Fresh raw food gardens in small back yards

I have had a long term desire to create an entire meal from produce grown in my own garden. This sounds simple enough, but is rarely achieved by the average person. Sadly I am one of those that is yet to accomplish this entirely.  

A vegetable garden was once a very common every day addition to every families household, abundant with essentials to sustain a families diet, but sadly, is now a rarity. With so much convenience in supermarkets and lack of space and time, vegetable gardens seem impossible for most. With our desires to one day become self sufficient and grow an abundant food forest to nourish the needs of our families diet, we are starting small and doing what we can with what we have.   
We live on a very small block in town less then 500sqm, but still we have created a small patch of backyard devoted to fresh produce to satisfy a small portion of our diets.

Within our small space we have designed a raised vegetable garden that lines the back fence. Within this narrow garden bed, we have planted 5 citrus trees and an array of vegetables that have been both planted and self seeded. I don't garden in neat rows like the magazines, but instead mix it up with a plant here and one there, allowing natural companion planting and survival of the best plant in the best location to dictate each crops survival. This works well for me and seems to produce great results as a garden of overgrown plants working in synergy with each other. Its also great for the kids as I can hand them a packet of seeds and let them choose randomly spots to sew them with out a strict order to the layout. Some plants survive better in some spaces more than others, and the ones that do survive the best tend to self seed themselves for the following seasons crop. I like nature do most of the work and just reap its rewards at the end.

Here is some pictures of our small backyard garden that produces enough little things to add a touch of 'home growness' to every meal, weather is be a herb or a salad leaf or a handful or cherry tomatoes.

Our small backyard vegetable garden filled with organic produce
to give each meal a touch of 'home growness'

A Tangelo tree abundant with fruit 
after only 3 seasons

Lemon tree

Fresh chili's to add a touch of spice to
a raw dinner

Fresh cherry tomatoes for a home grown addition to a simple raw
salad or an instant treat straight from the vine
The kids love foraging through the foliage to
find these juicy red treasures! 

A hardy plant to grow all year round - Kale.
Excellent for salads or kale chips and seems to keep growing
and growing and growing....



We all love red capsicums and fresh from the garden is the best
Its always a challenge to get a taste of one of these
glorious red fruits as the kids eat them the moment they turn red!



It doesn't take much space or effort to plant a few small lettuce
plants or English spinach to provide for a season of continual harvesting.
I am always using green leafy vegetables in all my raw dishes so can never have too many growing!

Herbs are a essential part to any vegetable garden and an important
ingredient to many raw meals. I grow lots of oregano, parsley and Thyme which
rapidly spread across the ground acting like a cover of mulch which is extremely beneficial during the dryer seasons

A large crop of parsley which self seeded from last season crop. Instead of
removing the dead plant after it has gone to seed, I just leave the remains of the plant lay
on the ground and within a month, it will be covered in a mass of new seedlings.

I even have a collection of pots to hold more herbs
for medicinal and culinary purposes.

Nasturtium are another easy to grow, self seeding crop that had multiple benefits.
Not only are the flowers and leaves a great addition to add colour to any salad, but I find
they keep the Caterpillar off the kale!

Cherry Tomatoes, Nasturtian, parsley, orange tree, passion fruit vine,
chili plant all growing together - no rules, just letting nature
do what it does best - grow....

As we do have a great desire to eat all of our intake directly from our own backyards, we are working towards that goal and expect to achieve it some day soon. In the mean time, this is as close as we get...

Even if you don't have a backyard, you can still have a indoor garden
of fresh greens!

Starzi collecting sprouts for our lunch

Collecting cherry tomatoes and salad greens from the garden

A fantastic crop hidden amongst the foliage

With some added rocket from a friends garden, some locally pressed olive oil,
home preserved olives, home grown limes, we have created a simple home grown
lunch....

Eating organic produce grown in season in your own back yard is what I believe to be the ultimate way to eat!