At the beginning of the year, I asked you think about why you garden. Whether it’s a hobby, our family’s main source of food, or anything in between, I maintain that understanding why you garden is really important to planning the garden and defining a budget.
But, what about the garden being more than just a source of food, exercise, or a connection to nature. What if it were something more?
That’s the question that Bailey Van Tassel has asked and answered. Bailey is the founder of the Kitchen Garden Society and author of the recently released book, Kitchen Garden Living. She has taken an approach to gardening that is not just seasonal in nature but all-encompassing in its seasonality, growing not just food but friendships, gifts, and time with family.
Today on Just Grow Something, I sit down with Bailey and chat all things kitchen garden, flavor gaps, winter bulk, and moving a garden from one climate to another. We also get into her book and her unique way of determining exactly what gets prioritized in her garden beds using playing cards and the game of Poker. Let’s dig in.
References and Resources:
Kitchen Garden Living book: https://amzn.to/3Xosxme
Bailey Van Tassel: https://www.baileyvantassel.com/
Great Grow Along - FREE Virtual Garden Festival Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/great-grow-along-free-virtual-garden-festival-tickets-1249534915569
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00:00:00
Back at the beginning of the year, I asked you to think about
00:00:02
why you garden. Whether it's a hobby, our
00:00:05
family's main food source, or anything in between, I maintain
00:00:09
that understanding why you garden is really important to
00:00:13
planning the garden and defining a budget.
00:00:16
But what about the garden being more than just a source of food,
00:00:19
exercise or a connection to nature?
00:00:22
What if it were something? That is the question that Bailey
00:00:26
Van Tassel has asked and answered.
00:00:28
Bailey is the founder of the Kitchen Garden Society and
00:00:32
author of the recently released book Kitchen Garden Living.
00:00:36
She has taken an approach to gardening that is not just
00:00:38
seasonal in nature, but all-encompassing in its
00:00:42
seasonality, growing not just food, but friendships, gifts and
00:00:46
time with family. Like many of us, Bailey feels
00:00:50
like our society has become disconnected from what we really
00:00:53
need versus what we've been programmed to want.
00:00:57
And that having a sense of getting just enough from our
00:01:00
garden can take us back to being really connected not just to our
00:01:04
own bodies cues for what we need, but also to our food and
00:01:08
the true flavor of it. Today, I'll just grow something.
00:01:11
I sit down with Bailey and chat all things kitchen garden flavor
00:01:15
gaps, winter bulk, and moving a garden from one climate to
00:01:20
another. We also get into her book and
00:01:22
her unique way of determining exactly what gets prioritized in
00:01:27
her garden beds using playing cards and the game of poker.
00:01:33
Let's dig in. Hey, I'm Karen and what started
00:01:35
as a small backyard garden 20 years ago turned into a lifelong
00:01:39
passion for growing food. Now as a market farmer and
00:01:42
horticulturist, I want to help you do the same on this podcast.
00:01:45
I am your friend in the garden, teaching evidence based
00:01:48
techniques to help you grow your favorites and build confidence
00:01:51
in your own garden space. So grab your garden journal and
00:01:54
a cup of coffee and get ready to just grow something.
00:02:01
So Bailey Van Tassel shares her gardening skills online through
00:02:05
her blog, her Kitchen Garden Society monthly membership, and
00:02:08
now her new Substack newsletter, while also sharing her personal
00:02:13
story of growing up on a hobby farm in California but then
00:02:16
ending up in suburbia. Bailey focuses on kitchen
00:02:20
gardening and cut flowers with her three young children
00:02:24
alongside her. And she and I are in total
00:02:27
agreement about the reasons why we should all be eating
00:02:30
seasonally. Why do you think eating
00:02:32
seasonally is so important? That is a great question.
00:02:37
For one, it's the most nutritious way to actually eat
00:02:41
because eating vegetables when they're not in peak season, they
00:02:45
reduce a nutritional density as each.
00:02:49
You know, as that peak window closes, the amount of nutrients
00:02:52
available to your body does as well.
00:02:53
So eating seasonally by design, from like a biological science
00:02:57
perspective is the healthiest way for you to consume food.
00:03:01
Aside from that, I also feel like it is part of our humanity
00:03:07
to not expect everything to be available all the time and also
00:03:14
not force things to travel to us.
00:03:16
So what nature is going to provide for you nutritionally
00:03:20
and seasonally is what's going to be best for your body, where
00:03:23
you live, and where you are in your life.
00:03:25
And I really feel like getting back to that sort of
00:03:27
connectedness is so important for our sanity and just the
00:03:32
state of being as humans. And that is something that the
00:03:36
garden really taught me was you're not supposed to be able
00:03:39
to have a tomato in December. That's not the job of a tomato.
00:03:43
I. Find that that changes also
00:03:47
based on. Where you live?
