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This is John Kohler with Growingyourgreens.com. I have another exciting episode for you from
The Woodstock Fruit Festival 2012. I know some of you guys, or most of you guys, probably
see, we are out here at the lake beside the talk that I gave -- the talks that were here
about eating a healthy fruit and vegetable based diet. There is all kinds of activities;
you can be at the lake swimming, playing on inflatables they had earlier, little kayaks
and canoes and whatnot or you can go to some of the talks.
So what I am going to do for you guys next is actually put up my favorite talk that I
gave and it is actually on one of my favorite things to eat in the whole wide world. It
is on the leafy greens and in this talk you are going to learn about 9 specific leafy
greens that I actually picked, harvested and dehydrated and brought here to the event.
I really want to share the information on how important leafy greens are into your diet.
The main thing to remember from this ; you want to eat a wide variety from leafy greens,
each and every day and eat , in my opinion, a minimum of 2 pounds to meet as many nutritional
needs as possible. So any way, let's get in the clip
I named my Youtube channel Growing Your Greens because I've learned that greens, next to
fruit, is a very important food that we should be consuming on a daily basis. It is my belief
that we should eat a minimum of 2 pounds of leafy greens-- I am not talking about vegetables
like broccoli. I am talking about the leafs. Especially the young tender leaves, they are
easy to digest and they taste a lot better. I mean, how many people have eaten kale from
the Whole Foods and get home and some people don't like eating kale it is so bitter. Does
that happen to anyone here? Wow! Almost everybody! Well that happens because the kale from the
Whole Foods. I mean it is picked. It is cut. It is hydro-cooled. It is put on a truck and
shipped and then it gets to you. And as food goes bad, it tastes worse. How many of you
has this happened to a fruit; you get an apple or peach, actually that is a very good example.
Peach ripes; you miss eating it, it starts going bad and you eat it and it is just not
the same. Well, most people are getting their greens in that state, and it is not the same.
It is that overripe peach that is just going bad.
Leafy greens also go bad. When they go bad, they taste bad too. But that is what most
people get. I really want to encourage everyone in here to grow your greens because they are
so important. Now, why are greens so important? We definitely know it is not for the calories.
There are hardly any calories in leafy greens but what there is, and that is where the fruit
comes in, fruit is our main source of calories. There is also some good nutrition in the fruit,
but not in the concentration that the leafy greens have. For example, things like Kale
have properties in them that have been shown to protect you from cancer. I don't know about
you, but I definitely want to be protected from things like cancer and other diseases
so by eating a lot of leafy greens you could definitely become disease-proof as Dr. Joel
Fuhrman would say. He created what is called the ANDI scoring- system and luckily Whole
Foods has adopted this system, so if you go to any Whole Foods in the country- I haven't
been to Whole Foods out the county, to see if they are using it there. They have a system
called the ANDI system and they score foods around the Whole Foods Market. I wish they
did it to everything because then it would really be opening people's eyes to what to
buy and what not to buy. Hopefully it would change the whole buying pattern. They are
trying to change it gently because most the Whole Foods business comes from none whole
food items unfortunately. I don't know why that is.
But so, if you look at the ANDI scoring charts; they have most fruits and vegetables listed
and then some processed food and a lot of the greens and nuts are actually listed. But
something like soda for example is a one and it goes down to zero. Zero is like you guys
shouldn't eat it. It could be detrimental to your health. The lower numbers are not
very nutrient dense, they may be calorically dense . The scoring system is based on the
nutrition, phyto chemicals, antioxidants, phyto nutrients, trace minerals and things
like that. And at the top of the list is something like kale. Kale is a 1000 on the list. Kale
is the most nutrient dense food. We have a tendency in America and other places to think
"I only want to eat the best and highest nutrition food" so then when you go to Whole Foods and
eat a bunch of kale everyday; number one it tastes really bad, number two if you are only
eating kale day in and day out and every day after day, you are getting the nutrients in
kale , your body is going to be flooding with those, but you are body is also so kind naturally
creating toxins in every green and why is this? One of my sayings in life is that I
strive to model nature and in nature, nature does things for a reason. These are natural
toxins that they plants made so like all the plants are out here and then there are animals.
People are seeing chipmunks, squirrels, frogs, and what other animals have you guys seen
around camp? Fox! Wow! Foxes are cool. Cats. There are all sorts of animals and some animals
their primary diet are greens so if the plants, food and some of the leafy greens didn't have
some toxins like all some may have alkaloids some may have oxylates and then those are
in there so that no one animal is going to set there and eat all the spinach because
if it does it'll get too many oxylates and it is going to get sick and maybe even lose
its life. So those are all in there for a reason so the plants can reproduce and stay
alive. But if we eat only kale day in and day out, we're going to get a lot of those
anti-nutrients that are in the kale. Where as if we eat kale today, swiss chards tomorrow,
lettuce tomorrow, the next day you eat something like, red vein sorrel, malabar spinach, Huacatay
, Egyptian spinach, the plantain the following day; everyday you're going to get a small
amount of those anti-nutrients but you'll also get a lot of the beneficial, phyto nutrients
and phyto chemicals and especially some of the food that I actually showed you today.
And probably they are not even discovered in research fully. These are really uncommon
food and some are from a certain countries which they even use in stables. I know the
watercress they use it in South America instead of cilantro.
But basically by growing your own food you're going to get a wider variety of nutrients
that now you get to choose from because the other thing that I often talk about is that
if you go to a grocery store or a health food store or The Whole Foods, even in many cases
your Farmers' Market, produce that is in trade . In-trade produce has to meet a few requirements
for the trade. Number one it has to be profitable so it has to be something that is going to
sell because the people that are growing it are not doing it for love or to better your
nutrients. They are doing it for the big old mighty dollar unfortunately. Number two, because
they are doing it for the profit, it has to be something that can be picked, and then
shipped in a refrigerated trucks and not go wilty or bad. So for example some of the tropical
green that I grow, if you cut them within a few hours that will be wilted and it is
not profitable to be selling those. So if you really look at the produce that is being
sold as leafy green in the stores, those are the greens that I can grow during winter time
when it gets down to freezing temperature, and they'll stay alive; things like lettuce,
spinach, kales and those are all the leafy greens we're getting so we're getting a very
small percentage of all the leafy greens in the world because we have to rely on the system
that grows food for us than for each person to take responsibility back to themselves
and grow at least a portion of their own food. Whether it is sprout -- I mean, I've been
growing these sprouts in my cabin here this whole time and they are maybe a few days past
the optimal time of harvest but I wanted to save them for this talk but I mean if I can
grow them in a cabin without hot water, you can do it in your apartment in Chicago or
New York city, or wherever you live. You don't have to have a big garden like I do. But I
am going to talk about that later if you want to grow greens outside have it setted up.
