Indoor Gardening: Fuel the Flavor
O
f all the benefits to growing your own food, one of the most enjoyable might also happen to be the most consequential – flavor! If you haven’t personally experienced the difference between store-bought and homegrown fruits and vegetables, I’d highly recommend it. Be prepared, though, because that bland carrot you usually dunk in ranch to make palatable will now carry a bold sweetness that holds its own against any party dip. The reason? Homegrown food tends to be much more nutrient-dense. Fortunately, sensations that get our taste buds tingling don’t have to come from high fructose corn syrup, salt or additives concocted in a lab. Fresh, nutrient-dense food can provide the same sort of flavor satisfaction while simultaneously fueling our bodies. The more nutrition packed into each lettuce leaf, the more flavorful it is, and the more we want to eat another. Whether we realize it or not, our brains have evolved to reward us for putting high levels of nutrition in our body by telling us they taste good. The danger, of course, is that food manufacturers have taken the same concept and replicated those desirable flavors in food that’s simply not good for us. No wonder so many of us struggle to maintain consistent, healthy eating habits. If the carrot that’s supposed to be “healthy” for us doesn’t contain enough energysupplying nutrition, it doesn’t taste good. How do we react? We turn to something that does taste good. We add a sugary sauce, pull out the salt shaker, or just scrap the veggies altogether and buy a frozen pizza. It’s important to pause for a moment, before we continue, to add the caveat that not all store-bought produce is lacking in nutrition. There are great, locally sourced,
organic options available at most major supermarkets. Yes, the prices tend to be a bit higher, but you get the nutrition (and flavor) you pay for. Similarly, while growing in your home provides total control over what’s being fed to your plants and the ability to grow year-round, it’s absolutely possible to grow food that doesn’t stack up to what can be found in a store.
Where the wheels start to come off in the quest for flavorful produce is in the actual delivery of nutrients to the plant. It’s easy to think, “I’ve got the perfect soil blend with all the right ingredients, now I just need to water it,” or, “I’ve mixed up a batch of nutrient solution in the proper proportions, now I just need to add it to my reservoir.” There’s one crucial step that should always
ents from reaching the plant. The pH level that provides access to the widest range of both macro and micro-nutrients in soil is typically 6.0 to 7.0. In hydroponics, it’s 5.5 to 6.5. As a comparison, city water can often be upwards of 8.0 to 9.0. That’s not just a significant deviation from the ideal, it’s the point at which almost half of the nutrients our plants require become
Avoiding the latter scenario starts with understanding the nutritional needs of your particular plant. What levels of primary nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium does it require during its different stages of growth? What are its requirements for secondary nutrients, such as calcium, magnesium and sulfur? Regardless of your growing methodology, attaining the proper soil, dry amendments and/or liquid fertilizer to meet those needs should be your starting point to producing nutrient-rich food. These items are readily available at your local garden shop.
occur before watering or feeding your plants, that’s to check the pH of your water or nutrient solution. This can be performed with inexpensive disposable test strips or inexpensive waterproof meters. pH, or Potential of Hydrogen, is the scale used to identify the level of a solution’s acidity, ranging from 0 to 14 with 0 being extremely acidic and 14 being the least acidic or a strong base. A pH value of 7, that of distilled water, is a perfectly neutral balance of acid and base. If the pH is outside of a specified range, it can limit, and sometimes completely prevent, certain nutri-
completely unavailable. If you find yourself in a situation where your water or nutrient solution is outside of the acceptable range, pH up or pH down solutions can be purchased. These are essentially strong bases (pH up) and strong acids (pH down) that can be mixed into your water to increase or decrease the pH. By identifying the correct nutrient mix for your edible plants of choice, along with the proper pH, you’ve now created a recipe to grow flavorful, nutrient-rich food from the comfort of your own home, all year-round.
JASON MISPAGEL Indoor Gardener 12
March 2022 | kcgmag.com
Jason Mispagel is the co-owner and operator of Year-Round Garden, a grower’s supply center serving both home and commercial customers since 2016. To contact Jason, call 816-216-6917 or jason@year-roundgarden.com.
