Living Food Kitchen Gardens
Growing clean green Nourishment close to home
To live in alignment with communitarian values that culminate in our collective well-being, access to fresh, living foods is not a luxury, rather it is essential. Evolved Living Nutrition centres on consuming nutrient-rich, unprocessed foods to support our health, vitality, and ability to contribute to the shared prosperity of the network of communitarian unions across the globe. The cornerstone of this cruelty-free, eco-aligned diet lies in the direct access to fresh, living produce that includes soft leafy greens and aromatic chives, flavour-filled tomatoes, crunchy cucumbers, and sweet strawberries – all grown and harvested from collaborative contributions to Backyard Kitchen Gardens and Right Livelihood Permanent Agriculture Food Forests.
Creating thriving Kitchen Gardens is not merely about providing healthful abundant living food; this act of toiling also contributes to both individual and union-wide resilience and self-sufficiency to ensure the communal unions have what they need to flourish. By cultivating living foods close to where we live, communitarians reduce dependency on commercial food systems, which in turn, lowers our carbon footprint, while also contributing to local and regional sharing of healthful abundant food stores that ensure food security.
The Essentials of Living Foods for Health & Longevity
Living foods – those that are raw, fresh, and full of life energy, are the backbone of an Evolved Living Nutrition diet. To thrive, we need consistent access to:
- Soft Leafy Greens: Lettuce, arugula or rocket are packed with chlorophyll, vitamins, and essential minerals. They are best when harvested fresh and consumed immediately to retain their full nutritional potency.
- Chives: These delicate, onion-like herbs add flavor and digestive benefits. Fresh chives are key ingredients of salads, dressings, and savory dishes, providing a mild yet vital boost of nutrients.
- Tomatoes: Ripened on the vine, tomatoes are rich in antioxidants like lycopene. Growing them close to home enables this fruit to be enjoyed at its freshest and juiciest with all its nutritional benefits intact.
- Cucumbers: Hydrating and refreshing, cucumbers are perfect for salads or just on their own with a little sprinkle of dulse flakes and lemon juice. Freshly harvested cucumbers have a crispness and flavor that are lost in store-bought varieties.
- Strawberries: Sweet, antioxidant-rich, and irresistible when freshly picked, strawberries grown in backyards or as part of the understory of food forests offer a delicious taste of spring and summer that enhances our diets with natural sweetness and vital nutrients.
By accessing living foods straight from mineral-rich, composted and well-mulched no-dig gardens, those following the Living Foods diet and lifestyle ensure they consume nutrient-dense, vibrant healthful nutrition, grown in harmony with the natural cycles of the earth.
Tools & Space Requirements for Establishing
Backyard Organic Kitchen Gardens
With the right selection of a plot of land, tools and techniques, establishing a backyard kitchen garden can be cost effective, productive and rewarding. A natural well-drained sheltered plot is the ideal choice. However, when suitable land is unavailable, communitarian unions are encouraged to invest in infrastructure to improve the likelihood of sufficient harvests of essential food items.
Equipment & Tools
*Grow Tunnels, Raised Garden Beds or Containers: If space is limited or if the available garden plot has poor soil, constructing raised beds within Poly Grow Tunnels maybe the only option to provide a controlled environment for food crops. Grow tunnels provide protection against pests, frosts, wind and excess rain providing a more stable environment for essential staples such as tomatoes, strawberries and cucumber crops to supply the communal unions’ needs.
*Garden Tools: Investing collectively in quality tools makes planting, weeding, and harvesting more viable. Sturdy trowels, garden forks, pruners, gloves, and a watering cans to water seedlings are essential tools, along with portable trellis material such as poles and wires or lattice.
*Compost Bays: For homemade organic fertilizer, a dedicated compost plot or utilizing the trench method turns kitchen scraps and garden waste into nutrient-rich compost, contributing to soil health and sustainability.
*Mulching Materials: Straw, wood chips, or leaf mulch helps retain moisture, suppress weeds, and regulate soil temperature contributing to the health and growth of living food crops.
Space Requirements
*Backyard Area: Even a small backyard can support a productive Kitchen Garden. A plot no less than 12 x 16ft per person is a good starting size, accommodating a variety of leafy greens, chives, and fruiting plants such as tomatoes, cucumbers and strawberries. Those with additional space can expand to include additional beds to provide excess to lay down as stores.
*Sunlight: Choose a location that receives at least 6 hours of direct sunlight daily. Leafy greens can tolerate some shade, however fruiting plants such as tomatoes and strawberries require ample sunlight to produce bountiful harvests.
Irrigation and Watering
*Automatic Sprinkler System: To ensure kitchen gardens thrive even when life gets busy, setting up an automatic drip irrigation or soaker hose system ensures crops receive adequate water at all times. These systems provide consistent moisture directly to the soil, reducing water waste and ensuring plants receive the hydration needed.
