Dark Days Meal #7

Week #7 already....and already I had a hard week. This week really opened up my eyes to what I should try to work on this year. I am a die hard farmers market shopper, who goes every weekend, gets my food for the week (with a few extras that'll keep longer) and cooks it. Besides that my involvment is limited. I had tomatoes and herbs growing last year, but no other garden. I live in an apartment and have very little space that gets good sun and being that most of my life I despised getting dirty, I didn't know much and messed up the other things I tried to grow. I don't preserve food in any kind of way and this week that is why I got into trouble. I hadn't gotten to the market during the holidays and couldn't again this weekend and had used up ALL of my food...Thankfully I had some Lundberg rice still in the cupboard and I had made another batch of bean/squash soup from last week, so I simply poured the soup over the cooked rice and added some local sun dried heirloom tomatoes from Schaner Farms. It was a delicious meal, but all week I felt dragged down about the food choices I had in my house. I realized I needed to try again at a garden this year, so I've been combing the catalogs looking for the best container seeds *If you know of any, please let me know*, and I realized I needed to start learning to preserve! I'm not sure all that that will entail, but I'm ready to learn and take the next step in my local food journey. I definitely will not have a harvest '0 plenty to put up myself, but I can definitely buy extra from my farmers and work with that. Again any tips, suggestions, advice you have, please share...because just like gardening last year I don't know anything and am starting from scratch. I will definitely keep you updated on my journey, and I feel wonderful going in to my next phase!