Announcing my newest book

Food Is Medicine: 101 Prescriptions from the Garden

By Kathleen Barnes

There is a certain romance to growing your own food. Whether it comes from a solitary basil plant on a window ledge, a potted tomato on an urban balcony, a small plot in a community garden or a well-manicured full-scale spread, we humans take pride in growing our own food, feeding ourselves and relishing the flavor and vitality our home grown foods bring to our bodies and spirits.

Most of us are aware that eating five or more servings of fruits and vegetables daily can prevent and even treat a host of diseases and illnesses. More and more of us are becoming aware of the importance of eating fresh wholesome local food that can keep us healthy, prevent disease and extend our lives. Many of us are trying to save money by growing our own food. Some of us even know the secrets of treating ailments and illnesses with herbs, fruits and vegetables.

In this book, I hope to make those secrets common knowledge. I’m here to share with you the road to good health through the freshest of fruits and vegetables. I’ll share with you what I’ve learned about health and healing with the right foods grown the right way. I’ll share with you some of my successes, failures and insights gained from a lifetime of gardening. I don’t expect that you can or will grow every fruit and vegetable mentioned in this book. Most of us simply don’t have the time or space. But I promise to offer you the secrets of healing with everyday foods available to everyone close to home.

Back in the early ’70s when I was just out of college, my friends and family thought I was a little wacky when I started talking about natural healing. They asked:

• Why brew a cup of sage tea when it was easier to take a swig of sugar-laden cough medicine?
• Why wrap an infected cut with chewed wood sorrel rather than slapping on a little triple antibiotic from a tube?
• Why chew a few fennel seeds or drink a cup of peppermint tea rather than take a Tums?
• Why compost my kitchen scraps when it is so easy to buy a bag of compost at the big-box garden center?
• Why slave away under a hot sun, watering and weeding and battling bugs and blights, when a juicy tomato was as close as my local supermarket?

Why? Because all of these remedies and a simple lifestyle contribute to health and longevity. Even when I was in my twenties, healthy and longevity were my goals. More than forty years later, they still are.

I’ve gardened all of my life. My earliest memories are of helping my grandmother weed her garden and gathering perfect roses wet with the morning dew. I’ve survived short growing seasons and harsh winters in northern New York State near the Canadian border. I’ve gardened in Asia and Africa, weathering the scorn of locals for my pitiful and often unsuccessful efforts.

Now I live in the mountains of western North Carolina, my gardens sprawl all over our one-acre property. They’re not always neat; in fact, they’re not often neat. My compost bins are as far from scientific as you can get; nevertheless, I get “black gold” with the help of Mother Nature and Father Time. I have my share of garden failures, sometimes due to environmental conditions beyond my control, more often due to my own shortcomings. And while I don’t grow every morsel on our plates, in the summer I grow most of our vegetables and some of our fruit. Right now, I’m itching to get my hands in the soil and plant the early crops for this year’s garden. I buy local whenever I can to support local growers and prevent the pollution associated with huge semis trucking produce across the country to my local supermarket.

In return, my garden has rewarded me with delicious food, good health, exercise that I enjoy, and a golden farmer’s tan. My aim in Food Is Medicine is to help you reap the same rewards.