Fresh Food from Small Spaces: The Square-Inch Gardener's Guide to Year-Round Growing, Fermenting, and Sprouting [Paperback]

Saturday, 17 March 2012

Product Details

Paperback: 178 pages
Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing (November 5, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 160358028X
ISBN-13: 978-1603580281
Product Dimensions: 10.4 x 7.5 x 0.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)

By : R.J. Ruppenthal
Price : $16.47
You Save : $8.48 (34%)

Fresh Food from Small Spaces: The Square-Inch Gardener's Guide to Year-Round Growing, Fermenting, and Sprouting [Paperback]

Customer Reviews

[Update: I read the book again; and I wish I had given it five stars rather than four. I cannot seem to edit the number of stars. But just pretend that I gave it five stars, OK? Thanks!]
'Fresh Food from Small Spaces' is an exciting book, an inspirational and informative book. Ruppenthal's main topics are container gardening, sprouting, fermenting, growing mushrooms, and small livestock (chickens and bees only), making compost and worm boxes. He lists and describes steps that anyone can take towards helping to build a more sustainable planet and living more lightly on the earth, as well as being more self-reliant.
I was very glad to see a short chapter on 'Survival During Resource Shortages' and one on 'Helping to Build a Sustainable Future'. The 'Introduction' also touches on these topics.
I was also glad to see that Ruppenthal recommends the use of Self-Watering Containers. I know from personal experience (and from being the listowner for a list devoted to Edible Container Gardening) that this is a very, very superior way to grow vegetables in containers.
What the book is not: it is definitely not a how-to book. It is not the only book you'll ever need about any of the topics that it covers. If you buy the book thinking that it is, you'll probably be disappointed. Instead, it gives an excellent general overview and introduction to some very disparate topics. It gives you ideas for things you can actually do. The author also points you towards more detailed sources of information on each topic. I doubt if anyone could have written a detailed instructional guide on all of these very different topics.
Major disappointment: the only illustrations are black-and-white stock photos. Some color photos - and more personal photos - would have been a great addition. This is really a very glaring lack. (Shame on you, Chelsea Green Publishers!)
Second major disappointment: no index. I would have expected an index in anything published by Chelsea Green, a quality publisher.
Major plus: The book is referenced, with endnotes. There is a list of resources as well.
I would definitely have given this book my unalloyed praise if it only had better photos and an index. I have no other criticisms. Ruppenthal writes well, too, by the way.
[...]

This is a wonderful book - I have never read anything like it! I've had so many people ask me what to grow in apartments with low light, and I've always wondered what to say! Really, all I could think of was well, salad greens, maybe some herbs... I knew that lettuce loved the shade, but I never knew there were so many options for growing food in lower light levels and indoors!
This book is a nice introductory guide to a great number of topics - basic gardening, growing food in tight urban gardens, growing food indoors, growing mushrooms, fermenting to make kefir or yogurt, sprouting seeds for fresh sprouts, composting without much room, keeping chickens in a small yard, and even a chapter on keeping bees. All of it wonderful for the urban or apartment dweller.
This is really the first book of its kind that I have seen - it is so practical and talks specifically about how to make self-watering planters, and exactly which crops you can grow in what kind of light, and which plants you might be able to grow on a not-quite-so-sunny windowsill. Brilliant, really. It's obvious that Ruppenthal has been doing this for years and really knows his stuff.
What's so crazy is that several of my gardening friends who are now stuck in apartments have been wondering what would grow in their windows, or in containers on their window-access-only balcony. Now I know what to say! I've ordered some seeds to start experimenting myself, and this book is going to more than one person for Christmas!