I have about 700 videos on Youtube that also explain growing the green and many of the
videos I have are about some of these specifics foods and you can see what the plant looks
like, what is actually growing vs. the dehydrated ones. Unfortunately I brought dehydrated samples
for you today; I don't like to do that, because I don't like to eat dehydrated food; only
when it is absolutely necessary. It is always best to eat fresh. One of the things that
I say is "freshtest is the bestest" I am not an English major because I know it is not
totally grammatically correct. So I like to eat fresh things but in this
case I really wanted to show you guys like some of the varieties. Just a day before I
left I harvested 9 different greens from my garden that I am currently growing and put
them in dehydrator at 105 and then I got them out and brought them for you guys. So at least
you'll get a sampling of what they can taste like. They taste better fresh of course. If
I was traveling and I did want to eat my greens and I was going somewhere where they don't
have my greens, dehydration is an excellent tool to perceive your food. I'd probably rather
eat my dehydrated food during a neutral dense nutrient soil that is really rare vs. some
lettuce from a conventional grocery store that is not organic. Because I know those
are all organic. You also want to hydrate these back with some
water. One of the things I like to do sometime is take green syrup and I'd just put them
in the vitamix and power it, run it on full speed and then I'd put them in a bottle and
literary I am doing my own green powders You guys know how much green powders sells for,
like 30 dollars for the little bottle. You can bottle all these stuff and make a crazy
bottle that is worth so much money. Now that I am advocating doing that, in a situation
where you are traveling or you can't be home, this is an alternate option for you to have
some of your own grown stuff. So if greens are so good for us, how much
should we be eating? How many greens do you people eat a day? 6 ounces? 1 pounds? 2 pounds?
5 pounds? - 2 to 3 pounds
- From 0 to 3 pounds - A pound of always the same roots, like 3
to 4 types. I have a question: They organic juice places
in New York have__________ raw and they say 6 pounds of juice. I drink 2 of those but
I don't think it is 6 pounds. John: Yeah, you're not getting 6 pounds of
leafy greens. It is very strong. A lot juice places they may not be using a lot of green
cause that jacks up their price. They are probably using a lot of celery and cucumber
which adds a lot of juice and lowers their cost. It is always better to do it yourself
obviously. So based on my research I think we should
eat a minimum of 2 pounds of mixed varieties a day. Keep trying to switch it off. Even
if you don't have anything else but the Whole Foods you could buy a whole bunch of different
varieties and try something new; new greens that you haven't eaten before. You may have
to start off small; some of the things like the dandelion that is sold is actually______
but it is closely related to dandelion. You can try that or escrow or ___________ and
all those different ones little by little to get all those different nutrients in you.
I really encourage you guys to support your local farmers if you aren't growing your own
food, at least they might have more varieties because at least if they are harvesting it
in the morning they could bring it to the Farmers Market and by then it won't be wilted,
you'll buy it and a few days later some of those greens will be wilted. But it is really
easy to grow some of your stuff so hopefully after this talk you'll be motivated to at
least try to grow some yourself. A lot people say "look John, I got brown thumbs". My thumbs,
they are still not too green. I've lost many plants but one of the things I've learned
it that to be a success you have to have more failures than success. So I've failed more
times than I've succeeded but I just get back up and keep growing some stuff. You learn
as you go. If you've been into raw food for just a period of time, you get on the wagon
and then fall off; you figure out I've messed up this time what did I do wrong, lets correct
that and move on. You can master the raw food but you could also really easily master growing
food because literary all it takes is the seed. The seed has and knows everything you
need to know. You put it in the ground and give it some good soil, a little bit of water;
not over water or under water, and it knows what to do. Another gardener that I know;
he says people intentionally kill their plants because if the plant was out there; grass
is growing and people are not doing anything. People are over watering it, not watering
it enough, and then they don't make it. But it goes out in Nature: it totally thrives
and survives. So what we really need to do is somehow take a handoff approach just give
it everything it needs, provide it with the right conditions and it is going to take off
basically So based on my research I think you should
eat a minimum of 2 pounds of mixed leafy greens a day. How you do you get those into you.
Some people might be able to maw into 2 pounds of greens; chew them and eat them. I probably
eat maybe a pound of green at night by myself. It takes me 2 hours every night to eat my
dinner because I chew well. If you don't chew well, maybe it will take you half an hour.
But then you are not getting optimal digestions. We're not setup like a cow that eats grass.
but if you do, you really need to masticate it and chew it really well because our bodies
are not designed like other creatures in the planet to digest and extract the nutrients
out of the fibers when they are locked in the fiber. So chewing by far is the best way
to do it; the best and the free way to do it. But the problem is that most people don't
chew. I hate it when I go to my parents' house and my dad is the best example of someone
who doesn't chew well. I got him on a30 day water fast years ago for his thyroid, and
it actually helped his condition. But better than my dad fasting for 30 days, he went to
a fasting clinic called True North in Northern California. During his 30 day water fast,
he got classes from the doctors. One of the doctors that was there was Dr Rick. The staff
gave classes and educated my dad on the right way to eat. So after he came out of the program,
beside just the water fast which is an amazing, I think what was more important to me was
that he made the dietary changes that I had been telling him for at least 10 years. But
you know, he is not going to listen to his son who he saw in dippers, but he is going
to listen to these doctors that are getting excellent results.
