Linda Ly's Blog, page 6

Tomato Growing 101: My Top 10 Tips for a Successful Harvest

If you’re planning to grow a summer garden, you’re most likely going to grow tomatoes in it. These plump, juicy fruits are the pinnacle of every vegetable gardener’s summer harvest, but it’s not always easy to get the ultimate tomato of our dreams: firm yet ripe, sweet yet tangy, a blemish-free fruit that’s perfectly moist and warm from the sun.

I’ve grown tomatoes every which way: straight in the ground, up in a raised bed, arranged in containers, even indoors for a short spell. I’ve tried...

Tomato Growing 101: 10 Tips for a Successful Harvest

If you’re planning to grow a summer garden, you’re most likely going to grow tomatoes in it. These plump, juicy fruits are the pinnacle of every vegetable gardener’s summer harvest, but it’s not always easy to get the ultimate tomato of our dreams: firm yet ripe, sweet yet tangy, a blemish-free fruit that’s perfectly moist and warm from the sun.

I’ve grown tomatoes every which way: straight in the ground, up in a raised bed, arranged in containers, even indoors for a short spell. I’ve tried...

8 Easy Ways to Support Your Favorite Author

Perhaps the sweetest moment of an author’s life (aside from the second we hit “send” upon completion of our manuscript) is the day the very first copy of our book arrives. And that day, my friends, has come.

Though The Backyard Fire Cookbook officially releases on May 14, 2019, we (the publisher and I) have received our initial copies to read through, hold tight, and squeal over. (The latter being mostly me, that is.)

It’s surreal to see a project of this magnitude come to life in the form o...

Advice for New Gardeners: The Best Seeds to Plant in Spring

In my very first year of gardening, I did what any ambitious beginner would do in a brand-new garden: I bought a bunch of seeds that looked good, threw them in the ground, and hoped at least a few of them would come up.

Some seeds did come up, but many others either took their sweet time germinating (laying dormant for weeks until I’d forgotten about them) or never sprouted at all, becoming a free buffet for a passing bird or slug.

It took several seasons of trial and error before I mastered...

A Sneak Peek of The Backyard Fire Cookbook

It didn’t seem so long ago that I shared the making of the cover for my third book, The Backyard Fire Cookbook: Get Outside and Master Ember Roasting, Charcoal Grilling, Cast-Iron Cooking, and Live-Fire Feasting (which we shot last summer), but here we are, just a month away from release!

May 14, 2019, is the official release date for the book, but initial copies have already been delivered to the publisher and my own FIRST COPY arrived this week!

Will (my photographer and in-house taste tes...

The Ultimate Seed Starting Guide: A Roundup of Garden Betty’s Best Tips and Tutorials

It’s 50°F and sunny in Central Oregon, and while that may still sound cold to our southern neighbors, we’re really enjoying our false spring. (This weather meme, which circulates throughout the year in our region, makes me laugh every time.)

The days are getting longer, the snow is melting rapidly, the songbirds are out in full force, and I’m itching to go outside and get my hands dirty in the garden. Realistically, we’re still months away from our peak growing season, but there are still p...

How Deep Are the Roots of Garden Vegetables?

What’s the secret to growing a healthy, vigorous plant this season?

Hint: It doesn’t start with what you see above ground.

Root depth is a topic that isn’t often considered when we think about growing in containers, building raised beds, or planning an irrigation system for our garden. But knowing how deep the roots of your plants reach is one of the most important pieces of the puzzle, especially if you’re working with limited space.

We tend to visualize our plants growing up or out, but be...

The No-Brainer Guide to Starting Seeds Indoors

Exactly as the title says — this is an easy and foolproof guide to starting seeds indoors.

Whether you have a dedicated vegetable bed in your backyard, or a cluster of containers on your patio, it all starts out the same way.

Growing seedlings indoors is ideal if you want to get a head start on the season, or if the weather is still too hot or too cold to put anything in the ground.

This simple step-by-step will take you from seed to seedling with a minimum of fuss. Just the stuff you need t...

How to Use Days to Maturity on a Seed Packet to Help You Be a Better Gardener

I remember the first time I bought seeds for my garden. They were tomatoes, and the packet read “75 days to maturity.”

Great! I thought. If I start them in March, I’ll be picking tomatoes by May.

So imagine my confusion when the first tomatoes weren’t ready for harvest until the end of June — and this was in a Southern California garden that received ample warmth and sunshine.

It had me looking more closely at other dates of maturity on my seed packets: 80 days for melons, 65 days for cucumb...

Pink Peppercorns: A Gourmet Spice Growing in the Backyard

Pink peppercorns are often thought of as a gourmet spice, packaged in small, expensive jars and called for in fancy cookbooks.

But in Southern California and other parts of the country, bucketfuls of the vibrant berries litter the ground all fall and winter, sometimes considered a nuisance by the gardener who has to rake them all up.

It almost seems like a food crime to let heaps of peppercorns lay forgotten when just a few miles away, they command upwards of $10 an ounce at specialty spice...