00:03:49
If you live in, you know, sunny California and or in Florida
00:03:53
where citrus is available in the winter time because that's the
00:03:56
climate that you live in versus somebody like me who is in West
00:03:59
Central Missouri where none of that is available.
00:04:02
But in the winter time, our sustenances things that can
00:04:06
easily be stored, you know, potatoes, winter squashes,
00:04:10
onions, and they pair with the meats and stuff that are sort of
00:04:13
comfort foods, which is something that you would eat in
00:04:16
the winter time, but not necessarily something that your
00:04:18
body craves in the summertime when things like fresh greens
00:04:23
and tomatoes and all those vibrant flavors are available to
00:04:28
you. And you know, I mean, you just
00:04:30
moved, you've moved from California to Tennessee here
00:04:33
recently. How has that changed been?
00:04:36
It's been wild. It's the first time I've
00:04:40
experienced living somewhere that gets a hard frost.
00:04:42
And we have the greenhouse, but it's a new way of thinking about
00:04:47
things. I mean, gardening in a Southern
00:04:49
climate zone 10B, it's really a marathon instead of a Sprint.
00:04:55
You don't have to be super vigilant about when you start
00:04:57
things. It's very easy to mess up as a
00:04:59
gardener in Southern California. You just kind of like restart
00:05:03
here. It's more of a Sprint where I'm
00:05:05
really going to have to be active in March and April to
00:05:08
make sure I get a great crop. I'm really going to have to be
00:05:12
figuring out fall gardening, which typically is my favorite.
00:05:15
But here it's really going to be playing between, oh, is it still
00:05:18
too hot and humid for these things?
00:05:21
I know that they'll germinate, but will they mature
00:05:23
appropriately? So there's going to be a lot
00:05:24
more nuance to uncover and then allowing sort of wintering to
00:05:30
happen, which I'm not used to, but I've been enjoying so far.
00:05:34
So it'll be a change for sure. But there is something to be
00:05:37
said for also, which is so counterculture.
00:05:40
But like, you know, you bulk up and you put on a little layer to
00:05:43
keep you warm in the winter. You're sleeping more in the
00:05:46
winter, but in the spring and summer that's going to change.
00:05:49
You're more active, you're out your longer days, you're doing
00:05:52
those things. So I think like, humanity needs
00:05:56
to just allow the seasons to like, let us be a little bit,
00:06:00
which I love. But yeah, it will be.
00:06:01
It will be crazy to see what a real gardening season this first
00:06:05
year. I'm going to have to ask
00:06:06
everybody to give me some grace on potentially just absolutely
00:06:09
failing, which will be really fun to do publicly.
00:06:12
Bailey is a big proponent of living seasonally, not just
00:06:16
eating with the seasons, something that may change a
00:06:19
little bit now that she's moved from a warmer climate to one
00:06:22
that actually has more variations to the seasons.
00:06:25
Do you think making that change from California to Tennessee now
00:06:30
is also going to change, you know, sort of your concept of
00:06:34
living seasonally and, and kitchen garden sort of living
00:06:37
because the seasons are so drastically different?
00:06:39
Yes, for sure. I can already tell that one.
00:06:44
We really have to change our mindset around like what we're
00:06:48
capable of in the winter. And that whole philosophy I just
00:06:50
keep telling myself like, there's no such thing as bad
00:06:52
weather. There's just bad clothing and
00:06:54
really pushing everyone to get outside even when it's cold
00:06:57
because there are blue skies. But it's, you know, 15°, which
00:07:00
it typically is, not this cold in Tennessee, we're being told,
00:07:04
but really pushing ourselves to continue to enjoy nature and the
00:07:08
seasons in just a different format.
00:07:11
But likewise, in the summer, I just imagine so much more
00:07:16
outside time in California. It's always nice and it's just
00:07:20
so easy to take advantage of it. But here it's like, I can just
00:07:24
really see how we're like going to be truly living outside in
00:07:28
spring and fall especially, but even in the summer, just like
00:07:32
really, really packing it in. I just, I can already see our
00:07:36
bodies like reorienting in that way where we're really like you
00:07:40
just hype it up in your mind where you're like, I can't wait
00:07:42
for these like being able to take long walks.
00:07:46
You know, now it's like, oh gosh, if we can make it 20
00:07:48
minutes, like then we're stoked And you're kind of figuring out
00:07:50
how do we do inside better? But I can just really see how
00:07:54
everybody is going to maximize their outside time because you
00:07:58
kind of get fatigued by that when it's like 70° all the time.
00:08:01
I don't think that's natural and and it's boring to be totally
00:08:05
honest. But you just you don't take
00:08:08
advantage of that great weather when you're in it all the time
00:08:11
and and therefore I think end up inside oddly more than you
00:08:15
would. So there's a bit of a shift for
00:08:18
sure when you are, you know, changing up different climates.
