Episode 2704

- [Narrator] Behind every Pick Tennessee product's logo is a real Tennessee farmer. Pick Tennessee products has helped people find those local farmers, food and fun for over 30 years. Biodynamic farmer, Jack Poppen, shares tips for growing a healthy crop of Chinese cabbage. Then Phillipe Chadwick takes an elevator ride to this garden space on the lower roof of the Pinnacle Building in downtown Nashville. From the country farm to the big city, good things are growing. First, these greens are going to make one heck of a taste kimchi.

- There are heads in these beds and I think they're from China. Their bright green leaves shine against the colors of fall which is when they love to grow. In Tennessee gardens, bok choi and Chinese cabbage simply don't do well in the spring. In mid July, I'm looking for a row to sow and grow some little transplants. So, I make a furrow in an old lettuce bed or bean row or something like that. Then I take the thieves of the bok choi or Chinese cabbage and I roll them between my thumb and my finger. Dropping, oh, 10 or 12 every foot or so. Then I take the back of a rake and I just push them into the ground to make sure they're firmed in before I lightly rake over some dirt over the top of them. In about a month, I have some small little transplants that I'm ready to set out about a foot or 16 inches apart in a bed. I like to plant these things as soon after I get the beans or lettuce of squash out of the field because the soil will still have a bit of moisture in it. Bok chois and Chinese cabbage transplant very easily. Between a month, maybe six weeks after they're planted, I lift them out of the ground, put them in a basket and bring them down to the garden. I'm careful when I deal with plants not to touch the roots because there's oils on our fingers that I don't want to get on the roots. I hold them there right about the first leaf or two. Then I dig a little hole and I put the plant in the ground and then I squeeze a little bit of earth around it. Like that. Then if it's very dry, I'll put a little water on it and then I'll cover it up with some dry soil on top and that way the moisture stays down underneath and if I watered it right now, it would get muddy and cake up there, but if I water it and then put dry soil on top, then it doesn't cake up and the dry soil on top keeps the moisture in by the roots where we want it. All that's left to do is a light hoeing once or twice but weeds aren't really such a pressure in September and October and they don't really require a whole lot of care. Insects and diseases don't bother these plants in the fall. Those problems only really happen when you try to grow these in the spring, which we don't do. Rubicon is the name of this Chinese Cabbage which makes the typical Napa head that you might find in a grocery store. They're really good for just any recipe that would call for a regular cabbage. A bok choi variety that gets huge is called joi choi. That's a dark green one with the white midribs. Used in Chinese cooking, stir fries and things like that. This is a smaller bok choi called mei qing. The dark green variety of bok choi is called tatsoi and it's as dark a green as spinach. Another Chinese cabbage variety we grow is called Tokyo bekana. This is a loose leaf Chinese cabbage with a light green color. These smaller plants where set out just a week or two ago and these bigger plants where set out six or seven weeks ago. You can see how we use successive planting so that we have good sized heads for a longer season. We can keep these cabbages over the winter for a little while if we cover them up. So, we make a little mini greenhouse. First, I make a big hole in the ground with this bar. Then I take an eight foot piece of conduit and I slip it into that hole on either side of the bed. This makes a frame, we put some of this what I call reemay, it's what people used to use to cover their tobacco beds with. It's also called a floating row cover. Before it blows off we grab a board and hold it down with the board. We also use sand bags or rocks or really just about anything that we can find to cover the reemay up, so it doesn't blow off. These cabbages then will have another eight or 10 degrees of frost protection and last that much longer into December and January. Sometimes we'll even mulch them with a little hay to further protect them from the winter freezes. I added bok choi seed to the crimson clover and daikon mix that I planted in this field. This bok choi has been grown with no hoeing, no watering, no cultivation, mulching or anything. It was just flung out with the cover crops. That's easy gardening. When I grew up, cabbages just meant one thing, the common European cabbage that we made sauerkraut out of and coleslaw. Made in China was certainly suspect. But now, thanks to these Chinese imports, we have a wide variety of Chinese cabbages and bok chois to fill up our Tennessee fall gardens with. Now I'll show you how to enjoy these greens in kimchi. Into a bowl, we've chopped up Chinese cabbage and some of these red, watermelon radishes, they're a daikon radish and some cayenne pepper. We're going to add a cup full of minced garlic and some ginger that a friend of mine grew. Those are the five ingredients that we add when we make kimchi. Now I have to mix this up real good. I want to add about enough salt that it would be as if you were going to eat it, so that it just tastes pretty good. As I work the salt in, the cabbage will start giving out some of it's juice. Kimchi is a traditional sauerkraut from Korea. Where, of course, Chinese cabbages and bok chois have been grown for a long, long time. One of the advantages to kimchi is how nutritious it is. It's packed full of vitamins A, B and C but maybe the best thing about it, is the lactobacillus bacteria that is so beneficial as a probiotic. Similar to what's found in yogurt. You can add lots of different things when you make fermented vegetables. They ferment almost any vegetable you can think of. In America and Europe, we usually just make sauerkraut. Which is salt added to the European cabbages. Got a crock a friend of mine made that I'm going to fill up with the mixture. So, just like making sauerkraut, it makes it's own liquid. But then we have to weight down the cabbage underneath something so that the liquid totally covers it. This crocks have a nice handy little thing here that we drop down in there. And then we simply put a lid on it. Let that sit for about two weeks and you have kimchi.

