If you are wondering why the vegetables in the grocery store taste like cardboard compared to the vegetables that are home grown, it is all in the way they are produced and harvested.
Tomatoes for example are picked before they are ripe so their skins are firmer for transportation and storage. This means they are picked before the complex sugars are converted to simpler sugars. It is the simple sugars that taste better to us. In our gardens, when tomatoes are ripened on the vine, they develop all their sugars and taste so much better to us.
One of the reasons I love no till is because the plants are healthier. Have you ever tried celery from your own garden? The smell and tastes makes you wonder what the stuff in the grocery store actually is!
Top is celery that I grew in my garden and the bottom is celery that I purchased in the store. The leaves are edible and can be used to flavour soups/stews! Oh the flavour!
If you live in a rural area, you may not be able to purchase the vegetables you prefer to eat in your local grocery store. I love to eat the rainbow - red, yellow, orange and even purple bell peppers! I can usually only find green ones in the grocery store. My Mom loves Walla Walla onions. I grow them for her so we can eat them all year round! And the taste?
The lettuce in the stores is always a disappointment compared to what I can grow in my no till garden. My lettuce is so dark green, huge leaves - big enough I can do lettuce wraps, is not bitter and is so full of water that it is like biting into a grape! Why? It has as much water as it wants, when it wants it!
Store bought iceberg lettuce (left) vs home grown iceberg lettuce (right):
In a bare black soil garden, the plants can be stressed for many reasons; insufficient water, low nutrients, the soil temperature is not optimal, tilling can remove feeder, disease, insect pressure, and competition from weeds can reduce growth.
In no till, all of this stress goes away. The plant gets to focus on what it was designed by nature to do, grow you a vegetable.
The more established a no till garden, the better it holds water so the plant has as much moisture as it needs, when it needs it.
The more established a no till garden, the more the beneficial insect population is established and the soil food web is built up.
The higher amount of organic matter means better access to nutrients and nutrient cycling.
So why no till?
Vegetables taste better. Vegetables yield more. Vegetables are more nutritious.
This image shows the leaf size and colour of the same variety of cabbage, planted at the same time - the only difference is that one was grown in an established no till garden and one was grown in a brand new, first season no till garden. Can you guess which one is which?
Want to learn how to grow your own vegetables?
I help Canadians grow their own vegetables to improve their own food security. You can view my online classes, in person classes as well as my gardening community on my website! I’d love to share with you my love of growing food! Let’s chat!
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