Niki Jabbour

December 2011 - I was a Greenhouse Technology student at Niagara college, new to this thing called "twitter" when I stumbled across a quote from Niki Jabbour "In the middle of winter, there are no bugs, there are no slugs"

Having started my food-growing career in Mattawa and Thunder Bay, my main motivation for going to horticulture school was to Improve Food Access and Food Security in the North. I was already experimenting with winter harvest techniques I had learned up north (Teresa Daniele, Thunder Bay deserves her own book) and here was this incredible, inspiring woman sharing her successes with winter growing in Halifax!

When The Year-Round Vegetable Gardener first came out, I convinced the Niagara College Library to acquire the book for its horticultural collection... and then promptly borrowed it for the rest of the winter semester!

Eventually, I returned my library book and purchased my own copy because The Year-Round Vegetable Gardener by Niki Jabbour continues to be a main reference when I plan my seasons every year.

Having started my food-growing career in Mattawa and Thunder Bay, I am often skeptical of claims made by books and resources from outside of Canada (with the exception of Eliot Coleman's Winter Harvest Handbook). Even books from Southern Ontario rarely deal with the realities of Thunder Bay's short season, short days and long, sunny winters. Niki's unique experience growing in Halifax was very transferable to the northern regions where I started Garddwest, and continue to be relevant here in Hamilton. As another Goodreads reviewer mentioned, "when a book is written from the region you live, it has a lot more credibility than when a Floridian tells you what’s possible in Canada" and I can't agree more.

Eliot Coleman's Winter Harvest Handbook is a rigorous and scientifically thorough manual, the go-to reference on this subject, but Niki's Year-Round Vegetable Gardener is possibly a better fit for a beginner-intermediate winter gardener getting started at home or in a community setting.

Niki touches on the basics of timing, temperature and light needs providing background for her more practical instructional content. One area where Niki does dig deeper is soil sciences - suggesting sustainable methods including cover crops, crop rotation, organic fertilizers and building a healthy soil profile. A section on intensive farming in small spaces directly addresses small scale urban agriculture and backyard farmers. With tips and tricks for growing, plus concrete blueprints for building cold frames and tunnels, this book has all the information required to get started with Cool Season Gardening.… (more)

This is a great book for any vegetable gardeners who want to expand their horizons into more global options. It's full of beautiful (and mouthwatering) photos. Niki organizes it in a "like that? Try this!" format, and it's well worth even reading sections where you might not actually "like that", because some of the "try this" options sound amazing. There are instructions for growing, suggestions for eating (who knew you could pop amaranth seed like popcorn?), and specific variety recommendations. She tells you what works well in pots, shade, and other tricky conditions. There's no bad advice here. Both beginner and experienced gardeners will find it helpful. I've been gardening a long time and have even tried quite a few of the varieties she recommends, but now my list of things to try is so much longer!… (more)

Anyone who reads my reviews regularly knows that I love to read (and review) gardening books - most especially vegetable gardening. Growing up, we had a few tomato plants, grew potatoes a time or two, and rarely another vegetable plant, though our yard was always surrounded by trees and flowers. Two years ago my parents, hubby & I planted a small vegetable garden, and at the end of our second season, we doubled the size of our plot. I've never been much for cooking, but having my own garden has made me so much more aware of the food we eat and where it comes from, and I've slowly become a better cook as a result.

This book is put together by 73 different contributors, so there's great variety of plans, from small herb gardens to huge spreads with every vegetable imaginable. The books is exactly what the title says, a book of garden plans, so there aren't a lot of pretty photos of growing gardens, but illustrations of where to plant what vegetable to maximum your space. There is an introduction to each plan that explains what's going on in the plan, the how-to's and the why's, so you can learn from the plans & make it your own.

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