- I'm here at the Pinnacle on Symphony Place and it is part of Highwoods Properties. There is about 17,000 square feet of actual planted green space and about 28,000 square feet of total green space. The whole space is used for the building occupants enjoyment and conservation of natural resources. Not only do we get to enjoy this spectacular green roof but the view from up here is just amazing. We've got the Titan Stadium and all the bridges crossing the Cumberland and I'm here today with Brian Phelps from Hawkins and Partners. He was one of the designers of this space. I see all kinds of different plants here, from vines to herbaceous perennial and sedums, what's this one that I see in masses right here with the tread leaf?

- [Brian] This is an amsonia that we put into the sedum mix that we had here. To give it to a little bit of height on the roof and we provided a number of drifts through the sedum mixes.

- [Phillipe] Yeah, it seems to be doing really well. From the property owners, what were some of the goals and objectives of this space?

- First and foremost, it had to be a great space. Second, we wanted to provide for storm water, mitigation and dealing with those and so this roof absorbs approximately about 67% of the storm water that falls on it each year. Which equates to somewhere around 560,000 gallons of water that we take out of the sewer system, so that was a really important part, no only the LEED, sustainability aspects that the goals that the owner wanted but also regulation wise. Nashville is now allowing the green roof to be a part of that best management practices for storm water, so for the civil engineering and the management of all that, you can use the green roof to help reduce the loads on our existing system within the district here. That had a really big impact and then in addition, to provide additional wildlife and habitat within the area. It also reduced the heat island effect as well. It had a lot of great, contributing factors to that and then in addition, it has great views from everywhere, so wanted to provide for the tenants to have something to look out on instead of whether it was an asphalt roof or even just simply a white roof that they could have those views out on. This used to be the parking lot that our office parked in when we were here, so it definitely is much better space than the parking lot that was here before it was built.

- Sure, it's very neat. Tell me about these towers, there's towers placed around in on the space and they're covered in a vine, looks like clematis, is that right?

- Yes. Well, one of the desires by the owner, they wanted trees on the roof. We had, because of the weight of trees, we had to limit the amount of area where they could be so structurally we could accommodate them, but we still wanted to provide some type of spacial definition that trees help provide and so we designed these trellises to mimic a height of a small tree similar to the amelanchier and the larger space. We ended up growing the autumn clematis on them to provide some interest in the fall. By the end of August, early September, these things are covered in snow white blooms. It's been terrific.

- [Phillipe] I bet it smells great up here. I see a lot of different textures and colors of sedums mixed in here, how many varieties are there?

- We planted, at the time, 17 species of sedum. And now over that time, it's definitely evolved to where different species have taken over others and others have died out. I couldn't tell you exactly how many species are on the roof today and I think that's one of the interesting parts about the sedum aspect of this is that, we had these patterns all designed and different mixes. Seeing as they bloom and the seeding and all that, seeing it all change has been really interesting. In fact, we got a lot of migrant type plants that have come up to the roof. It's the management of the weeding of that and the natural selection of things that actually look good. We have the wild strawberries up here and that sort of thing that we didn't expect.

- [Phillipe] How long has this been here?

- [Brian] We completed the project in August of 2009.