*Timers: Use timers to control the irrigation system, adjusting for seasonal changes to ensure optimal watering without overuse.
Fertilization - Feeding the Soil for Healthy Growth
Healthy soil is the foundation of a thriving Kitchen Garden. Living foods pull nutrients directly from the soil. For these reasons, gardeners must prioritize soil health through adherence to sustainable organic production methods:
*Organic Fertilizers: Natural options such as compost, well-aged manure, and worm castings provide a balanced nutrient profile to the soil. These materials release nutrients slowly, supporting healthy plant growth throughout the growing season.
*Seaweed Spray: Seaweed extract is a powerhouse of trace minerals, enzymes, and growth hormones. A foliar spray of diluted seaweed extract can be applied every few weeks to boost plant resilience, enhance growth, and improve yield.
*Rock Minerals: Crushed rock dust provides long-lasting mineral content to the soil. Elements like calcium, magnesium, and potassium in rock minerals support robust root development, plant health, and nutrient density.
Best Practices for Consistent Viable Yields
Growing living foods requires a dedicated, knowledge and skills based hands-on approach to ensure each crop produces quality food for the communal unions.
*Companion Planting: Utilize companion planting to enhance growth, repel pests, and improve soil health. For instance, planting basil alongside tomatoes boosts flavor and deters pests, while marigolds attract beneficial insects that protect leafy greens and microgreen trays grown outdoors.
*Pest Management: Use natural methods to manage pests. Hand-picking insects, introducing beneficial insects like ladybugs, and using homemade organic sprays, such as diluted seaweed concentrate, helps to keep the garden ecosystem healthy without chemicals.
*Harvesting Frequently: For optimal freshness, harvest leafy greens and tomatoes as well as berries regularly, taking only the amount needed to preserve the produce’s nutritional value. Fruiting plants like tomatoes and cucumbers should be picked at peak ripeness, encouraging continuous production.
Eco-social & Economic Impact of Kitchen Gardens
Backyard Kitchen Gardens are pillars of the evolved living nutrition diet and lifestyle as communitarians identify is as Gardeners – restorers and extenders of the earth. By growing clean green living food, we embody the principles of self-reliance, sharing, and eco-social responsible stewardship of the earth’s life-giving resources. The benefits are manifold:
*Nutrient Density: Living foods, freshly harvested, contain the maximum concentration of nutrients. This enhances our health and ability to contribute energetically to local and regionally globally-networked communitarian union eco-social and animal right to life and liberty practical projects.
*Cost Savings: Planning and growing sufficient quantities of living food according to the principles of collaborative provisioning within or in close proximity to communal union settlements, reduces grocery bills, thereby freeing up resources for other essential ‘common’ wealth Right Livelihood endeavors.
*Reduced Food Miles: By producing food locally, those living in association, reduce transport emissions, thereby reducing our collective carbon footprint.
*Bonding through Productive Toil: Kitchen Gardens offer opportunities to share knowledge and skills – essentially learning from one another to foster ‘Deep Union’ founded on practical Love-In-Action made manifest through cooperation.
*Connecting with Earthly and Cosmic Elements – Gardening together provides opportunities to connect with the earth, water, air, fire, wood, minerals and metals along with the changing seasons of spring, summer, autumn and winter, calling those who toil to deeper union with the lifegiving elements of the earth and cosmos including the sun, moon, stars, ether – time and space.
Creating a Culture of Personal & Collective Nourishment
By scheduling time each day to establish and tend Kitchen Gardens, even novice communitarians in their first years of association, can make significate contributions to demonstrating the path to overcoming health issues that lead to pain and suffering as well as premature death. Through commitment to producing clean-green organic living foods, communitarians build a culture that values nourishing our bodies, the communal unions and the earth.
Each garden becomes a space where the principles of Evolved Living Nutrition are practiced daily, a place where the wisdom of the earth informs our actions and choices. Through contributing time and toil to cultivating Organic Kitchen Gardens, associates practice Living Simply while building ‘common’ wealth in the form of producing abundant healthful food and also create a sense of purpose, harmony, and interconnectedness that permeates every shared meal and communal gathering.
Modelling the World We Wish to See
By nurturing communal Kitchen Gardens, communitarians are guaranteed sustenance, along with the satisfaction of contributing to modelling the world we strive to create. Through participating in growing living foods, we nurture ourselves – and in doing so, we honor the very essence of what it means to live communally, consciously with the profound joy of reciprocity – giving to the earth as it gives to us. This practice embodies our dedication to living in harmony with one another and with the planet, preserving its abundance for all beings, human and animal, who call this beautiful earth, home.
