The winter garden is a magical place. Under the row cover or plastic there is an abundance of food despite the cold temperatures and bleakness outside. You have to plan ahead and make sure everything is to full maturity before ~1 November (in the northern Virginia area) when the sunlight diminishes so much that no growth will occur. But if you get your garden plot planted in time you can enjoy a winter of fresh vegetables. Here is the lineup for the winter garden in 2020. Most things stays in the ground and I just cut what we need; when the temps really dip (if ever this year) I’ll pull some and put in the basement refrigerator.

1. I put my winter cabbage seedlings into the ground around the 3rd week of July; i plant them inside around last week of June.

2. I sow the carrot seeds into the ground in mid-August; I have to water them a ton to get them to germinate in the heat but with a timer and misters it works out o.k.

3. I put the turnip seeds directly in the ground in mid-August and then another round the second week of September

4. I plant radish seeds as late as 28 September

5. I start spinach indoors for 3 weeks and then move outside the second week of September.

Winter Romaine

I have two plots of this planted; you just chop off the entire head and eat salad all winter. I start these indoors at the end of August and then try to get outside by the 3rd week of September.

French Breakfast Radish

The French Breakfast Radish sits in the ground waiting to be part of my lunches through January. I direct sowed these in the last week of September. They grow quickly but more slowly in the fall. I eat the roots and the greens.

Daikon

Daikon (type of radish) grows to be very big. Shredded in salads or lacto-fermented they are delicious. I direct sowed these in the second week of August).

Cabbage

I planted these indoors in mid July under my lights. I put them out in the garden the first week of August. Now that they are to maturity I leave them outside. Chop one and eat in salad or mix into soups.

Chinese Cabbage

Ugly vegetable? I started these indoors in July and then put outside in August. The pest pressure in August is at its highest and these got crushed by slugs. But, the slugs eat the outside leaves that you don’t eat anyway so inside is a nice head of Chinese cabbage. More tender than regular cabbage, this a real winter treat.

Carrots and Spinach

You can see where the deer got into this one and ate my carrot tops. But in this bed is an abundance of spinach and carrot roots (luckily the carrots were at maturity by the time the deer got in there). Plus I still have 21 quarts of carrots in my “electric root cellar”/refrigerator.

Turnips

I have one entire bed of turnips planted. I love the turnip for its ease of growth, and this variety (Hakurai) is delicious raw in my lunches. The greens are also the best of any of the root vegetables in my opinion.

Tarps

For the beds that do not have any vegetables in them, I put black plastic tarp over them. I would rather use a cover crop to prevent erosion but when you farm intensively its hard to use winter cover crops because you’re usually using all the ground to grow veggies through the last of the sunlight. That is, I don’t have time to get the cover crop to maturity. So the tarps do a fine job and in some ways a better job than the cover crop.

Ferments

I lacto-ferment vegetables because it’s the best preservation method I have found. And your body likes the bacteria that grows on the veggies (lots of probiotics). A true symbiotic relationship. On the left are pickled turnips; on the right is the beginning stage of a Nepalese ferment called gundruk that uses turnip greens. The gundruk ferments in its own juices for a week or so and then I dry it out under the sun. All winter you can add it to soups.