00:08:21
I remember as a gardener in the out here in the Midwest, it, it
00:08:27
was like this aha moment that I had when I was growing Rosemary.
00:08:33
And here, you know, Rosemary is most times not a perennial.
00:08:38
You have to replant it like every single season.
00:08:41
It doesn't get huge unless you put it in a pot and then you
00:08:44
bring it in the house over the winter time.
00:08:46
And for some reason one day I remembered that my ex in laws in
00:08:52
California had a Rosemary Bush in their front entryway.
00:08:59
They didn't use it culinarily. It wasn't an herb to them.
00:09:02
It was. Just this.
00:09:04
Bush. It was ornamental, yeah.
00:09:06
For a part of the landscaping and I and I just kind of went.
00:09:09
Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh.
00:09:11
What a huge difference. Between that and what I'm
00:09:15
struggling to do here, you know, in in the in the Midwest and I
00:09:19
just think it, you know, it's a it's a really interesting sort
00:09:22
of, you know, juxtaposition. You get it.
00:09:24
You get the chance to experience that now having going from, you
00:09:27
know, one climate SO10B to what's your what's your growing
00:09:31
zone now? 7B Yeah, it will be interesting
00:09:33
for sure. Yeah, we had giant Rosemary
00:09:35
bushes at our last house, and citrus cheese and avocados and
00:09:39
everything pretty much could grow as a perennial if you
00:09:41
wanted to. When I tell you my gardening
00:09:43
friends to check and see whether something is a perennial in your
00:09:47
area before they deciding to plant something, this is exactly
00:09:51
what I mean. Rosemary is often listed as a
00:09:54
perennial on tags in the garden center, but it is most decidedly
00:09:59
not one in my zone 6B garden, although it was in Bailey's zone
00:10:04
10B1. We'll see how it does for her
00:10:08
now that she's in seven. As you can tell, Bailey believes
00:10:12
that living seasonally and staying grounded to the natural
00:10:16
world is really important to creating a meaningful life, no
00:10:19
matter where you are. So much so that she's written a
00:10:22
book about it. You just released a book and
00:10:27
it's called Kitchen Garden Living.
00:10:30
I'm going to pull that up for everybody so they can they can
00:10:32
see this. The first thing that I did when
00:10:37
I got this was I had to flip through and look at all the
00:10:40
pictures because they were just so amazing and your garden was
00:10:44
beautiful. The next thing I did was have a
00:10:47
little bit of a panic attack seeing like you wearing a white.
00:10:49
Shirt. But the.
00:10:53
The next. Thing that I found that I found
00:10:55
it very interesting. The way that you broke down the
00:10:58
chapters, I think was was very compelling.
00:11:01
It was a very interesting breakdown.
00:11:04
It basically laid out in terms of how the garden is used, you
00:11:11
know? So I mean, yeah, you start with
00:11:12
the seasons, but then it's plan, grow, tend, make, gather,
00:11:16
connect and inspire. I found that to be really
00:11:20
interesting and kind of inspiring.
00:11:21
And I think that really goes along with what your message has
00:11:23
been, which is it's the garden is more about you're actually
00:11:26
living in it. Like this is, it's more than
00:11:28
just food, right? Right.
00:11:32
Yeah. That was really, you know, it's
00:11:34
funny, I guess I haven't actually read that many
00:11:38
gardening books. There was one that was like
00:11:40
really, really key to establishing fundamentals and
00:11:44
how I grow the way that I do in terms of sort of a French
00:11:47
intensive style, like really dense planting, a lot of
00:11:52
biodiversity, companion planting, all that.
00:11:54
I read a book that really like inspired that for me, but yeah,
00:11:58
I didn't realize how different the layout and message of my
00:12:02
book was compared to other gardening books.
00:12:04
My point in all of it is like the kitchen garden can help you
00:12:09
reorient yourself to the rhythms of nature and enhance your life
00:12:14
in that way because it is providing you with this moving
00:12:17
meditation and this ultra nutritious food and this really
00:12:21
cool way to reconnect with yourself and with nature and
00:12:23
overall just enhance your life. That's kind of always been the
00:12:27
message and trying to really get back to that and maintain that
00:12:30
sense of inspiring people. I obviously want to equip
00:12:34
everyone. There's a ton of practical
00:12:36
knowledge in the book, but I did really want everyone to think
00:12:39
about it on that cycle of like, OK, we like we get the garden
00:12:43
going, we plan it out. We've got everything we need to
00:12:45
know to make the garden happy and beautiful.
00:12:49
But then what you know, then what it's like, OK, well then
00:12:52
you know, this is how we properly harvest and preserve
00:12:55
things and share it with the world.
00:12:57
And like just kind of lean into it more.
00:12:59
It's similar to like someone coming to you with a problem and
00:13:04
you give them a solution, but you don't give them the support
00:13:07
to like, overcome the actual problem.