But when I go to the house, I wish my dad would also mix up his diet instead maybe I'll
send him this link to watch this video. He eats like a spring mix; and that is great,
it is better than McDonald. I also strive and desire everybody to go further. But he'd
take his spring mix and shove them in the mouth; chew, chew, and sallow. So literary
if I am sitting across the table from him, it makes me uneasy to sit next to people that
aren't chewing their food. It is not just about chewing your food, it is about being
conscious when you are eating and not just unconsciously shoving food in because that
is what you're supposed to do. Aren't we eating to get the nutrient out of the food not just
to shove it in and then processing it and have it go out. So, I like to sit and take
my time because when you are stressed, you're not going to digest well either. I am not
like mediating while I am eating. I am one of the last people to finish eating, I am
taking my time, chewing well, enjoying everything, and taking everything in. My body is in a
good place to digest well. And that is especially important when you're eating the greens. With
the fruit, I still recommend you treat your fruit well and mix them with your ____________
it is going to digest a lot easier because we are much better able to digest our fruit
specially the leafy greens. So, eat 2 pounds a day, if you don't chew,
which it is the best way so chew it well. Some other options that you could do are blending.
Actually this morning I blended my little smoothie here. And in my smoothie I blended
a quarter pound micro-greens and some bananas and some coconut water and papaya. So I've
been drinking. And that was 64ounces and that is what I got left. And that is an easy way.
Sometimes I'd blend literary a pound, like a spring mix box of greens into an orange
juice or into coconut water and banana, or whatever fruits you like to do. I really like
to keep my ingredients down to less than 4- 5 ingredients at the most whenever I am making
something. That way I digest a lot better so I don't start throwing everything in the
kitchen sink in there because I've also made some nasty things. And in using all your organic
produce it tastes nasty; so do I dump it out or do I hold my nose and drink it. I usually
go for the "hold the nose and drink". Eating food should be pleasurable and enjoyable;
you shouldn't have to hold your nose. So if blending is a good way. I talked about
this yesterday, while you can blend ; blenders run at incredibly high RPM like the vitamix
runs at 27,000 RPM, that is really fast. Every time it spins, it creates a vortex that sucks
air into the blender that gets it to mix up, basically. And every time it is pulling air
in, it is actually introducing oxygen into your mixture which is basically oxidizing
your food; so if you cut an apple and it turns brown, well this is happening at very high
rate; much more than cutting an apple when you are blending things. So I always recommend
if do you choose to blend, to only blend for as long as absolutely necessary to get the
desired consistency you want. If you over-blend, you can do extra damage and oxidize some of
the important nutrients in the food. But for example if you take and just blend bananas
and some water smoothie; you can blend it and then drink it, it tastes one way. But
if you leave it sit out for about an hour or 2, you come back to it and then you drink
it, it will taste nasty because it is all oxidized. The other thing that it does also
when you are blending and fill it up to here (to the top), and then you turn on the blender,
then when you are done, the blender is not up to here! Now did you just create food somewhere?
No, it put all that air into your blended mixture, so now there is extra air. Also,
when you are drinking it, especially if you're drinking fast, you could get belching, burping
or gas because of the extra air. So we got eating, chewing; and don't forget
chewing really well. You get blending. What else do we have? Juicing is another excellent
way to get the nutrients out of the green. I prefer low RPM juices that run the slowest.
Once again, the higher the speed, the more oxidation and the more nutrients you are potentially
and probably losing. But with the lower speed juicers it is going to do the minimum amount
of damage to the vital nutrients and chemicals that are very important for us. And also it
is going to separate the fibers which is something else that the blender and the juicer does.
Some people here might not advocate juicing because they will say it is processed food
because there are no juicers in nature. And that is completely true, I agree with that.
But we all need to make the decisions for ourselves as to what we feel would be best
for us. If you can't eat 2 pounds and get it in because it is such a large quantity.
I can literally easily juice a pound of green, take out most of the juice and the nutrients
and separate the fibers and drink that. And literary 32 ounce in mason jar of juice with
no problem. There is one pound, it was so easy to get my 2 pound. If I do it again,
there is 2 pounds. You'll have to keep going up. It also makes it so much easier for us
to digest. I tend to believe if we lived like 200 years ago, we'd have had all those environmental
talk. I'd probably be cool with just eating my food. I don't think they even invented
blenders back then. So I'd have had to eat my food. And if you do want to juice without
a juicer, you can just take your food, chew it and then just spit the pulp out. It is
all liquid. You are the best juicer. You don't need to buy a machine but it makes it a lot
greens, which is really fun, I like to do grazing. So grazing is not allowed in Whole
Foods but it is allowed in my garden if you are me. I don't want people coming into my
garden going "John, you said grazing in your garden is cool, man" and just show up and
eat stuff. So I just go out a little to my garden some days, take a break from work and
walk outside and just start eating leaves and greens and tomatoes and bell peppers,
or whatever I have. And that to me is the funniest thing. Now I got the greens growing,
I pick it fresh, put it in my mouth ; there is minimum nutrient loss because it hasn't
been put in a truck, it hasn't been shipped for seven days, it hasn't been under refrigeration.
And I can choose which leaves I want to select. For example, if you are at Whole Foods and
you buy kale, you always get the large leaves. And those leaves when they get older, beside
getting bitter when they are shipped, they also get stronger taste --I don't want to
say bitter, but they get a stronger taste than when they get more mature. So I'm going
out to my garden to graze, I'm going to pick the baby leaves to eat on the top of the plants
and those ones are much tender because the fiber hasn't been fully developed and so they
are easier to digest. Now if I am going to be juicing, I am not
going to waste my precious baby leaves. I am going to go down to the bottom of the plant
and pick those nice large leaves that may have some snail holes or bug holes because
I am not spraying anything in my garden. And that is fine because the juicer doesn't care,
it will still juice up the stuff with the bug holes and then I'll get the nutrients
out of the big leaves. So, that is one way I like to do it; by grazing.
Another way you can include more leafy greens into your diet is by eating them with fruits.
