7 Easiest vegetables to grow in winter in South Africa

In most parts of South Africa we can grow vegetables for at least 8 months of the year. In this video I show you 7 of the easiest vegetables to grow in your backyard.

welcome back to the sh urban farm in today’s video we are going to discuss seven of the easiest vegetables to grow in winter and in Autumn and some into spring in South Africa let’s dive into [Music] it first vegetable on the list are radishes radishes are super easy to grow and they grow so fast they can be ready to harvest in 3 to 4 weeks they love the cooler weather though if there’s hot weather then they are just not pleasant to eat at all they’re just super spicy and really not nice so to plant your radishes you can sew them directly what I like to do is I like to sew them in the greenhouse or in the house and then I transplant the little guys in about 10 cm apart they are actually also really nice obviously in salads but they um quite tasty if you put them into a stir fry next up is lettuce now lettuce is not only easy to grow but it’s also continuous Harvest you just need to pick off the outer leaves as you need and they last when they fresh like this they last so long in your in your fridge in a obviously in a packet and sewing them I do I don’t actually sew them often normally they will self seed cuz I’ll let them go to seed and then if they are not self-seeded then I will go to the nursery and just buy the little plugs it’s just easier but they are easy to se from seed as well and if you can get them in like a this is a sort of a mtled shade semi- Shady spot they will really appreciate that in one of my previous videos I showed you how I sew carrots in these 20 L buckets carrots actually really prefer cooler weather I um I mean if you look at many of the seed packets then it will tell you you can sew them throughout the year and so you can but if you want nice sweet crisp carrots the cooler weather is definitely best for it so I would suggest anything from um sewing your seed Early Autumn maybe late summer might be a bit too hot um all the way through I even even now in Winter I’ve sewn seed it does take much longer to germinate but into spring it’s amazing you can have um the most beautiful carrots so sweet and so crispy and crunchy and whatever but take a look at my video which I did on sewing carrots in um these buckets it’s the same procedures which you would do if you’re doing it in in ground beds our next vegetable on the easy to grow in your back Garden list is um Swiss chard which we like to call spinage in South Africa I’ve sewn these are I think they called bright lights and um so they have got the different colored um stems of Pi on and see this one is now yellow and then there’s some red and then there like a green and white um they are just so easy to grow they prefer the cooler weather like I keep saying um some of the seat packets also say you can grow them throughout the year but I beg to disagree on that one uh they do like to have sort of mtled shade so it’s a little bit warmer today so you can see some of the leaves are are witing but as it cools down later on this afternoon then they will perk up again and they also do like fair amount of water most vegetables do but super easy to grow you can sew them directly you can get plugs from the nursery or a tray and sew them like that or you can sew them into sea trays what I like to do when I’m doing a lot of them then I’ll just take a tray and then I scatter the seed on the top lightly cover it and then once they’ve germinated then I pick them out and then I’ll plant put them on into separate trays until they’re big enough to go into the garden now my fourth easiest vegetable to grow is baby cabbage I have even successfully grown it throughout the summer they are just amazing they do get um AIDS every now and then but I spray it off with a hose or if I’m really energetic I’ll get the neem oil solution and spray that on most of the time time I just jetted off with the hose but you plun them in here I normally buy I don’t sew them from seed I get the little um plugs from the nursery I stick them in and then there they go and they form their little heads it doesn’t really take that long okay so like I said in Winter everything just almost grinds to a complete halt but um in Autumn and spring it picks up again we’re almost there I can’t wait and then within a few weeks you’ve got a little head I then cut that off and allow it to form another three maximum four little heads and then I’ll uh pull that the whole thing out leaving the roots behind but super easy to grow um in the cooler weather then it’s Al I must say in the cooler weather they are sweeter because they do release sort of a bitter substance when it is hot but very easy to grow in your back garden now PE are one of of my favorite things to grow in the winter I wish I could get the a summer variety of peas that will tolerate the heat but um the ones that I prefer the most to grow are snappies because you can eat the whole thing if it’s a one a shelling pee then you can’t really eat the the shell unless you don’t mind eating something that resembles lucern but these are M oh the crisp sweet it’s just Divine and I mean you can see these these ones these are actually hom saved seed and you can see how nice and Tall they growing full of little pods everywhere I actually need to harvest that’s the one ticket though you do need to harvest regularly so that they will continue to flower I have sewn these ones directly um the previous batch that I had I did sew in the green house but I pop them in really quite close to each other probably about 5 cm apart and there we go they will give you at least two flashes of um of peas and so it’s really helpful to have a succession sewing my peas that are on the other side of the garden over there they are now doing a second flush not as prolific as the first flush but y so worth it growing your own piece you you can’t beat it last on my list is actually more of a herb than a vegetable is coriander also known as daia so coriander is actually so easy to grow they just they um you plant your seeds you can do them in little trays or you can SE them directly these ones are transplanted from um somewhere else in the garden because they’re self-seeded I like to let them flow it’s nice for the pollinators and then once they’ve G to seed then I’ll save the seed and then um roast it and grind it up into the powder so that I can use it in my cooking the leaves are just Divine unfortunately I’m the only one in the in the house that enjoys the coriander but they do prefer as well you won’t be able to grow them successfully in hot weather even here under the Lemon Tree they’re doing so well they like to be in cooler weather a little bit of partial shade is perfect for them there you have it my list of seven easiest vegetables to grow in your backyard I hope it inspires you to get out there and start growing your own food even if it’s in containers growing your own food it just empowers you and it just feels like amazing just taking a bite out of that wonderly free Fresh Harvest if you enjoyed this video then please like And subscribe and share with your friends and I will see you in the next video