00:13:11
And I think that is something I really want to where it's like,
00:13:13
OK, I'm going to teach you how to garden, but I'm also going to
00:13:15
teach you how to, like, fall in love with gardening for the rest
00:13:18
of your life. So it's not just a fat pad.
00:13:22
I love that. I love that I that's, I love
00:13:24
that that whole message and I think, you know, in terms of
00:13:28
practical application. The other thing that I.
00:13:31
Thought was was really interesting.
00:13:33
Is your your? Poker Card.
00:13:35
Method for planting. Talk to me about aces, faces,
00:13:40
planes and jokers. Yes, I'm so glad everyone's been
00:13:44
excited about this because it's sort of my own little
00:13:47
proprietary method. I immediately when I started
00:13:51
gardening was like, I want to try and grow as much of what we
00:13:54
consume as possible. So like grow the grocery store,
00:13:57
replace the grocery store, whatever.
00:13:59
And that felt really overwhelming to me because I
00:14:01
just couldn't figure out like how to make that happen.
00:14:05
And So what I did is the poker planting method is just, it just
00:14:09
helps you prioritize the plants in your garden to give you a
00:14:14
very easy way to say like, OK, these plants go in first because
00:14:17
they're going to, I want them to have the most space.
00:14:20
They're most important to me. And then these plants go in next
00:14:23
because they're of a little bit less importance to me.
00:14:25
Or I can get them at a farm. These even less so because
00:14:27
they're more just for fun. It was just a way for me to
00:14:30
organize the plants in my mind and get them into my garden so I
00:14:33
could actually maximize the space that I have.
00:14:37
I know this struggle of figuring out what to plant and where to
00:14:42
fit it all in is very familiar to a lot of us.
00:14:45
It's one of the things that we spend a lot of time on in my
00:14:49
plan, like a pro course, because it can be very overwhelming.
00:14:54
I generally teach gardeners to fit it all in using companion
00:14:58
planting combined with inter planting by going high, low,
00:15:03
fast, slow, OK, this is pairing the tall plants with the low
00:15:06
growing ones and then the fast maturing varieties with the slow
00:15:09
growing ones. What Bailey is doing is
00:15:12
combining the plants in such a way that the high priority
00:15:17
plants, the one she really needs in the garden, get the spotlight
00:15:21
and most of the space, and then tucking in and the other plants
00:15:25
in order of priority from there on down.
00:15:28
It's a unique way to organize the beds in terms of making sure
00:15:32
that you don't run out of space for the things that are most
00:15:35
important to you. Essentially, each plant is
00:15:38
assigned like an ROI or like a value in your mind.
00:15:42
So aces are the most valuable for me.
00:15:44
That's like potatoes, onions, garlic, those really like.
00:15:49
I am cooking with these on a daily basis.
00:15:52
I know I if I give them the time and space in the garden, I can
00:15:57
completely replace them for my family.
00:15:59
I know that they grow well. I know that we use them.
00:16:01
I know that we love them something like radicchio, like
00:16:05
we don't eat that that much. It's like really cool to grow
00:16:08
because I think it's really pretty, but my kids don't really
00:16:10
like the taste of it. We're just not eating it that
00:16:13
often. So that's de prioritized.
00:16:15
If I have space, I'll sneak in some radicchio, but it's not
00:16:18
actually going to like enhance the quality of our lives, you
00:16:21
know, like onions. Well, things because I really do
00:16:23
find every single spring people are completely perplexed by seed
00:16:27
starting and by just mapping out the garden.
00:16:30
Like just where do all the things go and how do I like stay
00:16:33
on top of it? And sometimes the problem is
00:16:35
you're trying to fit too much. You don't have to grow 12
00:16:39
different varieties of tomatoes if that's not your main thing,
00:16:42
you know, Yeah, they look cool, but how?
00:16:44
How is that serving you? This is a problem for beginning
00:16:49
and experienced gardeners alike. There is often a temptation to
00:16:53
grow as many things as possible because they look cool, or we
00:16:58
think it's expected, or it's the trend, or we're trying to
00:17:01
literally replace all, all the things from the grocery store.
00:17:05
By prioritizing what we plant by how we'll use it, we can save
00:17:10
ourselves a lot of stress in not just the planning phase, but in
00:17:14
all the phases of gardening. There's an idea that Bailey
00:17:18
stumbled upon in her own garden of just enoughness.
00:17:22
Oh, in chapter. Five the make chapter.
00:17:26
I want to read just a little portion of that.
00:17:28
I loved the I the idea of just enoughness in the kitchen garden
00:17:34
are parallels. A handful of cherry tomatoes on
00:17:37
a summer's day is all we need. Not a big plastic clamshell full
00:17:42
of gas ripened fruit wandering out into the garden to find a
00:17:45
rogue potato plant that yields 2 perfect spuds for the following
00:17:49
mornings. Breakfast burritos makes us
00:17:51
happy. There is a just enoughness in
00:17:54
the garden which you'll find quickly leaks into the rest of
00:17:58
your home and the lives of you and your family.