Especially I've found that people that have blood sugar sensitivity; too much sugar, you
can take a nice romaine leaf , take a banana, put it under there and roll it up. Now you're
eating the banana with the greens. So number 1; you're getting more greens. Number 2: you're
diluting the sugar with extra fiber which is going to slow down the absorption of that
sugar into your blood stream. Sometimes when I don't want to be so fancy, I just eat a
bite of fruit then eat some greens. For every bite of fruit, I take 2 bites of green. So
then you are getting some dilution now. The other way; every day I eat large salad
at night so during the day, my general diet is either smoothie juice or whole fruits usually
Moderate meals then at night I eat a big salad and what order is it depends on what I feel
like because I am more drawn into eating what I feel like at the time instead of planning
whatever I am going to eat 2 days in advance. I just buy a ton of produce; I have it all
laid out nicely really so I can see what is going ripe and then I can make the decision.
I had this and this and this, this morning for breakfast; what do you want? What do I
feel like? And then I just go for it and eat it.
So the best way to get your greens is to grow your own. That is by far the best way and
it is really easy. Why should you grow your own? As I talked about it earlier, the taste
could change, and the nutrition could go down within 24 hours of harvesting, up to 50% of
certain nutrients can be lost!. And that is just within 24 hours. There is a study that
shows that 60% of flavonoids were lost after 7 days of harvest in broccoli. So most broccoli
you buy in the store are 7 days old so now you're getting food that is half as nutrient
rich as it could be. And people don't know this. That is why some people might be on
a raw diet and be deficient because they are eating whole produce once again, if we are
modeling nature back 700 years ago, there was no refrigeration. People would go out
and get things fresh; animals always eat their food fresh. They go to the bush and start
chopping away. They don't but it in refrigerators and then store it unless it is nuts for the
winter. But then the nuts, they store fairly well. Another reason is that it tastes better.
I don't have to say anything about that. Another reason is that it costs less money.
Sometimes when I visit South Florida; I like to go to South Florida for the winter, I am
not from New York, I am from California. South Florida is one of the most expensive places
I've ever been for greens. You go into Whole Foods in California, the lettuce I think it
might be $1.99 a head, but in South Florida it is 2.99 or 3.99 a pound. That is insane.
Growing your own is really inexpensive. You can go to Walmart- I got kicked out of Walmart
actually. They have 20 cents seed package; not that I recommend growing those seeds but
growing 20cents seed packages is better than going to the Whole Foods and buy minimum 7
day old produce. Obviously they have different companies that sell heirloom seeds and some
of the other varieties that will cost more. But none the less, you can grow a lot of food
for a little bit of money. Another reason for me it is important to grow
food is that now you are able to have much wider, like almost unlimited varieties. If
you go to the store you got: lettuce, and brassica family for the most part, there are
other ones too. But those are the ones that are cold________ that are would make the shipping
Another reason is that you can selectively harvest the leaves that you want for the task
you want to do. So, if I am juicing; I am picking the big leaves. If I am eating them
fresh; I am picking the small baby leaves. If you go to Whole Foods I guess you have
a selection on Bok Choy sometimes you get the small ones, sometimes you get the large
ones. But that is about it. I think that unless you are buying the micro-green, you might
grow green kale on some Whole Food or you can get the big leaves. But there is no in
between. Earth Bound is now selling baby kale but they are crazy expensive.
So harvest tender young leaves; less fibers and they usually taste better and sweeter.
Next I am going to get to the portion where I am going to talk about some of these different
foods that I grew in my garden; also some fresh ones here and share them with you guys.
To let you know some of the varieties and let you experience some of the taste of them
as I send them around you get to taste and also talk about them a little bit.
Some are fresh and some are dried. I actually brought them from my garden.
So the one that I actually grew here was the sunflower greens. Once again, every different
green has its use and usefulness. If I lived in an apartment, which I'd never choose to
do, you can grow something like sprouts in your kitchen without a patio or anything.
I did a video on growing sprouts and there was a warehouse in South Florida that actually
grows sprout in a big warehouse building about as much light as in here with the florescent
light and they are very successful. This is their business. They have been doing it for
many years. Luckily I know the owners so I actually went in there and filmed a video
that takes you step by step to show you guys and teach you guys how to exactly grow your
own sprouts at home. So I am not going to stand here and give that lecture, but you
can go online and see it. It is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to grow sunflower
greens. Also, in that video I talk about growing other sprouts just in water not in soil. Overall,
I prefer the soil grown spout whenever possible especially if you're growing it in a good
rich compost and adding trace minerals segmentation to the soil. I think it is very key and very
important. I always recommend whenever you eat something
you are growing don't just go "my sprouts are ready. I am going to harvest them all";
put then in the fridge then take them out of the fridge and use them. No, you are going
to let them grow till you need them, then you're going to harvest them.
The next thing we're going to send around are red kale micro-greens. Just like the sunflowers
that are growing in trays; you can grow micro-greens. Generally they just need water in little mat.
Those are actually red kale micro-green at the back of the kitchen. I like micro-greens
a lot because once again these are the most tenderous form of the plant. A few of these
are not a lot of calories, but they pack some good nutrients and they are very simple to
grow. The problem is; to grow as many micro greens as this, you need to have a lot of
seeds, because every seed only turns into one leaf. So unless you have unlimited amount
of space, I don't necessarily recommend growing micro-greens unless you live in apartments.
One other thing I do is I let my kale plants grow up and grow really big and then they
grow their seed. They make those green bean-like-paws. When they are ready, they split open and all
the seeds would drop on the land below. And then next season when the time is right, they'll
sprout automatically. And to me, I can't have as many plants growing so close together.
So I take my scissors and cut them off and then I'd harvest my own micro-greens. I didn't
do anything to grow it. They are just there. And I leave some of them to grow up into full
plants for next season. They have a unique flavor and there are many companies now that
are starting mirco-green businesses around the country, so that is great. But the problem
is for some of the micro-greens you are going to pay like $4 for an ounce or half an ounce,
0.75 of an ounce. It is insane. But you can easily grow them yourself, they are really
good. The next thing that I am going to pass them
around is plantain. Aside from growing your own food, another way of getting your green
is by wild harvesting. I am by no means the wild harvesting expert; I know a few ____
that get me by. What I've done is actually I went out and wild harvested certain greens
and brought back the seeds. This is actually the seed stock to the plantain. This is a
large seedstock and this one is when it is much younger. And then when these get brown,
that is when seeds are mature and you can take the seeds and take them home to grow.
