot counterparts, but sweet no heat. They have the sweet bonnet instead of hot scotch bonnet .nadapeno no heat jalapeño. Also orange and red lesya sweet pepper. And then sweet Hinata no heat.
They also have orange spice, brown lemon, spice and pumpkin spice jalapeños, which range from dark orange to pumpkin orange, yellow and brown instead of your traditional green
They also have orange spice, brown lemon, spice and pumpkin spice jalapeños, which range from dark orange to pumpkin orange, yellow and brown instead of your traditional green
Habanda
We were laughing that the theme of our video was "we can't tolerate spice!" We do like spicy food, I swear! Those look really neat, we are trying that sweet (spineless) habanero, perhaps we will try a few others!
Try the Amish paste tomato and Sprouting broccoli.
We keep toying with Amish paste but haven't tried it yet. With our set up we grow most of our paste tomatoes as determinant plants in straw bales so that's the one thing that has kept us from growing it (it being an indeterminant paste tomato). Perhaps we will find a spot for one this year however!
Try Paul Robeson tomato is my favorite!
Oooh, that one looks really good, I love darker tomatoes. Thanks for the suggestion!
What's the name of the cucumber again, please?
@@ruthrichardson1013 our favorite last year was “Unagi.” We are also trying to”Gimlet” this year too
@TheGardenFamily thank you
When did you plant your Brussel sprouts in garden? And when did you harvest? Also did you start seeds indoors? I grew some for the first time in 2024 and started indoors planted out in May and when they finally were getting some sprouts they got afids really bad
Help???😂
We started our brussel sprouts indoors in June, planted out in July. We harvested on Thanksgiving day (we had a really nice Fall season here). I’ve found it better to start fall brassicas indoors since it’s so hot out when they need to be started mid summer. Initially we had shade cloth over the younger plants as well. Hope that helps!
Thank you this helps very much
I liked Buffalosun!
@@DollyPerry-t5e oh good! We are excited to try it, hope it works for us too!
I’m new to your channel and love your garden set-up and content. Keep it coming please!
A fantastic determinant paste tomato is Roma Supremo. Large and great disease resistance. Paisano I would have loved but they had bacterial spot so I had to toss the seeds. I just bought Brandyboy seeds so I’m happy to see your review. Try Principe Borghese. They’re not for fresh eating but flavour intensifies when dehydrated or cooked in a sauce. Super prolific and I add them to my romas for a big flavour boost.
Jimmy Nardello is our favourite pepper. Great tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and roasted. Freezes well. Carmen is also a fantastic grower in my South Eastern Ontario season. 14 or more large peppers per plant when bells never do well for me.
I haven’t tried Unagi but they keep catching my eye. Our go-to parthenocarpic is Diva. I’ve grown them up a tomato twine with clips and also on a fence panel. Indestructible and so prolific they’re like trying to give away zucchini. I ended up dehydrating them and making cucumber powder for dressings and Thai soups. I do the same with Dunja zucchini. It makes great Amish Squash Flour for using as a thickener instead of cornstarch. Wishing you a great gardening season in 2025!