00:18:01
How can you make what you already have enough?
00:18:05
And if you do need more, can you make it yourself?
00:18:10
And I, this is what I'm talking about with this book and just
00:18:13
sort of your whole, you know, idea and the way that you do
00:18:16
things in this community that you've grown.
00:18:18
It's not just about, OK, well, here I grew this and then here's
00:18:23
a recipe for how to use it. And then I'm I'm done.
00:18:26
There are so much more you know that you can do with the garden
00:18:31
and what comes out of it and how it sort of flows into the rest
00:18:34
of your. Life.
00:18:34
I love that you picked that up. It's just something I think the
00:18:38
garden is an endless well of, you know, inspiration and life
00:18:43
analogies. I like to let the garden dictate
00:18:47
what we cook and going out there and seeing what's available and
00:18:50
bringing it inside and like letting that be where I come
00:18:53
from for instead of being like, oh, I'm in the mood for
00:18:56
enchiladas. And then like, you know, it's
00:18:58
more like, what do we have and how, how can we do something
00:19:00
good with it? And tomatoes I don't really love
00:19:04
to grow. I think they're Divas.
00:19:05
I think they're high maintenance.
00:19:06
I think they're overhyped. And so I never grow like that
00:19:09
many of them. But every time I do, it's like
00:19:12
truly my handful of cherry tomatoes like is enough to saute
00:19:16
with a little bit of garlic and olive oil to coat our pasta.
00:19:19
And it's there's just so much overconsumption or sort of just
00:19:23
like allowing other people to decide quantity for us because
00:19:27
of how we shop in the grocery store that you're not even
00:19:30
realizing what you need to like make the meal happen.
00:19:35
So I kept seeing that in my garden where I was always
00:19:37
yearning for like more garden, more veggies growing more.
00:19:41
It was kind of like a weird ego thing where I was just like, I
00:19:43
just wanted this big garden, but I always had enough to make an
00:19:47
amazing meal and let what I was growing be the star of the show.
00:19:51
And so it was really this cool experience for me to be like,
00:19:57
whatever the amount of space is if you.
00:20:01
Allow it to be good enough for you right now, you'll find a way
00:20:04
to maximize it. And I do think that leaks over
00:20:07
and it just gives you that deep sense of satisfaction.
00:20:10
And I tell people this all the time, whether you have a one
00:20:13
acre garden or 1 pot full of just culinary herbs, we are all
00:20:18
going to experience the same joy of like harvesting something
00:20:21
that we grew, adding it to our food and making that taste
00:20:25
amazing. And there's just this sense of
00:20:27
like, I did this. It doesn't matter how much you
00:20:29
have or how big it's like that. It's just that fundamental tiny
00:20:33
little moment where you're like, I did this and then you get to
00:20:36
share it with someone and they love it.
00:20:38
And it's just that really that's joy in my opinion.
00:20:41
I just really wanted people to feel like it was accessible,
00:20:46
that joy, that satisfaction. It's not about growing 100
00:20:49
tomato plants, it's growing just enough tomatoes to be able to
00:20:52
experience the joy of that homegrown flavor.
00:20:56
I have said before, it is a very visceral feeling when you can
00:21:00
look down on your plate and see just one thing that you grew
00:21:05
yourself. It's like something primal deep
00:21:09
inside that you provided for yourself, you're providing for
00:21:13
others, and it was sort of like what we were meant to do and buy
00:21:17
all of your stuff in the grocery store doesn't give you that
00:21:20
opportunity anymore. Science has shown us that doing
00:21:25
things with our our hands, manual tasks like gardening and
00:21:29
cooking, releases serotonin and endorphins.
00:21:33
All those feel good hormones and it reduces cortisol, the stress
00:21:38
hormone. Doing manual tasks like
00:21:41
gardening don't only give us a sense of pride in our
00:21:44
accomplishment or satisfaction in providing for others, but
00:21:48
they have been clinically shown to improve our mood, our
00:21:51
attention span, and even our memory.
00:21:53
I think we're like disconnected from what we need to a certain
00:21:59
degree too. You know, we're planning
00:22:00
everything for like efficiency instead of waking up and being
00:22:03
like, you know, I'm really craving papaya today.
00:22:06
And I think our body gives us a ton of use and there's a lot of
00:22:11
stuff going on with everyone's body that if we were just like
00:22:13
listening a little bit more closely to what our body's
00:22:16
craving and wanting and needing, we can unpack a lot of that.
00:22:20
But we're so distracted and we're so numb by like everything
00:22:24
else that we're just like meet the fundamental need as quickly
00:22:28
and efficiently as possible and, and make it feel good.