One question that I got at least half a dozen times since being here is "John, I got rabbits,
deer and woodchucks at my house and I tried to grow lettuce and they always find a way
in past my things and eat it. What do I do?" I say number one: build a better fence. You
can build a fence down below the ground and go higher up and make tighter so they can't
get through it. That is one option. The other option is outsmart them. How? Surely in your
area wherever you live there are wild foods growing that you can't eat raw from any bush
you can, and I encourage you guys to be 100% sure before you eat anything; that it is edible.
So you need to find a wild_____ person in your area and go out on a tour with them,
and have them show you what it is and actually collect the seeds when you're out with them,
beside eating it, bring the seeds back to your garden and plant those things in nutrient
rich soil in compost_________. There by you are planting native things that is out in
nature. The animals are not crazy enough to break through the fence to get the stuff that
is already out in nature. But if you are growing things like lettuce and kale, those are like
delicacies to them. They are like schmorgesborg "there is no lettuce out in nature, but in
this garden what I've eaten is really good"; it is like eating durian seed. That is a real
treat. So outsmart them instead of growing food for them.
So I want you to notice on some of those leaves, especially on the larger leaves, there are
much more fibers and it can be hard to digest. I've picked some smaller ones here so just
maybe try to get a small taste of the small ones and feel the texture.
Now definitely some of the leafy greens can be very strong tasting even if you are used
to it. That is why you want to eat a little bit this and a whole bunch of romaine if you
are not quite used to some of the strongest of these guys because they are also detoxifying.
The next one we're going to talk about is buckhorn plantain, that was the common plantain.
This is not a good presentation because now we're getting to my dehydrated stuff that
I grew. The buckhorn plantain is actually grown in France. It has those little horns
or offshoots of the leaf. They are really good because have the same center thing and
it rapidly reseeds. So another thing that I strive to do when I am growing a garden
is that I grow things that I can just grow once and it will actually grow a seed, drop
the seed and then they'll come back automatically. So I really like a garden that would do that
for me every year so that one day I'd wake up and the gardens is growing without me even
planting anything. And I am getting there. It has to be a long process. But this is something
that I've actually that had reseeded on its own.
This one is really fun. It is called red-veined sorrel. These leaves look amazing when they
are fresh. When they are dry they still look pretty cool. It looks kind of decorative.
This has a nice lemony flavor. And I've found that the best use of these is when they are--
the youngest. They are the tastiest when they are fresh. When they get older they are not
quite as good because they get a bit strong. But I like to juice them. It adds a nice lemony
flavor to my juice. The thing that I found that was cool—I was actually doing a recipe
contest on-line. I actually dehydrated some of them instead of using kale to make my kale
chips, I dehydrated red variegated sorrel chips. And you can do that. You don't have
to make kale chips or leafy green chips with kale. You can use any of these greens that
you have, so iff you don't have kale make plantain chips or whatever you want to do.
Or just dehydrate the leaves and eat them without any of the high____ sauces that they
put on there. When you dehydrate them, they actually get very salty, so then you don't
have to use salt to make it taste good. You can just dehydrate this and it tastes salty
on its own. And this one is another one that really reseeds readily really well.
The next one is called the New Zealand spinach. It does have a fairly high levels of oxalates
so some people like it, some don't. I recently had a visitor from Brazil visit me in my place.
I gave her a tour in my garden and made a video on that. And she said if you go to Brazil
in the market, this gets sold as spinach. So if you buy spinach it is this stuff. Because
Brazil is tropical so they have a hard time growing the cold-weather spinach that we know.
But they have no problem growing this. And this is another thing that grows for me year
round with no problem although I don't eat it too often. But I have friends and visitors
who come over and they love those stuff Next is a plant that I really love. If you
live in South Florida there is no reason you shouldn't be growing this. This will grow
year round in South Florida in a big long vine; you can transcend it over a big fence
and it will just take over. It makes these nice purple berries that are definitely__________
and I eat as many as I can. I spit the seeds out so that they'll grow next year. It will
stain your skin. If you're a lady and want to you to do makeup, you can actually break
them open and they be a nice purplish color that you can put on your eyes for an eyeliner.
But I like the leafy greens because they are suckily and leafy green; you're not going
to get that texture because I dehydrated them. Their texture is maybe different from the
other ones I passed around because this is really like a succulent type leaf and it just
tastes so good when they are fresh. So that is tropical so in a place like Hawaii or South
Florida they'll grow year round, no problem. Unless you get a freeze one of these years
otherwise grow them in the summer time and this is another plant that I've grown. You
have to give it a place to vine up or a fence to grow up and it can grow up really tall.
And it produced leaves for you throughout the whole summer. It starts growing pretty
slowly but then it gets established it takes off. It is called malabar spinach. I've written
the name on every plate. The next one is really fun. It is called edible
chrysanthemum. So many people know the Chrysanthemum flower, but there are certain varieties of
chrysanthemum where you can eat the flower and also the leaves; this maybe available
at a local Asian market near you. So while our culture really will eat lettuce, kale,
and bok choy, other Asian cultures have different greens because of their environment. In the
tropics there are different things with their different weather pattern than we have here.
If you go to most Asian markets they should have edible chrysanthemum. So that is another
way if you don't choose, and I highly encourage you to choose to grow your food or a portion
to it, you can go to Asian markets to even open up a wider varieties of greens that Whole
Foods won't have. Obviously they probably won't be organic but at least you're going
to get a wider variety and that is a good thing.
The other thing I want to talk about really quickly is on those guys, the leaves are really
small so what happens when the plant starts to grow the leaves are really large because
now the leaves are basically pulling in nutrients to allow the plant to grow bigger. And as
the plant gets bigger, then it goes through its life cycle. As it goes on, the plant is
into its reproductive cycle. It is in the growth cycle, then its reproductive cycle
it is working on making the flowers which I also encourage you guys, besides your leafy
greens, to eat a good portion of edible flowers every day. They are very high in anti-oxidants;
another virto-chemical and vitro-nutrients that may or may not have been researched.
