Staple Foods To Grow In Your Garden In 2024
Would you like to cut down your family’s grocery bill this year, or grow a large portion of your own food?
Perhaps, like many of us, you are looking to improve your families health or get your food from a source you can trust and believe in. Maybe you have simply fallen in love with the wholesome joy one gets from sticking their hands in the dirt and watching things grow up out of it.
Whatever the dream for your garden this year, it starts with one beautiful first step - a plan! ;)
I’m Jeneva, an avid home gardener and the owner of Kingdom Gardens. :)
Today, I am going to highlight some crops to consider growing to provide reliable sustenance for your family in 2024.
Potatoes
Number one - potatoes! When looking to grow food for sustenance, potatoes are amongst the top of the list. Rather than being an addendum to the meal, potatoes are a good base from which you may build any number of dishes! They can be mashed, roasted, fried, baked- and much more.
Potatoes can also produce a relatively large amount per square foot and provide many basic nutrients including carbohydrates, dietary fiber, vitamins, and minerals. They do well in a cool environment and though they are not frost hardy, young plants will sprout again if the initial sprouts are killed off by frost.
One of the winning aspects of potatoes is that they can store for 6 to 8 months in a cool room or basement, if well sorted and cured. This means you can potentially eat your potatoes all winter and spring until the summer harvest begins to roll in again - and many people do!
If you have limited space, you can still grow potatoes in 10 gallon pots or 5 gallon buckets around your porch or patio and reap a good yield.
When choosing what variety of potatoes to grow, you may want to look outside the traditional white or russet potato. Russets are very high in starch, but relatively low in nutrition, and can be inflammatory. There are many varieties of potato such as red, purple, and various fingerlings, which are known to be higher in vitamins and minerals and lower in starch. When choosing your variety, I do recommend looking for a variety that stores well!
Potatoes can be cured by being left in a cool, dark environment to harden their peel for about 10 - 14 days. After this period of time you can sort through potatoes, separating any ones with cuts that did not heal, for quick use. (The more you do this, you kind of get the knack for knowing which ones will heal and which won’t, and you can kind of pre-sort before curing.) They can be stored in a cardboard box or other ventilated container in a cool dark place for months! 45-60 degrees is perfect and 80% to 90% humidity is fantastic for longer potato storage.
Winter Squash
Winter Squash is another high on the list! There are many varieties of winter squash - Butternut (pictured above), Acorn, Hubbard, and more. Winter squash typically has a thick, creamy flesh that can be roasted, stuffed, baked or boiled for soups, custards, and more. The flesh is high in vitamins, antioxidants, potassium and fiber and has plentiful health benefits.
Winter squash also produces in abundance, and their hard rind makes them another storage winner!
As long as they are ripened and cured fully, these squashes can last 6 to 8+ months in a dry, cool location, making them another over winter into early spring staple.
These plants are not frost hardy, so it is important to plant them once the weather has warmed up a bit and be ready to throw a cover (such as agribon cloth, or a sheet or blanket) over the plants if frost threatens before the squash are ripe. A good frost at the end of the season when plants are ripe will not hurt anything and will be a sign that it’s time to harvest.
Winter Squash can be cured by cutting them from the vine (after they are fully ripe) and letting them sit in a warm, dry environment. If weather permits, you can do this in your field!
There are many varieties to choose from, but keep in mind that if you plant more than one variety of squash they are likely to cross pollinate, unless you intervene.
If you are wanting to save seed that produces true to type from your squash, you will need to plant one heirloom variety or plant your heirloom varieties at least a half mile apart from each other. For many of us, the latter is not an option.
You can alternatively cover some of the squash flowers individually with a breathable fabric or net and hand pollinate when they are at the right stage.
If you choose to cover and hand pollinate, you will want to read up on it first!
Cinderella Pumpkin
As an expansion of the winter squash category, this pumpkin is a personal favorite. The Cinderella pumpkin is not only beautiful in appearance, but the plant is a very high producer yielding 2-5 pumpkins which can weigh anywhere from 10 to 30 pounds each!