00:22:30
So you know, I am not perfect at this by any means, but it's just
00:22:34
something I'm always thinking about.
00:22:36
Yeah, Yeah. I think the fact that that we,
00:22:39
we live in such a global economy now.
00:22:41
And as the, you know, especially in the US, we rely a lot on sort
00:22:46
of those outside, you know, sources for a lot of how we live
00:22:52
that it's gotten a lot more difficult for us to be able to
00:22:56
understand the signals that we're getting from our own
00:22:59
bodies that say, you know, hey. We work, We need.
00:23:02
Something sweet or we need, you know, and it's like, Oh well,
00:23:06
I'm just going to grab, you know, this piece of candy or
00:23:08
this chocolate or this whatever instead of hey, maybe.
00:23:11
Some fresh fruit. That's nice and sweet.
00:23:13
That might be the carbs that your body is looking for, not
00:23:16
necessarily that cream filled doughnut that's sitting over
00:23:19
there on your counter. You know, it's made it a little
00:23:21
bit confusing I think for people and doing something like having
00:23:26
a kitchen garden and being out there and in it, physically in
00:23:31
it, I think, you know, probably would put people you know
00:23:35
further or closer to understanding a little bit more
00:23:38
about what their body is asking of them.
00:23:41
What's really interesting, I read this study out of the UK,
00:23:44
like out of London, and they were talking about how doctors
00:23:48
were prescribing people with 20 minutes of gardening a day as an
00:23:53
sort of antidote to anxiety and depression.
00:23:56
And the reason that gardening makes us feel better or reduces
00:24:02
the feelings of depression and anxiety is because it increases
00:24:06
the amount of perceived happiness that we have.
00:24:09
And since with humans, perception is reality, that's
00:24:14
why it's so good for us. It, it makes us feel more
00:24:17
content, feel more happy. And then that transcends
00:24:21
throughout the rest of our day. And to make it like, it's like a
00:24:25
rising tide lifts all ships. But like on the emotional level,
00:24:28
where it's like these happiness feelings are pushing away the
00:24:31
depressed or the anxiety feelings.
00:24:33
And it's just because you're, you're feeling more accomplished
00:24:36
and more content and more joyful.
00:24:38
There's also sort of the science of like the microbes in the soil
00:24:41
releasing serotonin in our brains, which is yet another,
00:24:44
you know, biology telling us we need to be gardening.
00:24:47
But I thought that was so interesting because it was like,
00:24:51
it's such a beautiful way to like create the environment to
00:24:54
thrive in where it's really like this is something that overall
00:24:59
enhances your life just because it's it's giving you those
00:25:02
feelings of happiness and contentedness that are really
00:25:04
hard to come by in other ways. It's not this like false
00:25:08
dopamine. It's not like this checking that
00:25:10
I did the laundry off the list. It's it's the sort of Co
00:25:14
creation moment and I think that that's a really, really cool
00:25:19
part of the entire situation. The National Health Service in
00:25:24
the UK are increasingly prescribing time in nature and
00:25:29
community gardening as part of its green prescriptions.
00:25:32
Scientists have found that spending two hours a week in
00:25:36
nature is linked to better health and well-being.
00:25:39
Doctors with the NHS already use social descriptions, non medical
00:25:44
treatments that have health benefits to tackle things like
00:25:47
anxiety, loneliness and depression.
00:25:50
This often involves referring patients to a community or
00:25:55
volunteer organization for the social aspect.
00:25:58
And increasingly, doctors are opting for community gardening
00:26:02
because it's not just social, but has the added benefit of
00:26:06
time spent in nature. And it's not just the UK.
00:26:10
Parks Prescription Canada is a national nature prescription
00:26:14
program led by the BC Parks Foundation.
00:26:16
They are making the intersection of health, medicine and nature
00:26:20
more accessible to doctors and patients by giving healthcare
00:26:25
providers practical tools, including custom minimized
00:26:28
nature prescription files and patient handouts to make
00:26:33
prescribing time outdoors just more simple and effective.
00:26:37
Of course, all of these recommendations are based on
00:26:39
scientific studies that have shown the universal benefits of
00:26:43
spending time in natural environments regardless of age
00:26:47
group or health status. In short, gardening is good for
00:26:51
you in more ways than just food. Speaking of food, it's a little.
00:26:56
Bit about like when to harvest and the difference with.
00:26:58
Ripeness and and all those. Types of things, but the one
00:27:01
thing that got me was the reference to the flavor gap and
00:27:06
how, you know, there is such a difference between truck
00:27:10
ripened, you know, fruits and vegetables versus either what we
00:27:15
can get from our own gardens or what we can get locally from,
00:27:21
you know, locally sourced, you know.