They have been official _____ for example I know specifically in the marigolds they
have zeaxanthin and lutein. And if you go down to the health food store, you can buy
a bottle of zeaxanthin and lutein extract from the marigolds flowers. Why should we
buy bottles of pills when we can eat the flowers and get those nutrients. The problem is most
Americans are not eating their flowers to get the nutrients, so their eyes are jacked
up because they are on a diet that is really poor in anti-oxidants so now they are taking
supplements. But if you eating the right food then you don't need any supplements.
So with that you can eat the flower on the edible chrysanthemum and at this point right
now, my plant is in its flowering stage. Once it goes to flower, the next stage it makes
new seeds so I can save them to grow them next year. So you can make a onetime seed
investment, grow it to maturity, harvest those seeds and save them for next year and even
having appendence of extra seeds that you can sell or give to friends so then more people
can grow their food and that plants actually puts off a lot of seeds. But when it goes
to seed the plant gets more bitter. Some people say "when the plant goes to seed, don't eat
the greens anymore" because they are too bitter and probably there are other properties in
there ____the plants is really focused the seed instead of the greens. I don't really
have a problem with eating the seeds. I also go and eat what is desirable to me. So I go
to my garden and taste one of everything and go "ok, what did I like the best? What am
I really needing right now?" well that one tasted really good so I am going back to eat
malabar spinach and not the other things. But I always like to give my body the chance
and the opportunity to figure out what it wants.
This one is a strong one so you have to be really careful. So I don't recommend chopping
off a whole leaf; maybe take just one little leaf of the whole cluster. I was really concerned
I was going through the TSA. When you look at this leaf you may look like some other
medicinal herbs that I actually don't grow. And if you look at the plant it actually looks
kind of similar if you don't know what you're looking at. But this is Watercress and this
is the first year I am growing it. I don't know if I consider it a leafy green. It is
kind of more of an herb. For me herbs and leafy greens, it is kind of a cloudy line.
Like for me, for many people they consider cilantro or parsley an herb, right? For me
I consider them leafy greens because I go out to my garden and harvest a whole big bowl
of cilantro or parsley and that is my salad for the night. Many people won't do that because
for them it is a flavor. This one is definitely more of a flavor for me because I haven't
eaten a whole bowl of it; it gets too strong. One of my favorite things to do is to do a
dressing in my blender and have it in a bowl then walk out to my garden and take a leaf
of whatever; dip it in my salad dressing and eat it. I can sit there at one plant eating
leaves of the same plant or go around to different ones. That is the best way to eat a salad
in my opinion. I actually have a really good video where I do and you can see how much
fun I have. They use it in South America kind of like we would use cilantro as a spice or
flavor and not as a whole meal. The next one is one that I also started growing
this year. It is called stradolo. It is another unique and rare. It is actually hard to find
the seed for these guys. It is a green from Italy. They use this in Italian culture and
it is green fresh. It is going to taste a fraction of what it does fresh. Because we
took all the water out, it is all fibers, it has no flavor. But fresh, it is pretty
much a nice chewy leafy green that doesn't have a flavor either way; you can use it like
lettuce. And that one rapidly goes to seed. It also makes those beautiful flowers that
you can also eat. The next one we're going to talk about is
called _______. This is another one from Europe. I like this a lot and really you're not getting
the full experience because it doesn't look like this on the plant. Have you seen how
coral looks like a wose with the little things going everywhere? That looks like this but
imagine the corals is just blades of grass now and it just spreads out. And this is a
cool plant because it can be grown in sandy and salty soils. So say you have a lot of
salt content in your soil—you live in South Florida near the beach and you can't grow
anything else; this is going to grow really well. The other unique thing about it is that
it is also kind of a salty plant because it can't tolerate the salt it actually pulls
the salt and the minerals into it and it tastes really good. I really like to put the sprigs
of this on my meals, into my salad and sometimes I just sit there and eat it. You can look
at my Youtube channel; you can actually see the plant growing. And this is another plant
that actually has a short viability of the seeds from what I hear; it is the first year
that I grow it. And once again it is slow to start growing but once it did it is a full
bush now and right now it is about flowering and I am going to have a bunch of seeds so
I don't know how they are going to do next year. I am really excited about this plant;
another unique plant. The last one I am going to talk about is probably
my favorite. I've saved the best for last. I like to do that. This one is called Egyptian
spinach. I talked earlier about the ANDI scoring system, I said kale is the most nutritious
thing on the ANDI scoring system, and I'll bet you dollars to ______ that if this was
scored, it would be over a 1000; it is that important. But nobody knows about it so I'll
read a couple of statistics. So Egyptian spinach; also known as molokhiya, is known as the king
of vegetables. Its carotene contents are 4.6 times more than spinach and 19 times more
than broccoli. Its calcium contents are 9 times more than spinach and 10 times more
than broccoli. Even vitamin B1 and B2 are 5 times more compared to spinach. It contains
much more vitamin E, C, potassium, iron, and other vegetable fibers than any other vegetables.
