If you’re an Andy Griffith Show fan, you probably remember Aunt Bee’s infamous homemade pickles. The ones that tasted like kerosene. Well. Apparently Aunt Bee and I have more in common than I realized. I know how to can a lot of things. Tomatoes? Absolutely. Jam? Please. Peaches, spaghetti sauce, chicken stock, hot sauce, pickled peppers? I can line those beautiful little jars up on the counter, stand back, admire my handiwork, and feel dangerously close to becoming insuffera

For my entire life, up until about three months ago, I had never made Greek yogurt. Not once. I think what has happened is that my children have grown up, and become independent human beings, and suddenly I have a lot more time on my hands. Apparently, I have decided to use that newfound time investigating all the things I could have been making from scratch for the last 30 years. Enter homemade Greek yogurt. And y’all. WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME?!?!? Seriously. How have I made i

There is a special kind of optimism required to be a gardener in North Texas. The calendar says, It’s time to start the fall garden! The thermometer says, Absolutely not. We are currently living in what can only be described as Satan’s armpit, where 100 degrees apparently counts as a cool front and 105 has become less of a temperature and more of a lifestyle. And yet, according to the gardening calendar, it is time. That’s the tricky thing about fall gardening in North Texas.

My garden is looking a little different. The tomatoes are coming out. Not because they're sick. Not because they failed. If you've been following along, you already know why I'm hitting the reset button for fall. But what happens next is the part I'm even more excited about. I'm planting pinkeye peas and green beans. Most people think of them as dinner. I think of them as little farmhands. They're going to spend the next several weeks working for me, quietly helping rebuild t

We're in the thick of summer here in North Texas, where the weather app has apparently forgotten there are numbers below 100°. By late July, my garden isn't exactly thriving. It's waving the white flag. The tomatoes are wearing the evidence of another brutal Texas summer. Sun-scalded shoulders. Split skins. The tomatoes are all but getting cooked on the vine. The peppers aren't much better, sporting little sunburns that make them look far worse than they really are. If I were

If you walked into my garden today, you might think I'd lost my mind. Healthy tomato plants. Green vines. No disease. And yet...I'm cutting them back. HARD. Some of them are coming out completely, and the rest are getting what can only be described as a drastic haircut. Let's call it the summer cut! But why? Even though my tomatoes are indeterminate and could technically keep growing until our first freeze, North Texas has entered the annual "surface of the sun" phase. With t

One of my favorite things about living seasonally is that every time of year has its own kitchen traditions. Spring is for planting. Summer is for preserving. Autumn is for soups, sourdough, and cozy evenings. And somewhere in the middle of the sweltering Texas heat, while everyone else is dreaming about air conditioning, I'm already thinking about cold and flu season. Every summer, I make a couple of batches of Fire Cider. It feels a little backward, standing in a hot kitche

One of the things I love most about gardening is that it keeps a person humble. Just when you think you've figured something out, the garden gently reminds you that you're not nearly as in charge as you imagined. Take red onions, for example. Last year, I could not grow a red onion to save my life. I planted them faithfully, watered them carefully, encouraged them shamelessly, and harvested... disappointment. Tiny bulbs. Stunted growth. The gardening equivalent of a polite sh

As you can see, the garden is absolutely booming. The tomatoes have decided that this is their year, and honestly, I am just trying to keep up. I have several varieties growing, each with its own personality. My grape tomato plant is loaded with fruit. Every time I walk by, I seem to find another cluster forming. If all of them ripen, I may never have to buy tomatoes again. Then there is my Arkansas tomato. It was sold as a determinate variety, which means it is supposed to g

I went out of town for work for four days thinking I’d come home to a garden politely waiting on me. Instead, green chaos was greeting me upon my return. Apparently while I was gone, the tomatoes became an unruly jungle, the basil tried to grow into a small shrubbery, and the Swiss chard unfurled itself like dramatic Victorian fans determined to make an entrance. Everything exploded with growth while I was gone. The funny thing about gardens is that they never ask permission

At some point, without really meaning to, I became the kind of woman who keeps mysterious bubbling jars on her kitchen counter. Honestly, if you had told twenty-year-old me that someday I would be emotionally invested in the calcium levels of squash and tomatoes, I would have laughed directly in your face. And yet...here we are. One of my favorite little garden rituals is making homemade foliar calcium spray from eggshells and vinegar. It feels equal parts homesteading, kitch

After years, and I do mean years, of unsuccessfully trying to grow zucchini, I’ve finally accepted zucchini defeat. I know. I KNOW! Every middle-aged woman with a garden is supposed to be out here supplying the entire neighborhood with zucchini. It’s practically written in the homesteader’s handbook somewhere between “master sourdough” (working on it) and “learn to can everything” (which, for the record… I do). . The squash borers always got my vines, no matter what I did. Ev

I live in Texas. That means I live in Texas , period. And if you know, you know, summer here feels a whole lot like gardening on the surface of the sun. Garden beds don’t just struggle… they suffer . Last year, in a moment of “well, why not?” inspiration, I had a wild idea I decided to test out. And today, I get to tell you how it went. I bought 8-foot sections of perforated French drain pipe and buried them right down the center of my garden beds. I dug a long trench, tucked

I’ve read many times over the years that saffron is the world’s most expensive spice. Because I love gardening and a good challenge, I decided to give saffron a go in my garden this year. I ordered ten corms. (Why are they called corms, anyway? Why not just call them bulbs? But I digress.) I planted my ten little corms in early August and had all but given up on them ever sprouting when, one day...poof...saffron blooms appeared! All I had to do was pluck the flowers, gently p