Green City Market

Green City Market found us learning much about community gardening and tasting fresh, organic fruits and vegetables. I found the lemon sorrel to be amazing with its surprising lemony taste since I never thought an herb could pack so much zest into one leaf. What I found most compelling on our short tour of Lincoln Park's Edible Garden was both the ease and difficulty of gardening. I fell in love with lemon sorrel instantly when I bit into it and just had to ask how I can grow some at home. The process, as with most herbs, wasn't too difficult. A small plot of land will do just fine. These instructions from Harvest to Table give a great overview on how to grow sorrel in your own garden but simply you plant the seeds about 2-3 inches apart, keep them evenly moist and wait about 60 days until you can use your sorrel in salads, as garnishes or even as a small, tasty snack. It's not a demanding herb; it only needs a little bit of love and attention to grow. Hopefully I'll be able to plant my own somewhere in my apartment complex's backyard. Though I love sorrel and could buy it at the store, I'd much rather grow my very own for a) the organic and fresh aspects and b) just the fun experience of home gardening.

Herbs are easy enough to grow at home but other produce requires much more time, patience, equipment, knowledge, hard work, the list goes on and on. Edible Garden grows many different types of produce but much of it is due to the resources they have on site. They have an irrigation system, on a timer, that waters the produce at the optimal time of day for water absorption. They have a three-stage compost heap in order to give the best possible nutrients to their produce. Probably their biggest resource is their staff, with years of home gardening experience and time to volunteer to tend to the garden and teach the community about local produce. This may be a consequence of Lincoln Park's neighborhood socioeconomic status. Having been working in the South Chicago neighborhood, I've been fortunate to understand the community from various perspectives and know full well that the neighborhood can start a community garden much like Lincoln Park's, with minor financial help I would say for start-up costs. My team and I stumbled across a community garden adjacent to South Chicago Neighborhood House, indicating that residents of the South Chicago neighborhood know how to grow produce and have the time to do it. What I didn't see at the community garden, however, was some sort of community education program or equipment similar to the types present further north in the city. An interesting project could be to implement a community education garden in the South Chicago neighborhood that brings the community education. After all, who wouldn't want to try some sorrel? What kids wouldn't want to get their hands dirty while simultaneously getting dirty? An aesthetically, who wouldn't want a great looking, colorful, good-sized garden right in the middle of their neighborhood? I know I do!