Alright!
This is John Kohler with Growing Your Greens.com coming at ya from my backyard garden.
And today I thought I'd make a really quick video for you guys.
The suns going down and it's actually quite windy, quite blowy and actually a bit cold
'cause we're now well into fall.
The winters approaching but I still have my summer stuff.
Ya know, I'm probably not gonna have to pull out my summer stuff until December, until
we get an actual frost.
It's been getting close, maybe with in, I don't know 6, 7 degrees.
But it's not frosting yet so I got all my summer plants growing.
And what I wanted to do in this episode is kinda like what Oprah Winfrey used to do.
Or maybe she still does in her 'O' magazine.
It's like 'Oprah's favorite things', right?
Well this is John's favorite plants for growing in the summer, in the heat.
Now, I know you're watching this in the winter, but next summer you're gonna wanna grow these
things especially if you live where there's a big heat.
Like, it peaked over 100 degrees here.
And it was over 100 degrees, ya know weeks at a time.
And the plants I'm gonna show you are time-proven, that kick ass even during hot heat so that
you guys can still grow food.
Anyways, before it gets too dark lets go ahead and head over to my garden and show you guys
some of the amazing plants that I grew and my top favorites this year.
So my first favorite edible plant this year that I grew was this guy.
Now, this guy has performed outrageously.
I'm, like totally convinced that if you guys live in hot desert climates or even just hot
humid climates, this plant will thrive.
Now, a lot of you guys don't know about this because if you go to your local grocery store
you'll probably never find this.
You might find this at some Asian or ethnic markets sometimes.
But it's a pretty rare crop so I do encourage you guys to grow it in the heat because it's
by far the best vegetable you guys could grow.
It's actually know as the Malabar spinach.
There's like a red stem and a purple stem kind.
I grew the purple stem because it just looks more colorful, looks decorative.
And I don't know if you guys can see but I have this whole trellis here, it's like 8
feet by 4 feet and I don't know if you guys can see these uprights but I basically put
these sticks going up, you guys can't see them.
But things are climbing up there, too.
And it's just so lush, so beautiful, I had leafy greens for days.
Now, be forewarned, these guys, they start off growing slow.
You're like, 'John, I planted those a month ago they're like 2 inches taller'.
Well, maybe a little bit taller than 2 inches.
But really, they grow slow but once they're off to a good start then all the sudden you
come back and you're like oh my god that thing filled up this whole trellis in like 2 days,
ya know?
And all the leaves are nice and succulent and edible, nice mild, neutral flavor.
Actually I like this better than the standard spinach you would find in the store.
And the other benefit is it does go to flower.
So it's going to these little pink flowers and then it turns into these little undeveloped
green fruits, and then it turns into purple more mature fruits.
So you guys can see there's a little purple fruit and we're gonna squeeze that.
And look at my fingers now, I'm all like purple.
So this is like purple anthociandidens.
So, I like to like, eat a bunch of these and not chew the seed up.
Spit the seed out into your garden.
But I like to get that nice purple pigment into me because I'm sure that's full of really
rich antioxidants.
So, yeah number one to grow in the heat, Malabar spinach.
So, my next favorite plant is this guy right here.
I don't know if you guys can see it but it's really sad.
It's been blowing and windy lately so this thing just actually knocked off a piece of
it.
But that's good 'cause you guys can see it close up now.
This is known as—I first learned about it and it was called leaf ginseng but it's not
related to the standard ginseng at all.
This is a totally different plant.
And upon further research it actually is named—or a common name that we could use is Surinam
spinach.
And I was eating the seed pods.
The Surinam spinach also has these nice succulent style leaves.
Really neutral, little bit mucilaginous just like the Malabar spinach.
A nice, neutral flavor, again I really like it a lot.
And this guy I didn't even plant here.
I grew these and the seeds dried up in my greenhouse and they just kinda got some places
and a plant came up here.
And it's been thriving.
So unlike the Malabar that I got behind it on the wall, or the trellis, I probably planted
about a half-dozen plants there and it took over the trellis, this guy you'd probably
want to plant him, I don't know, like I'd probably say about every foot or so and have
a bunch of them.
Because unlike the Malabar this does not make that many leaves, but when it's time to go
to seed this produces a lot of seeds and will readily sell seed.
Now this is more of a semi-tropical plant so you're gonna wanna grow where it stays
warm.
Ya know, for a longer season, 'cause once again this is kinda off to a slow start.
I also am able to grow this in my un-heated greenhouse year round.
