Evacuation Ready Plants with Medicinal Properties

Keep your edible garden growing year around, as potted indoor plants, ready to evacuate with you at a moment's notice. These are the most beneficial plants to consume for your family's overall health and wellness.

Read the medicinal benefits for each edible plant listed below, with suggested meal or beverage usages as recommended in the books "How to Grow an EMERGENCY Garden", and the "ABC's of Nutritious Cooking". All these edibles can be grown together, organically bundled around 2 or 3 larger dwarf tree pots, placed beside a sunny window.

Broccoli - nutritionists are in agreement that this is an important vegetable to help stave off cancer, and is a dense source of nutrients, also rich in vitamin C. Broccoli florets are an inexpensive and tasty addition to pasta noodles (cooks right along with boiling pasta water) and the stems can be peeled to eat like celery, for dipping, or juiced for liquid content (unavailable from florets).

Zucchini - consists of 95% water, is easy to grow in extreme climate conditions, and is another dense source of nutrients. Juice or chop leaving the nutritious skin attached, and add to casseroles, and stews, or grill slices right on the barbecue.

Spinach - is a hearty salad-leaf plant, which is easier to grow, and is more nutritious than fragile lettuce crops. Spinach can also be chopped and added to sauces, dips, or pasta dishes, adding healthier dark-vegetable nutrients to your diet.

Jalapeno or chili peppers - ward off illness and infections, while adding concentrated Latin spiciness to salsas, dips, and dishes, with extra vitamin C. However caution is required with hot peppers, as a little will go a very long way, and even the dried varieties can burn skin and eyes if residue isn't thoroughly washed off hands.

Cilantro - is Spanish parsley that gives salsa its distinctive flavoring, and helps to remove heavy-metal toxins from the system. If you like the flavor it can be added to salads, casseroles, and side dishes, otherwise try milder Italian parsley.

Green onions - provide all the antibiotic health benefits and flavor of onions, without having to dig up the entire plant. You will be able to pull off the green stalks to chop and add as garnishing, while allowing the bulb to continue growing, providing more stalks.

Garlic - can be treated the same as green onions, pulling off the green stalks and chopping for flavorful garnishes, while allowing the bulbs to continue growing. However the potent antibiotic properties are found in the garlic cloves, which can be peeled and preserved in olive oil for several months (which is how I keep garlic on hand).

I preserve garlic as I would protect an expensive medicine, as it can reconcile high fevers, and will aid the body in fighting off infection, to maintain good health. The bonus is the flavor that fresh garlic adds to foods, and by preserving them in olive oil, it is always on hand ready to slice up, and use in cooking.

Besides the healthful incentives to growing and eating these pungent herbs (garlic, green onions,

cilantro, and hot peppers) they also act as natural bug deterrents. Even the addition of garlic peelings spread over potted-plant top soil will help keep harmful bugs from eating your crops.

Lemongrass - has cancer-fighting properties, and also acts to keep bad bugs (such as mosquitoes) away, while appearing to be innocent lawn grass. You may even try to pull out the first few blades of growth, mistaking them for grass, and discarding them as I have done.

Make sure to smell the delicate lemon fragrance left on your hands before discarding any of these important grass blades. I tear off handfuls of lemongrass, chop into 1" to 2" pieces, steep in hot water, and strain, to make a fragrant lemon tea that's good hot or iced. I've also mixed the lemongrass with our dog's food, to keep them healthy too.

For more specifics on container growing refer to "Maximizing Space with Themed Container Gardening". It is possible to protect your living medicine cabinet under controlled growing conditions, making it easy to pack in your car, and evacuate right along with your family.