Low maintenance gardens tend to produce for weeks or months, don’t require constant pruning and constant watering, resists pests and produces large volumes of vegetables. I mostly garden on Sundays, so I prefer growing low maintenance plants that keep producing vegetables for long periods.
Zucchini has always been a staple in my garden. I plant it twice. Once in the spring and once in August. I’ve learned not to plant more than 8 – 12 plants because they produce so much zucchini that I couldn’t keep up with it, so a lot would go to waste. For the best eating, pick zucchini when they are fairly small. They do grow fast and can get very large pretty quick. When that happens, I puree and freeze them to make zucchini bread/cake/brownies during the winter. I also add some to soups. Another way I use large zucchini is in canning zucchini relish. It’s hard to find relish that isn’t full of sugar or high fructose corn syrup. Canning relish is easy too. I also spiralize zucchini and use as noodles in place of pasta and add cut up zucchini to stir fries or cook them in a skillet with olive oil, salt and pepper.
Green beans are easy to grow and low maintenance. I like the Blue Lake and Calima varieties of green beans. They both do well and produce a lot of green beans. They are bush green beans. There are also pole green beans, but I like bush beans better. Bush green beans are compact and don’t need a trellis like the pole beans. I plant green beans in the spring and then again in late summer for a fall harvest. Pick the beans when they are young before they get stringy. I usually cook them in a stir fry or by themselves in a skillet with olive oil, garlic powder, salt and pepper.
I love growing cherry tomatoes. I start them from seed in the winter and transplant them outside in the spring. The cherry tomatoes are easy to freeze and use in soups & stews. Fresh cherry tomatoes are great for eating in salads, homemade salsa or added to stir fries. Cherry tomatoes grow well in raised beds and containers. Using tomato cages is a good idea to keep the plants from falling over.
Arugula is a great green to grow. It’s very easy and doesn’t have oxalates like spinach and kale. It makes a great base for salads or added as a pizza topping. If you let them go to seed, they produce small white flowers and will reseed themselves to produce new plants. If you do let them go to seed, put them in a spot where they can take over the area.
Kale is easy to grow. I planted some years ago in a raised bed and haven’t had to plant it since. It just keeps reseeding itself. Kale also keeps growing well into the fall/early winter. One year I harvested kale in the middle of December. The downside to kale is it attracts cabbage worms since they are part of the Brassicaceae family like broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower. Kale is versatile and can be eaten raw in a salad, added to soups, skillets or made into kale chips. Eat kale in moderation though, so it contains oxalates which are natural organic compounds that bind to calcium and can increase the risk of kidney stones in some people.
Growing easy vegetables provides weeks of fresh food that saves money and is better for your health.
Join the newsletter for seasonal gardening and recipe inspiration.