And this is yet another one of my favorite leafy-green edible vegetables for the summer.
So my next favorite plant is right here.
And I'm standing in between my pepper beds I planted over, I don't know 200 pepper plants
this year.
And I love peppers more than tomatoes.
And I would encourage you guys, also to plant more peppers instead of tomatoes.
I'll link a video that I did below, 10 Reasons to Plant More Peppers Instead of Tomatoes.
But, ya know as I love peppers I always have certain varieties that I like more.
And the variety that I like this year, that grew the best—I mean this guy-- I mean,
I'm kinda, ya know, not standing on my full feet, I'm kinda squinting down a little bit
or whatever, but this guy is like 4 feet tall at this point, we're here in November.
Super tall and he's got, ya know still lots of peppers on there.
And let me go ahead and see if I can find a ripe one on here for you guys to show you
what it looks like.
So here it is right here, this is a NuMex Suave Orange Pepper.
And this looks like one of those super hot ones.
Like, it's probably like a Trinidad or something ya know, 'cause it has this weird ass look.
It's not like a regular Bell pepper or a Ancho pepper, it has like once of those weird looks,
right?
And I'm gonna bite into this for you guys.
That's what it looks like on the bottom.
Now, upon the initial bite it's not hot at all.
I mean, on my scale of hotness from 0-10, I mean, I'd rate it like a 2.
It's barely hot.
Maybe if you get some of the seed pods or some of the white parts.
But to me this peppers amazing, not only 'cause it grew well for me in the heat, not only
did it produce well but this has a unique pepper flavor.
Like it really has some pepper overtones.
Like, it's like a fruity overtones.
You don't get that with most peppers.
They're either just kinda sweet and blah or super hot.
This has really a nice pepper flavor depth to it.
And if you guys are a chef you kinda know what I'm trying to say but I can't put it
into words 'cause I'm not like some fro-fro gourmet chef or whatever.
But trust me, this shits damn good.
So grow this one.
Alright my next favorite plant is actually up over yonder.
I don't know if you guys can see it, I've got these T-posts kind of upside down for
a big trellis thing that's not longer being used, but then behind that, I don't know if
you guys can see it but it's like—kinda curves up and it kinda goes at an angle.
And it's that big, tall green plant over there.
And actually there's more right here.
Yeah, up close.
And this is the foliage or the leaves of the Jerusalem Artichoke, also known as the sun
choke.
So this is another one of my favorite plants.
Through the 110 degree weather or 100 degree weather for several weeks these guys did well.
Just ya know, if you have them in pots you gotta water them twice a day because the pots
dry out really fast.
So I don't encourage you guys in the desert climates to grow in pots, grow in the soil
and the results will be amazing.
Because I grew these guys in pots and yeah, I mean some of these guys maybe hitting, I
don't know 12 feet but that guy over there man, it must be at least 16, pushing 20 feet
'cause it's curved up.
And meanwhile, as the top growth grows it's sending energy down to the bottom growth which
is the sun choke tubers or the Jerusalem Artichoke tubers that are high in inaline which is a
pro biotic that'll feed our intestinal flora.
Which is really quite good for us.
So, ya know, it grows well, does well, it was actually here before the white man came.
So that's why I think you guys should grow it too.
So my next favorite plant, it's kinda blowing in the screen, is right here.
This is my Red Hibiscus and some of this guys is actually towering over me.
Now ladies, I'm like almost 6 feet tall.
But this guys like 8 feet tall.
And this is just in one season.
I started off with little plants, starts about that big and now this is over 8 feet tall.
This is definitely a no-brainer if you live somewhere where it does not freeze, like south
Florida.
This could be just a standard landscape plant that you'd have leaves to eat off of every
single day of the year.
So, the other cool thing is when it's getting cold here you can see the leaves start to
change color.
Ya know, kinda looks like I'm in Massachusetts or Vermont or something 'cause the leaves
are changing color.
But the good leaves up top are nice and dark and purple.
And I wanna encourage you guys to grow foods that color!
Not just grow green foods or white foods, grow some red foods and purple foods and black
foods.
What kind of black foods are there?
Black mushrooms?
Black truffles?
Alright, anyway, these guys are really cool 'cause they have a nice sorrel flavor.
Bit lemony.
Reminds me if you've ever tasted sour grass.
And hopefully a cat didn't pee all the way up here.
But yeah, this stuff is known I believe as a rosel or false rosel.
I grew the other one, the other variety last year and they equally grew just as well.