00:27:22
Farms or whomever. Talk a little bit about, you
00:27:26
know, the difference between or what you've, you know, kind of
00:27:28
discovered when you talk about things that are grown in like a
00:27:32
depleted soil on a commercial basis versus things that are
00:27:36
grown in, you know, a, a, a better soil or something that
00:27:40
has grown, you know, by us in our own.
00:27:42
Hands and our own gardens. Yeah.
00:27:45
I mean, the amount of flavor that your food is able to access
00:27:50
is going to be in direct relation to like how nutritious
00:27:53
it can be, how dense it can be, how full.
00:27:57
Like this is going to sound so woo woo, but like how much life
00:27:59
force energy can the food hold? And so that's access to more
00:28:05
clean water. That's that's access to more
00:28:07
pure soil, that's access to the right amount of sun during the
00:28:11
right part of the year. And so that's why I like a vine
00:28:15
ripened by the natural sun. Tomato is going to taste better
00:28:20
is because it's drawing in all the different minerals and all
00:28:23
the different elements like that are accessible.
00:28:26
Just like if someone gave you like 1000 compliments versus
00:28:29
just two, how good would you feel about yourself?
00:28:32
And so I think that people are really, it's hard to understand
00:28:37
it until you've really tasted the difference.
00:28:40
But they're just some things you cannot perfectly mimic in
00:28:44
nature. And that's one of them.
00:28:45
And I remember spinach is another one.
00:28:48
When I eat spinach from the grocery store, it kind of gives
00:28:51
me this weird feeling in my mouth, almost like a coppery,
00:28:55
like there's like a weird coating on my tongue.
00:28:57
And when I grow spinach at home, that is not the experience at
00:29:01
all. It's much sweeter.
00:29:03
It's light on your palate. It's in my opinion, it's an
00:29:08
entirely different spinach experience.
00:29:10
That is the flavor gap right there is like the the difference
00:29:14
in the nutrition and the taste from a homegrown tomato versus
00:29:16
one that you just picked up from the store that was ripened in
00:29:19
the back with gas that travelled, you know, 10
00:29:22
miles on a truck. The vegetable is never able to
00:29:26
reach its full potential, so the flavor is never going to reach
00:29:28
its full potential. It's funny.
00:29:30
That you said that about spinach because my husband hated
00:29:33
spinach, absolutely refused to eat it until we started growing
00:29:37
it ourselves, and he said the exact same thing to you.
00:29:39
This is not. This is a completely.
00:29:41
Different vegetable. This is nothing like I have ever
00:29:43
tasted before, you know. And so, yeah, he'll routinely
00:29:46
eat fresh spinach out of our garden, but he haven't touched
00:29:48
it anywhere else. It's one.
00:29:50
It's one that I love to use. This is an example because you
00:29:52
can really, I could like feel the difference too, but I think
00:29:56
most herbs as well. Like I never liked chimichurri
00:30:00
until I made it myself with my own herbs and it tasted
00:30:03
completely different. And there are just so many
00:30:07
things like that. But that's also the difference.
00:30:08
Like when you do have a restaurant experience from
00:30:11
someone that's shopping the farmers market seasonally versus
00:30:13
just like a in the box restaurant.
00:30:15
You know what I mean? Like that's why sometimes these
00:30:17
flavors are so much better is the chef really knows how to
00:30:20
like pick what's ripe and what's its season and source it from
00:30:23
the right place. Like that is the mark to me of
00:30:25
someone that's like a very thoughtful chef or restaurant.
00:30:28
It's like they're really able to make what's in season sing and
00:30:32
that's what I want to eat and also like learn about too.
00:30:35
I think it's so fun to go and be like, oh, wow, this is how you
00:30:38
made delicata squash. Amazing.
00:30:40
You know, in the gardening world too, there are you have a way
00:30:44
bigger selection. So one of my favorite things to
00:30:47
grow is cheddar cauliflower. It's like like an orange
00:30:50
cauliflower and my kids, the way they devour it, they, they like
00:30:56
cauliflower in general, but it's so buttery and like nutty and
00:31:00
smooth. And it's just what you're
00:31:03
getting from that. Essentially it's a flower, but
00:31:05
what you're getting from that vegetable is just so different.
00:31:08
You, I mean, you can't buy that most places either.
00:31:10
So you just have so many more options to experience a much
00:31:13
wider range of flavors when you're growing from heirloom
00:31:16
seeds and just from the garden. There's just so much that you
00:31:20
can cultivate. I really can't.
00:31:21
I mean, I think it's so fun to have someone taste something
00:31:24
homegrown for the first time and just see everything like their
00:31:28
their brain chemistry changes and they're like, wait, what?
00:31:31
Like, what have I been doing with my life?
00:31:33
It's like, yeah, I know, I know. I got it.
00:31:35
Yep. Yeah, I know.
00:31:36
Absolutely. As a horticulturist, when I say
00:31:38
to people you are what you eat, and I mean that very literally.
