Calendula is grown as a self-seeding annual in USDA grow zones two through eight. In areas with warm winters (above 25⁰F), it blooms year-round. Calendula thrives in full sun with well-drained soil. I recommend sowing Calendula seed directly into the garden early to mid-spring. It’s ideal to plant the seeds as soon as the soil is workable since germination benefits from cool weather, but don’t stress too much about timing. I’ve had success planting seeds year-round. Calendula is a self-seeding annual, which means seeds dropped by the plants in the fall will lay dormant on the ground all winter and then sprout the next spring. However, it’s not an aggressively spreading plant, so don’t worry about it taking over your garden.
Posts filed under Food & Nutrition
Great Tastes in Local Food: Spring 2023
Restaurant reviews for: North Star Lounge, Latin American Cuban Cuisine, and Plate Sushi and Chicken.
Sustainable Health: When Food as Medicine Becomes Food as a Threat to Health
In the early 1990’s, when first beginning my foray into nutrition work, the cutting edge was the emergence of the low carb diet. The Atkins Diet was published in 1992 and faced off against the high carb, low fat heart disease reversal program of Dean Ornish. Ornish is a physician who led the public and the medical community toward a plant based, low fat lifestyle approach to preventing and reversing heart disease.
Cooking With Lisa
Vegan burgers are plant-based alternatives to traditional meat-based burgers. They’re made with a variety of healthy and tasty plant-based ingredients, such as beans, grains, vegetables, and soy protein, and can be seasoned with a variety of spices and herbs to create a flavorful and satisfying meal.
Tea Time with Peggy: Cold Brew Tea
By Peggy A. Alaniz
With the high heat and humidity of a summer day in Michigan, the last thing I want to do is boil water for tea. It’s summer! I want to take life easy, maybe play in my garden or go out on the lake. While boiling water is not hard, I don’t want to waste time waiting for the tea to chill. While I could let the sun brew some tea, I could just as easily cold brew it in the refrigerator overnight.
Argus Farm Stop: Mission Driven
Mission driven in all its disparate pieces, this grocery store, that is so much more, is determined to serve many sectors of our local culture. It could seem confusing, if it wasn’t all so smooth. Argus is a daily farmers’ market, and a local grocery and sundries store. It is a coffee shop and cafe, a tavern, and an entertainment venue. It is an education center offering weekly webinars, classroom curriculum, and full trainings. And Argus Farm Stop is a crucial component that was missing for the growth of our local food system.
Leaps of Faith :Tales of Local Businesses--Carosello Pasta
This column is a look at two brave souls who took a leap of faith to open their own business. What follows is a personal profile of Chelsea and Mike Carosello who are following their dreams and thriving despite the odds—and Covid.
From Nature to You--Remedies for PMS and PMDD
Every month, I know when it's that time in my menstrual cycle: the time to cue up sad movies and bust out the dark chocolate. There are signs my luteal phase has arrived, and it used to make a grand entrance, but I learned ways to dampen its arrival.
Feeding the American Dream
Almost everyone has eaten in an American style diner where burgers, fries, and homemade pies are the best sellers. A place where everyone knows one another, coffee breakfasts for groups of friends start many people’s mornings, and dinner take-outs end the workday. In Ann Arbor there is a diner that mixes classic diner fare with a bit of Korean flair. Around 1990 Bell’s Diner started serving Korean food as an addition to the already traditional all-American favorites.
Great Tastes in Local Food: Winter 2023
Downtown Ann Arbor is home to a diverse landscape of breakfast, brunch, and lunch restaurants. Stray Hen Cafe, located at the corner of Washington and Division, has been a wonderful addition. The prices are moderate, and the portions are large!
Detroit Nonprofit Paves the Way for Innovative Urban Agriculture
Tucked into a three-acre section of Brush Street in Detroit’s North End lies a utopia of freshly grown foods available to the surrounding communities at no cost. Made possible by the 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization Michigan Urban Farming Initiative (MUFI), the project, known as America’s first sustainable urban agrihood, aims to combat challenges unique to urban communities such as Detroit. More than 120,000 pounds of food are grown from seed from this portion of Detroit’s land, which was once abandoned.
How York Helped Forge a New Way of Dining Out
When the pandemic started in March 2020, restaurants had to close their doors for a bit of time to re-group. Most were able to provide delivery, no contact pickups, and take-out options. During this time, mobile food folks had an edge. It was truly amazing how food businesses, from farms to restaurants, figured out new ways of operating in a short period of time. York Food and Drink (and many other alternative eateries) made the change successfully and super-fast.
Cooking with Lisa
Lisa Viger Gotte is a Chelsea resident passionate about plant-based cuisine and loves showing others how simple, delicious, healthy, and joyful it can be. A vegan diet improved her own physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health and she’s seen it do the same in others! She is also an artist, cookbook author, MSVA Vegan Life Coach, and RYT 200 yoga teacher. You can learn more about her and find more tasty recipes at planted365.com.
Great Tastes in Local Food--Fall 2022
A takeout counter in the back of a party store is not where I expected to find amazing vegan food. But there I was, standing in Lakeside Party Shoppe, located a stone’s throw from the shores of glistening Whitmore Lake, waiting to pick up my order from Eli’s Blazin Wings + Pizza.
Tea Time with Peggy--Home Grown Tea
weekly fertilizing. Early fall is the best time to receive the earth’s bounty. Pumpkins, squash, and assorted herbs are plentiful. Depending upon the richness of the soil, and the amount of water the garden received over the summer months, the taste of the plants grown each year will be unique to that season. These distinctive flavors should be savored. I can think of no better way to show thankfulness for the harvest than to enjoy a cup of tea made from plants and herbs found in my own garden.
Zen and the Art of Community-Supported Agriculture
Celebrating, preserving, and sharing our areas rich Agro-Centric heritage is one of my favorite interests. A somewhat new land preservation project has gained my interest over the past year and is ongoing at the corner of Scio Church and Zeeb Road. Follow me on a journey of one family’s dream passed on. This is yet another food-farm venture of Tantre` Farm’s stewards, Richard Andres and Deb Lentz.
Sustainable Health: Bacteria and Viruses — Essential to Human Life
Bacteria and viruses have always gotten a bad reputation in our modern society, but these microscopic microorganisms are essential to human life and can quite literally be a key aspect to our optimal health. In fact, trillions of bacteria, viruses, fungi, and other microbes live all over our bodies, with the largest concentration in our intestines.
Scratch That! Tips for Cooking Real Meals at Home
Want some good news about the pandemic? Apparently, it’s finally gotten us to cook from scratch and eat at home more often.
Great Tastes in Local Food--Spring 2022
Local restaurant reviews, spring 2022.
Community Farm of Ann Arbor-- A Look at the Past, the Present, and the Future
The Community Farm of Ann Arbor was founded in 1988. It was one of the first organic, and perhaps the only biodynamic, farm in Michigan, as well as one of the first CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture). A few years after the Farm began, and up until three years ago, it was run by Annie Elder and Paul Bantle. After Annie and Paul moved to California in 2018, several other farmers ran things, and then this spring, Dan Gannon was hired to run the Farm.