So yes, one of my favorite plants, the ones that grow easily.
So my next favorite edible plant this year was this guy.
This is known as the longevity spinach also known as the Gynura Procumbens.
And this guy did amazing.
I planted this, not this summer but last summer and it actually survived through the winter
with some Christmas tree lights that I put on them.
I don't know if you guys can see them.
I was too lazy to take them down so they hung out the whole year and actually pretty soon
I'm gonna have to plug them in again.
But this hung out all winter and stayed alive, I won't say it thrived or anything because
it didn't out here.
Now the ones in my un-heated greenhouse thrived during the winter and stayed alive and then
they came back full force.
This guy had a recovery period 'cause he kinda got frosted out a little bit.
But he stayed alive.
And then now you can see he's in full production.
I mean there's so many leaves here I can't possible eat them all.
And this is a very anti-disease plant.
They call this like the cholesterol lowering plant some places I've gone.
And they just say eat a couple leaves of this a day to lower your cholesterol And I think
while that may be beneficial I think it's also really beneficial to actually stop the
cause of your high cholesterol which is eating cholesterol laden products such as animal
foods.
Anyways, I wanna go ahead and show like one or two more of my favorite plants with you
guys, this year, that I grew this summer.
Alright, so my next favorite plant is right here.
You're like saying, 'Wait John, I don't see a plant.
I see some Malabar spinach kinda vining up something that's not alive.'
And that's exactly my favorite plant.
It's the perennial Tree Collards that I grew.
And it's quite sad, actually.
This summer for some reason I lost my favorite perennial green Tree Collard tree that was
pushing 14 feet tall.
And ya know, it just went kaput.
I'm not exactly sure why.
Maybe not enough water, maybe it got too hot.
It had lasted the previous summer and I have other Tree Collards, both purple and green
that have lasted the summer here.
But this year this guy decided not to make it, ya know.
They definitely thrive in the winter and the summer they'll get by.
I did notice that in different areas of my garden, especially where it's a little bit
more shaded in the summertime they did better.
So it may behoove you not to plant your Tree Collards in full sun unless you take special
care and attention to them.
Make sure they're getting enough water and whatnot.
You also might wanna cover them.
I'm not exactly sure why this happened but I've lost Tree Collards over the summer so
this is not a surprise to me.
But I always have at least a dozen extra going in the greenhouses ya know, from cuttings.
So then I can replace them the following year.
But they'll last a couple good years depending on your climate and where you live and where
they're planted.
So for better production, full sun for more stable, long-lasting production, plant them
in the shade.
So the last favorite edible plant that I'll share with you guys this year is my top pick
for cucumbers in the hot heat, bar none.
It's these guys right here.
These are the Armenian Cucumbers and this guy I didn't even plant.
I think the seeds go through my compost system and it doesn't get hot enough, it doesn't
deactivate them.
So I get ya know, melons and some cucumbers coming up randomly sometimes.
Which is good 'cause I just let them go to fruit and guess what I have free food.
That's something really good.
But most cucumbers that I planted this year, I planted mostly Japanese and the Armenians
and some lemons.
The lemons really just didn't do crap in the heat.
The Japanese did fairly well.
And then these produced the best.
So not only did I have the standard Armenians, I also had striped Armenians that produced
quite well for me.
So that's one cucumber that I would recommend for you guys to grow.
'Cause you'll have them all season.
I like to harvest them when they're small and young and tender to eat, or when they
get larger like this.
Ya know, I've actually let a few of them fully ripen up which is quite interesting because
although they're called Armenian cucumbers they're actually like a melon.
And I've let them ripen up to be like a melon status.
And they remind me of, like one of those Asian melons that are kinda hollow and have a little
bit of sweetness inside.
Because when these guys get ripe they're actually a tad bit sweet.
And I don't really care if they're ripe or unripe I still throw them through the juicer
when they get big like this and I have all the delicious, rich, nutrient dense grown
cucumber juice to stay hydrated in the hot summer heat or even in the Fall cool weather
that we're getting right now.
So, yeah, those are my top pics.
If you guys enjoyed that, hey please give me a thumbs up.
And if you're one of the first viewers hey, make a list for everybody down below with
like timestamps so they could know the time and the plants so that you guys could easily
look them up.
And make sure to also search for seed sources for the plants, I think most of them—well,
some of them you need cuttings but some of them are propagated by seeds.
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Okay, so anyways once again my name is John Kohler with Growing Your Greens.com.
We'll see ya next time until then, remember, keep on growing.