00:31:43
Like what is coming out of your soil is creating this plant, and
00:31:48
that plant is creating your. I mean, it's I I am very literal
00:31:51
about it. And they look at me like, huh.
00:31:53
Oh, OK. So had my godmother.
00:31:55
I talk about her in the book. She's a huge inspiration for me,
00:31:57
a fantastic gardener. Come visit me in Southern
00:32:01
California. And she was like daily, I hate
00:32:04
to like be this person, but your water smells so strongly of
00:32:11
chlorine that I'm like, I can't even stand it.
00:32:15
And we had gotten so used to it. And so she was the one that that
00:32:19
taught me this. I put RV water filters in every
00:32:23
single one of my beds. So then the water was getting
00:32:26
filtered before it watered my veggies.
00:32:30
And that's another reason why I love growing like onions is
00:32:32
they're so they hold on to so much water and people are always
00:32:37
talking about like glyphosate in the soil and like our soil
00:32:39
health. Well, what about our water
00:32:41
health? Not only are we is the water
00:32:43
either really, really toxic, like full of things that you
00:32:47
shouldn't ingest, but then if it's over filtered, it's not
00:32:50
being re mineralized. So that's why like water in
00:32:52
Italy is so fantastic because it has the minerals that water is
00:32:55
supposed to have. That was another thing where I
00:32:57
came in and was like, OK, you are what you eat and what you
00:33:01
drink, but just anything that you're going to put into your
00:33:04
veggies or your animals or your chickens that are laying eggs or
00:33:07
your pigs that you raise. That's all so important.
00:33:11
Love that message. I think you.
00:33:12
Can preach into the choir I love.
00:33:13
That anyway, yeah, but that's OK.
00:33:16
Everybody wants to hear this. Bailey, thank you so much for,
00:33:20
you know, talking to me and and I, you know, I'm really going to
00:33:23
encourage everybody, you know, grab, grab this book.
00:33:26
You are also in the middle of recording a whole year long
00:33:31
series with your greenhouse builder and that is super
00:33:35
exciting. So where can everybody sort of
00:33:38
what's the best place for everybody to sort of find you
00:33:40
and follow you and see keep up with what you're doing
00:33:43
throughout the rest of the year? Yes, thank you so much.
00:33:46
Bailey vantassel.com is going to be just my primary website and
00:33:51
then on Instagram is where you could like DM me and I'll
00:33:54
actually respond. I'm just Bailey Van Tassel on
00:33:58
Instagram and that's where I'll I share a lot of updates and a
00:34:00
lot of like links and all that stuff.
00:34:02
So yeah, I've got like a newsletter you can sign up for
00:34:06
so you don't miss anything. But yeah, just Bailey Van Tassel
00:34:09
everywhere. And of course, I will leave
00:34:13
links to how to find Bailey, including how to get her book in
00:34:17
the show description, and those links are also in this morning's
00:34:20
e-mail for those of you on the newsletter list.
00:34:22
Bailey really is everywhere. She just participated in an
00:34:25
online gardening summit, The Great Grow Along, this past
00:34:28
weekend on March 1st and 2nd with the likes of Kevin Espiritu
00:34:32
and Jacques in the garden and Jennifer McGinnis and a bunch of
00:34:34
other people. That online event is actually
00:34:37
continuing over the next couple of weekends.
00:34:39
I don't think Bailey has another session, but there are others
00:34:41
coming up that are pretty interesting.
00:34:43
I will leave a link to that in the episode description as well
00:34:46
and maybe they'll have a replay of Bailey session.
00:34:49
I will say Baileys book to me is less like a step by step how to
00:34:57
and more like a beautiful blog put into print with eye-catching
00:35:02
photos that explains her background and how she does
00:35:05
things in the garden and why she does them and not the sort of
00:35:10
why or how. The way that I explain it.
00:35:13
Bailey is less science, more practicality with a side of
00:35:18
anecdote. She feels her garden and wants
00:35:21
us to feel the garden in the way that she does and have it just
00:35:25
permeate our entire life. I appreciate that viewpoint
00:35:28
because it's not something that I do well.
00:35:32
She gives advice on things like planning walking paths and the
00:35:36
garden's location in relation to some exposure while we're
00:35:38
reminding us to stop and breathe and take it all in.
00:35:43
I highly recommend it, both the book and stopping to breathe.
00:35:47
Honestly, that's it for me this week.
00:35:49
I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Bailey.
00:35:51
Spring is inching closer, thank goodness.
00:35:54
So next week we're talking all about spring planted perennials
00:35:58
and bulbs. Yes, we are talking veggies and
00:36:01
flowers next week. So until next time, my gardening
00:36:04
friends keep on cultivating that dream garden and we'll talk
00:36:06
again soon. If you want more for my
00:36:08
conversation with Bailey, head to patreon.com/just Grow
00:36:12
Something to hear what didn't make it into today's show.