After you have your emergency food storage taken care of, wouldn't it be nice if you could count on some fresh veggies during an emergency that kept you inside for days or weeks or during times when you couldn't get to the grocery store?
With a windowsill garden, you can still have some fresh and healthy vegetables almost year-round to augment your emergency food supply. Plus, it's a fun project for the kids and it's easy and inexpensive.
Hikingware.com suggests the following vegetables for easy indoor growing and eating!
Green Onions Buy one bunch at the store and you'll never have to buy another set again! Simply use the green stalks down to about 2 inches above the white head. Then, put the heads in a small jar of water and place them on a windowsill with some light exposure. Within days, the green stalks will start growing again and you can have an unlimited harvest of scallions year-round. Change the water in the jar about once a month to avoid any mildew odors.
Carrots and Radishes Most root crops need greater depth to grow than you can provide indoors, but radishes, especially round or globe varieties that do not root very deeply, grow well in boxes, troughs and pans. Seeds can be sown from late-winter until mid-autumn, often producing usable roots 21 to 25 days later. Round carrot varieties are also successful in pots and boxes.
Potatoes Seed tubers used for outdoor plantings are easily grown in large pots, buckets, or even plastic sacks, and produce worthwhile yields of tasty new potatoes. When planting the tubers, leave space at the top of the container for adding more compost to earth-up the plants as they develop. The top of the sack can be rolled down to start with, and then rolled up as required.
Mushrooms Mushrooms are an ideal indoor crop for any time of year. Prepared bags of special compost with mushroom spawn only need watering before being left in a draft-free, dark place such as an attic or cupboard. Keep at 50-60ºF (10-15ºC) and mushrooms should be cropping a few weeks later.
Beans and Peas Dwarf French beans can be sown in pots from late-winter on-wards for early pods. Dwarf broad beans and dwarf runner beans crop well indoors too. Tall runner beans grown on cane wigwams or on string up the sides of a sunny conservatory are decorative as well as productive, and both dwarf and tall mange tout peas will do well as houseplants. Pick the pods while they are young, tender and juicy.
And here are some delicious herbs to grow indoors that will brighten any meal, emergency or not!
Basil Start basil from seeds and place the pots in a south-facing window—basil likes lots of sun and warmth.
Bay It's a perennial that grows well in containers all year long. Place the pot in an east- or west-facing window, but be sure it does not get crowded—bay needs air circulation to remain healthy.
Oregano Your best bet is to start with a tip cutting from an outdoor oregano plant. Place the pot in a south-facing window.
Parsley You can start this herb from seeds or dig up a clump from your garden at the end of the season. Parsley likes full sun but will grow slowly in an east- or west-facing window.
Sage Take a tip cutting from an outdoor plant to start indoor sage. It tolerates dry, indoor air well, but it needs the strong sun it will get in a south-facing window.
Thyme You can start thyme indoors either by rooting a soft tip cutting or by digging up and potting an outdoor plant. Thyme likes full sun but will grow in an east- or west-facing window.
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