This stuff is really cool. And how I learned about this is a unique story. So every year
I go to the Health Food Industry tradeshow, it is mostly all supplements and I have a
few videos where I actually do review the tradeshow and one of them was this package
food product called Eat Your Vegetables. I took the pack, I dropped it and I kind of
stomped on it. If you want to eat your vegetables don't have some packaged crap; eat your real
vegetables. Occasionally I do find some cool products and I am able to teach others about
those products and I do put those in my videos every year when I go to them. But one year
I went there and there was a booth from Japan selling these little tablets; they are like
little green tablets. Every booth I am always curious about what it is, if it is something
that could be applicable to me or not. They give those pamphlets it shows the nutritious
compared to kale and it was off the charts. So asked them what it was, and it was the
Egyptian spinach. They grew the Egyptian spinach, then dehydrated it, then powdered it in little
tablets that you can eat now. Because that is the way we're suppose to get out food,
right! In little tablets! So I was so excited; I learned about this. I was like Wow! I have
to learn what that thing is and I have to start growing it myself, because once again
we want to go back to nature. If there is something in a bottle; how did it get into
the bottle, what is it derived from? What don't we just get the real food? So I started
growing it. This is my third year of growing this now. It is a really cool plant. Once
again, you're not going to get the same exact flavor, but it has a very mild flavor and
it is so delicious fresh. Hopefully you guys get that when it is dry. That is how I learned
about it in the trade show because it was so nutritious. But you know me; instead of
sitting here and selling you bottles, I am telling you to grow your own food, because
truly it can't get better than this. Now you've tasted all the different things
that I've brought. I see that some of them are quite____ better than others. That is
good; you are getting to know what they taste like. And once again, they taste different
when they are fresh because I took all the water out. These are also new food to you
so you're introducing yourself to new food so whether it is during here and you have
joined for the first time and you have to start slow and kind of work out till you get
used to it. Everybody is also going to have their individual preferences.
Let's say you want to grow some of these things, how do you do it? The easiest thing that I
recommend is that you start with a raised bed garden. For raised bed garden you simply
take a couple of pieces of lumber, I'd say a minimum of 6 inches. You cut them to 4 feet
long. If you don't have a saw don't do that, just go to a Home Depot and buy some wood
and say cut that to 4 feet. You can buy some 2x6s or 2x8s.They'll cut it for you there.
You take it home and put a couple of screws or nails; I recommend screws, to make a little
box. Once you got that box you're just going to fill with a mixture of things like compost,
vermiculite, coconut, peat moss; 1/3 each. That is a standard ____ mix out of the Square
Foot Gardening book. You're going to buy a book about gardening, I recommend you get
that book as a beginner; it will take you through everything you need to know. Then
you're going to start planting it. Basically how you do is you segment the 4x4 foot garden
to 16 squares; each square is one specific planting area. And in one square you can plant
one pepper plant or in one square you can plant 6 bok choy plants because they don't
need as much space as bell peppers. Or you can plant like 10 radishes. You can grow the
radishes for the root but there are some varieties of radishes; the greens are actually quite
editable and delicious. So I've also researched a lot of the different plants like radishes
to grow radishes for specifically the greens. Actually there are some turnips that actually
make them amazing tasting green that actually aren't too strong but it doesn't make any
turnip roots into the ground because I am more interested in eating the leaves than
the roots although I do eat the roots but not many; there isn't a lot of roots that
you can eat raw although I have a video on my favorite ones online: daikon,__________
and Chinese_______, which are 3 _____ that are really mild flavored. daikon is fairly
sweet; they call it earth apple. In general I don't eat a lot of _____ but it takes up
some space. There are different varieties of radishes that you can grow specifically
for the greens and daikon is not one of them. So if you can't make a 4 foot by 4 foot raised
bed then another easy way to do it is to get half a wine barrel or half a whiskey barrel.
You want a barrel or a container or a pot that hass actually really nice wide surface
area. It doesn't have to be deep; just 6 inches, maybe 12 inches if you are growing carrots.
But 6 inches is plenty for most things. And you want to have a lot of surface areas so
you can plant and fill in as many plants as you can because each plant is going to produce
food for you. But you don't want to pack them too tightly because the plants need some room
to move their elbows. And that is a container if you have a patio or you are in an apartment,
if you don't have space to put a nice large container. Let's talk about the requirements
of the plant. Mainly plants need a few things; they need good nutritious soil to grow in,
they need some water, and one of the most important things is sunlight. If you have
a really shady spot, then you don't want to plant any kind of fruiting crops; like cucumber,
tomatoes, and peppers, anything that makes a fruit; that takes up full sun to do. You
can do it in some shades but you'll get poor results and I'd not waste your time. You'd
want to grow more leafy greens or herbs. You can have a herb garden in your window cell
or the kitchen. Or grow some leafy greens because those are the plants that are going
to do well in more or little light conditions. Another thing I strive to do in my personal
garden is that I want to grow things that I can be really good at and that is going
to save me a lot of money. Of course I am talking about much kale is and it is really
expensive. I can easily grow 6 leaves of kale and I am saving like 3.99 or 2.99 depending
on where you live and how much it costs. 2 carts of strawberry in California is $3, but
to grow that many strawberries takes a lot more space to do that. So I am going to buy
my strawberry and grow my leafy greens. I am going to grow things that are really productive
for me and just buy some other things that are a bit more challenging. For example, celery
while I do grow, celery it is a crop that takes a really long time to maturity. I buy
celery but I also grow some. It is a lot better for me to grow greens instead of celery because
I know I am going to use those a lot more and celery; I'll juice the whole head and
boom in one juice and if I am growing it, I won't have enough. But I can easily grow
enough leafy greens to keep me satisfied. So if you can't grow in a container or a raised
bed, then the next way is in the trays. You can easily grow in trays like this the green
sprout, the mirco-greens and you can also do standered sprouting which I also consider
leafy greens. So those are the ways to grow and how to do it. I've showed you guys the
unique things I've brought so hopefully it'd open your eyes to the wider varieties that
there are and hope they also encourage you to just go home and start growing something;
you're just going to start sprouting today. I have a lot of videos for support to show
you guys how to do it .And at this point I'd like to take any questions.
So the question is: do you have something that you can just plant once and it just keeps
growing and you keep taking leaves and leaves. Many crops as I talked about earlier, you
have to plant once and it actually goes through its life cycle and it goes to seed. And when
it goes to seed it pretty much doesn't put off any leaves anymore. So you got to start
all over. But there are many Perennial crops and I have many specific videos on them; it
is actually one of my biggest areas of interest. Much like__________ if you plant it once,
it is going to live for a long time and continue to give you fruit every year. Unfortunately
vegetables aren't set to do that; most of them anyways. So if you do live in a tropical
area, there are many tropical editable vegetables. I have a video where I go to Echo in South
Florida; Four Miles are where I show some of those and you can grow those in the summer
time and put them in pots and take them out in the summer and in winter you can take them
in. You may have to put some into lighting because once again, they are tropical plants,
they like it warmer, humid and they like some sun. So you may need to put them in the winter
and take them out in the summer, and I'd probably not harvest them a lot in the winter when
they are not getting as much sunlight as they should.