The flesh is thick, orange, creamy and nutrient dense and is perfect for pies, smoothies, and any other ways squash is prepared. This plant is also not frost hardy, so it is important to plant it once the weather has warmed up a bit, and be ready to throw a cover (such as agribon cloth) over if frost threatens before the squash are ripe.
As with winter squash, the Cinderella pumpkin stores 6-8+ months when fully ripened and cured.
Keep in mind that Cinderella pumpkins will cross-pollinate with winter squash, so if you choose to plant both and plan to save your own seed you may want to space them a half mile apart or cover and hand pollinate them.
Cabbage
Cabbage is a very cold hardy, nutrient dense food that can be eaten fresh in slaws and salads, roasted in roasts or for cabbage rolls, sauteed, fermented, and more!
Because it stores so well it can be used as a fresh green all throughout the winter, when leafy greens can’t be grown.
Cabbage is compact and much of it can be grown in a small area. Due to its cold hardy nature, it’s possible to plant cabbage before the last frost and grow two crops of it before the seasons ends, storing the second crop for over winter use.
You can store cabbage by harvesting it with root in-tact and hanging it in a root cellar or damp cold basement by the root. Alternatively, you can chop the root off, tightly plastic wrap the cabbage head and store it in the fridge for quite some time. You can also chop and ferment cabbage for sauerkraut!
When choosing which variety to grow, I recommend looking for a compact storage variety.
I find that red cabbage is more flavorful and possibly more nutritious than green, but choose to grow both for the sake of variety.
Carrots
Carrots are a nutrient dense vegetable and another storage winner. They can last 6+ months when stored correctly. They provide vital nutrients such as vitamin K, potassium, and many antioxidants while still providing fiber and are an important part of the northern diet. In addition to being eaten fresh and in salads, they can be added to soups, roasts, casseroles, grated for cakes, muffins and bread, juiced and pureed for smoothies.
Carrots are very cold hardy and do not mind frost at all. They are also .pace efficient and easy to grow; just make sure that the soil you plant them in is loosened to a depth of 12” so they can grow long without inhibition.
Carrots can be stored by cutting off their greens at harvest and layering them in a tote of damp sawdust (sawdust, carrots, sawdust, carrots, sawdust.) When kept humid in a 30 to 40 degree room, these carrots can last a very long time!
There are many carrots varieties to choose from including purple, yellow, orange and white.
Carrots produce seed the second year, so if you want to save seed from your carrots, you will need to leave a few of them in the ground in the fall and allow them to flower the summer of the following year. Keep in mind that if you plant a range of varieties you may not want to allow them all to go to seed near each other, as they will cross pollinate. Cross pollinated seed will still produce carrots, but there’s no guarantee of the quality of their product.
Onions
Onions are an important staple in the kitchen! They add flavor and nutrition to many meals and can be baked, boiled, grilled, sauteed, fried and more.
Onions are also very cold hardy, and can be planted early then harvested continually throughout the season.
They will store 6 to 8 months when harvested fully mature, cured (allowed to dry in a ventilated, shady spot) and stored properly. A great way to keep onions is to braid them and hang them in a cool, dry, dark room.
You can bring one braid of onions at a time into the kitchen for that use that week in order to maintain the freshest onions for the longest amount of time.
Garlic
Garlic is a very powerful plant! It contains antioxidants, is anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, very medicinal, and overall improves your health greatly. It also has a delicious flavor that improves an innumerable amount of dishes.
Garlic is also very cold hardy, space efficient and easy to grow. It can be harvested when the lower leaves begin to die off and then hung under cover to dry/cure. It can then be braided and stored for 6+ months in a dry, dark, cool room, much the same way as onions.
Garlic must be planted in the fall, usually in October in our area, so you may not be able to plant it for this year if you haven’t already. However, I do sell some delicious Spanish Roja garlic in the late summer. :) You can certainly get some from a local farmer and plant your own this fall!