- [Phillipe] Cool, so it's really had time to come and go and we've had that tough winter that may have killed out some of the sedums, so it's really -

- [Brian] Yeah, it has actually performed really well in the winter time. The sedums really well suited for the rooftop environment.

- [Phillipe] Was there any special consideration you had to do in dealing with the soil?

- [Brain] Well, when you're on a green roof you do have to take the soils into consideration which we call it the planting media because we don't want to confuse it with what soils, like top soils down on the ground. Part of that is weight and also dealing with the sediment and the finds within that. That you're going to clog up your drainage mat that's underneath all of this that you have to have. Also, there's an inorganic content to it to provide a structure and that you don't get the decomposition and loss of it that you may experience over time.

- [Phillipe] So, in these raised beds, the plant material looks a little different, so what do we have over here, it looks like itea?

- Yes and some butterfly weed and noriapy. The areas around the gathering areas are, with the raised planters, allowing us to have between 12 and 24 inches of additional soil or the planting media that we were able to grow more sophisticated plants such as the nepeta here and the amelanchier. Here we have the depths for where we actually put some small trees and some of the hollies that you see here. Part of this was to provide a little bit more comfortable, familiar planting than the sedum areas and define the space more. It also, with being Pinnacle Symphony Place and being across the street is bringing in a lot of the plant material that you see down below, the user sees when they're around.

- This does feel like a courtyard space you would see typically on the street.

- [Brian] Yes, yes, the space relates to the building's strong symmetry and access that was created with that. You do see a lot of the same plant material repeated around to emphasize that.

- At the end of the day, it is a garden and it's still growing and dying and changing and evolving through the seasons.

- It can be one of the frustrations with landscape architecture is that the day goes in when it's architecture, it looks the way you intended but you really have to patient and there's always the microclimates and the different conditions that have happened. Just the maintenance of a landscape and it's a living thing, so it's just one of those things we deal with as landscape architects.

- [Phillipe] I really appreciate you showing us the space up here, it's really a gem in Nashville.

- [Brian] We appreciate it.

- Thank you.

- Thank you.

- We are soaking up sunshine in midtown Memphis. I'm thinking about dinner tonight and I'm thinking I'm going to have squash and maybe some eggplant or a cucumber. I'm just going to run to the corner, but you know what, we take that for granted. There are places in the inner cities where there is no fresh produce available. When we finish speaking to Sarah Taylor, we're going to find out about what a giving person she is and what she has started here over five years ago. Tell us about your endeavors.

- We started this garden, this is the Community Table Garden we started it in an effort to improve the quality of food that is available for people that have to get food from food pantries and eat meals at soup kitchens that otherwise might not be able to afford their own produce. The majority of food that is donated to food banks and soup kitchens and pantries is often processes and high in sugar and not high in nutrients. So, we're just basically trying to increase the amount of fresh produce that's at the food bank.

- And fresh is the best.

- [Sarah] It is, the Midsouth Food Bank is where the majority of our produce goes. They are a, basically a hub, so they serve all the surrounding counties in the tristate area. West Tennessee, East Arkansas, North Mississippi are all served by the Midsouth Food Bank.

- [Annette] Then those people can come to that distribution center and shop there just like we would shop in the supermarket.

- [Sarah] Exactly.

- [Annette] I would like to emphasize the fact that you are a volunteer.

- Yes.

- [Annette] You do have a sponsor here, we are on property that belongs to the -

- To Huey's, Huey's burgers, their office is behind us and they have a chain of burger restaurants in Memphis and they have been wonderfully gracious enough to let me be here for going on five years not.

- [Annette] The other thing of interest I think, if the fact that you do this organically.

- [Sarah] Yes.

- [Annette] Well, let's go and look at some of the crops that you have now that'll soon be harvested.

- We are just now transitioning over to most summer stuff, so we got a few spring things left, but mostly we're moving into summer veggies. We've got watermelon. These are eggplant, they're just starting to flower so we should be getting a bunch of eggplants soon.

- [Annette] These tomatoes looks like they've had a good time to grow.

- [Sarah] They have, these are bush tomatoes, so we don't prune them, just let them do their thing because they have a bit shorter of a season than a vine tomato. So, yeah, they're getting really full and we're starting to get some little babies under there.

- [Annette] I see them, they're almost like a pear shaped tomato.

- [Sarah] Yeah, these are all sauce tomatoes.

- [Annette] Now, this is something to share right here. This is?