For those of us not lucky enough to live in Hawaii or South Florida, there are only a
few plants that I found to be true Perennials one of which is my favorite is called the
Perennial tree collards so these are tree collards that you plant once and it grows
up to like 15 feet tall and it is really growing like a tree; the stock or the steam is like
that thick and I can just go out any day of the week and just harvest leaves. In the summer
time I get _____ and ________ but it doesn't grow as much because it really likes the cooler
temperature. But in winter time, it really puts out a lot of leaves and it is actually
quite sweet and delicious. And it is fairly____ so it grows in Las Vegas and even in summer
like now in Las Vegas it is doing great provided my redundant watering system is going off
everyday Other than that beside the Perennial that
you only plant once; for me I always considered Perennial if you like plant them once and
they go through their lifecycle , they drop seed and then they reseed. So the red vein
sorail for example; you plant it once it grows into a little plant and it is making leaves
the whole time and what happens it grows the seeds, it drops seeds, and by that time it
grows through its life cycle but the roots don't put out new baby shoots so I just cut
off the old stuff and it is still growing. So it is kind of the same plant but not on
a full tree. So if you have areas where you grow certain crops, they can reseed their
own and still produce for you without having to replant. So I am currently in the research
and I am doing a lot of experiences like that. Maybe one day I'll have a video specifically
on that cause I know it is an important subject to me and also to other people who don't want
to have to spend a lot of time in their garden. The next question is about wild editable and
how they are really strong because they are growing in nature and they have to deal with
nature and the animals eating them and maybe the soil conditions which are maybe good or
maybe bad and if that is something that I want to include more of in my diet.
So I think number one the genetics of wild food is actually really good because they've
had to survive out in nature and they have had adaptations to survive. And some of the
adaptations end up in the form of anti-oxidants and nutrients that are good for us. On the
same token; I don't want to spend my life wild harvesting stuff because that could be
a pain and also wild harvesting; hopefully the soil is good where you are harvesting
the food, you're not out on Brooklyn and picking dandelion greens from the side walk cracks.
But even though you're in nature, you still don't know the quality of the soil. Does it
have the whole speck of minerals that the soil should have or is that_____ de-mineralized
because of all the rain and all the erosions ,what does it have, which composts. Plants
could survive in many different conditions. We survive in big cities on junkfood, does
that mean it is the best! What I strive to do is to get the genetics from the wild, bring
the seeds back into my garden and grow them in what I know is nutritious rich soil and
compost and all the other beneficial host of micro-organisms in the soil and then eat
them. So that is really what I am after instead of just wild forging. And once again wild
forging is way better than probably going to your Farmers Market or anything else that
most people can do. But you can do better than that; getting wild genetics and growing
it under your specific conditions to have the highest quality food
The first question of this part is do I recommend a place for the seeds sources. I do have a
video online it has my top 5 favorite seed sources. I'll name my top 2 because those
stuck in my head and those are the ones where you'll find the widest varieties. But even
yet some of these crops that I've shown you today, the seeds may not be available at those
2 sources because I had to go to some weird places in Italy and I had to mail-order some
seeds to get them back to me. No one seed seller has all the seeds in the world. So
the 2 ones that I recommend are rareseeds.com they have over 1400 varieties of different
seeds that are heirloom and open pollinated. If you are really into growing heirloom there
is going to be an upcoming heirloom expo in Santa Rosa California coming up in September
11th ,12th ,13th. You can visit the website theheirloomexpo.com or you can search for
the heirloom expo. I am going to be there. I'll be speaking there about growing stuff.
I'll also have some of my tree collards for sale I was there last year; I made a video
on it as well. There is going to be over 3000 different varieties of heirloom crops there.
There is going to be also The California Rare Fruit Growers. They'll be having their annual
meeting there; or their annual conference there integrated into it. So they'll be giving
some farm tools and farm tours and also they will also have a big large display of all
those different variaties of apples; it is kind of different fruits that you probably
never seen before. They won't let you taste it but they'll show you. The second one that
I recommend is bountifulgardens.org ; they are like a nonprofit and they have a lot pf
the ones that are pretty rare as well. The last part of your question was regarding
soil sedimentation and what I recommend. I mainly recommend growing in good organic compost.
Compost quality can vary widely. The stuff that I get in California is different than
the bagged stuff you're going to get at the Home Depot. So once again you have to do the
best you can. So I recommend using trace minerals sedimentation; whether using rockdust under
the brand name___ of azomite or _______ which I use. They can actually be very difficult
to get. If you go to _______ to buy it and ask for it, they'll look like you're crazy
because they have no clue that it is. Most of the time you won't be able to find so you
can get something like Ocean Solution or Ocean Grown; it is basically seawater that comes
in a bottle that you can dilute down and feed your plants with, and that is another source.
If you go to my Youtube channel and search for rockdust you'll see a whole bunch of videos
where I talk about the alternatives. So the microbes that you put in your plants; there
is a company called Plants Excess; I like their products a lot. And those you have to
actually go to ___ to buy or buy them online. And that is just a mixture of ____________Also
it has a very wide spectrum of beneficial bacteria for your soil.
I hope you guys enjoyed this clip; learning more about the 9 different leafy greens that
I've brought from my house plus some of the ones that I harvested locally. I definitely
want to share with you guys that people undoubtedly really liked the Egyptian spinach. Everybody,
or most people came up to my and said "I love that Egyptian spinach. I am going to start
growing it" so if you guys are not already growing Egyptian spinach, I highly encourage
you to grow that leafy green plus many of the other ones that I grew to see if they
are going to do well in your area. I had a lot of fun at the Woodstock Fruit Festival
and if you are interested in eating a diet rich in fruits and vegetables you have to
come to the Woodstock Fruit Festival 2013. You can visit the woodstockfruitfestival.com
for further information.