Beets
Beets are packed full of essential nutrients, and are an excellent source of fiber, potassium, iron and vitamin C. They can be eaten raw grate in salads, steamed, or pickled. The greens can be sauteed or eaten fresh in salads as well.
Beets are also very cold hardy and are a short seasoned crop, which means you can potentially plant several plantings. Beets can be stored fresh, layered in damp sawdust the same way as carrots, and will store 4 to 6 months with the beet greens removed.
Celery
Celery, though often overlooked in the home garden, is an excellent source of vitamins and minerals as well as antioxidants, and is very is anti-inflammatory. Homegrown celery also provides a zing that is incomparable to the stuff you purchase from the store.
Celery can be eaten fresh or added to salads, soups, casseroles and more. The leaves can be eaten fresh or dried and used as a seasoning or even a health supplement.
The plant is compact, and doesn’t take up much space in the garden. The most important thing to remember is to keep it well watered so that the stalks are well hydrated.
Celery can be harvested fresh continually throughout the season, and then harvested and stored in a root cellar packed with damp straw or wrapped tightly fridge for 2 weeks to 2 months. Celery leaves, if somewhat limp, can also be revived in ice cold water. Additionally or alternatively, celery can be chopped, blanched and frozen for use in soups and stews over the winter and early spring.
Green Beans
Green Beans are a warm, short season crop with a high yield. They can be eaten fresh or tossed in a salad, or steamed and eaten with butter to pair with roasts, casseroles and a variety of meals.
I add this to a staple crop list because, in addition to fresh summer eating, green beans are an excellent side dish and filler to many winter and early spring meals.
Green beans must be planted after the last frost, but are easy to grow and abundant in harvest. The best way to preserve green beans is to pressure can or freeze them for easy use throughout the colder months.
Berry Bushes
There is no time like the present to plant berry bushes! Once established, they are the gift that keeps on giving, and can play an important part of your families diet. They will take a couple years to become established, depending on the variety, but once they are established and if they are well maintained, they will yield an abundance of fruit in season from which you can make crisps, jams, sauces, pie fillings, and more.
I first recommend strawberries and raspberries, as they are very cold hardy and yield very well in our area. Strawberries are high in vitamin C, and raspberries are high in vitamin K, among other things. You can transplant them out in the spring or the tail end of the summer, when everything starts to cool down.
Plant them in fertile soil or composted manure and mulch them well for the best start.
When you harvest your fruit in a year or so, you can freeze them for later use as stovetop jams, toppings, smoothies and etc. or water bath can them as jams and spreads.
San Marzano
Depending on your household, this may not be an essential. But if you and your family are tomato product lovers, this is the ideal canning tomato!
Year after year, I have canned my years worth of tomato products from this tomato variety. It’s flavor is excellent and it’s side walls are thick and meaty. Its interior is much less watery than a beefsteak tomato, which cuts the processing time for any tomato product in half!
The San Marzano produces up to 30 lbs of tomatoes per plant, so you can easily use this tomato to can your years worth of salsa, pizza sauce, and other tomato products, avoiding genetically modified store purchased tomato products.
The San Marzano is a long season tomato, so it’s important to have a healthy plant start and transplant it out as soon as the frost has passed. I recommend having some agribon cloth on hand to toss over your tomato plant in case a frost threatens before your tomatoes are ready for harvest. Tomatoes can be eaten fresh, as they ripen throughout the season.
Since this plant produces so abundantly, any tomatoes that don’t ripen on the vine by the end of the season can be placed in a box or flat and ripened out of sunlight indoors.
In Summary
These are a handful of crops to consider planting this year to eat well and fill your cellar and pantry with ample, nutritious food for the cold months!
There are many more excellent additions to your garden such as broccoli, cauliflower, herbs, lettuce, leafy greens, peppers - and much more! The ones highlighted in this post focus primarily on staple crops that store well with minimal processing.
I hope you find this information helpful towards the end of planning your healthy, beautiful, reliable garden this year!
Happy Garden Planning and God Bless!