- Collard greens.

- [Annette] Wow, they look really healthy too.

- [Sarah] They love the heat.

- [Annette] Okay, your organic, what did you put in here as far as anything to supplement the nitrogen they need.

- [Sarah] Well, what we actually did was in the fall, we planted a cover crop in almost all of these beds. We either did a crimson clover or we did a winter rye grass and just let them go all winter. Then we cut them down in the spring and tilled it in and just let the nitrogen from that grass go back into the soil.

- Well, over here I see beautiful red beets.

- Yes, this is actually a smorgasbord of a bed. It is my beet bed. It's also, there are some pole beans coming up in here that a volunteer planted and then we also have okra planted in between the rows of beets.

- [Annette] That's cool.

- [Sarah] Couple rouge carrots in the edges there. We usually have three crops in each bed per season depending on what they are, but yeah, we often have something coming in as something else is going out.

- [Annette] I can tell that it won't be long before you have peppers coming in.

- Yes, we already have a few coming in. I think we've got some sositoes coming in down here.

- [Annette] These are hot peppers?

- These are all hot peppers, mildly hot to hot. We've got some sosito, poblanos and then jalapenos and cayenne peppers. The entire season last year I think we yielded just under 1500 pounds of produce. We just aim to increase it every year by a little bit.

- You know in that poundage, there's no way to measure those heads of lettuce and then those collards. There's no weight to them, so you could have bushels of those.

- Exactly, it's a lot.

- And not much weight. Obviously the cucumbers are happy.

- Yes, the cucumbers are really happy this year. We have one bed of slicers and another bed of pickling cucumbers. We've got both varieties going.

- You know, I can't help but say, its so exciting to see all this even though there's planes overhead, there's a backhoe over there, there's cars going there and right here is the soul, the heart of all of us, this fresh food. It just makes me have chill bumps.

- It's pretty neat, having worked in both urban and rural farming and gardening settings, I can tell you that this is definitely unique.

- Yes, it is.

- But there's a different peace that you can find in a garden when you're surrounded by this much chaos.

- You don't even hear that mess, do you?

- Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.

- Okay, now this is mustard greens?

- [Sarah] There are mustard greens and they're actually on their way out. You can see their going to seed and it's just getting too hot for them, so we are going to pull those out hopefully this evening and plant some more tomatoes. This is swiss chard and there's also a few onions left in there that are bulbing.

- [Annette] They're probably getting peppery.

- [Sarah] Yes, yes they are.

- What kind of experience have you gotten from this community table garden?

- Oh, wow. Well, I'd say aside from getting to take food to the food bank every week and donate it, which is always a highlight of the week, I think the other most important thing that I've gotten is just the response from the community. People walking by that live over here, bringing their dogs through, their kids through. Just stopping to ask questions. Gardening tips, trading gardening tips with people in the neighborhood.

- [Annette] Sarah, obviously this is a raised berm type bed, so did you till?

- We did not till, we actually just did a quicken version of oxidation or was a lasagna gardening, a combo. In the fall we laid down what would be similar to cardboard. They're actually compostable beer filters that are used by the local breweries here. They donate them to a lot of gardens to use just for weed suppression basically. We laid those down and leaf mulch and plastic in the fall and we just left them over the whole winter and let the grass die and then we took the plastic up and then we just started layering on top of the leaf mulch, so we did a pro mix of garden soil, sand, leaf mulch and then four to six inches of compost on top of that. In these few rows we have flowers, we've also got our tomatoes over here. It has definitely been a bit of trial and error getting the nutrients and everything right in this soil, because they are new beds.

- I can tell that you have a heart that is full of caring because who else would come out and not have supplementary income. You're thinking of those people that are not privileged to have what you and I have and you've put them into your world and not pushed them aside.

- Absolutely.

- I know that there are many good things that come from here and most of all is gardening is for the soul, isn't it?

- It is indeed.

- Whether it's yours or somebody else's.

- That's the truth.

- Well, thank you so much.

- Thank you, thank y'all for coming by.

- It's wonderful to know someone of your age, young woman is caring and thinking about others.

- I appreciate you calling me young. Thanks.

- Compared to -

- I don't feel it in this heat.

- [Narrator] For inspiring garden tours, growing tips and garden projects, visit our website at volunteergardener.org or on YouTube at the Volunteer Gardener channel and like us on Facebook.