My New Vegetable Garden

To enjoy the splendour of the garden,click on pictures for enlargement. This is one of the favourite hats I wear in life - the gardener's...

Picking lettuce for lunch and dinner and juicing them minutes before consuming has always been on my mind for quite some time...and I am no stranger to procrastination...

There are a thousand and one things we say we wish we can do 'someday'... Sometimes somedays never come...

The first 'serious' vegetable garden I grew was when I first got married and was lecturing in Kota Kinabalu,Sabah in West Malaysia.The second garden was in the corner yard of my house which I kept for about 10 years until I started the import of organic produce in 1996.

After stopping the business a few years ago,I found myself being blessed with time in my hand again ( hooray...! just love time...,don't you ?)

From the time I became a student of the cello 2 years ago by some divine appointment,I found myself unwinding quite happily through engaging in doing the things I had been postponing for so many years...I guess it is quite infectious because,about a year later I found myself taking classes in fine arts and finally learning the piano,all at 52 !

Then one fine inspirational day last October, in the midst of practising and rehearsing for my first ever orchestra with the KL Pac Sinfoneitta,I just made a firm decision to end all postponing and started this vegetable garden...

Just look how satisfying and fulfilling it is to plant a dream garden and see it grow.....

The two rows of young seedlings at the end of my vegetable plot have just been transplanted...

You watch in awe as they grow by leaps and bounds, and in two weeks they completely cover the earth below ! Ready for harvest !Even though I have seen this miracle happening countless number of times over the years,it never fails to delight me over and over again -

I am addicted to seeing things grow !


The Making of A Home Vegetable Garden

With a burning desire to start establishing a vegetable garden,Cheng Swee,my maid,Tess and I quickly set out to plough the earth on the empty plot of land in front of our house in Taman Tun Dr Ismail.Here 20 years ago,Cheng Swee planted several Angsana trees which have since grown to near Raintree size,making this a cool spot to picnic in.

First we clear the away the grass and we started to loosen the earth and heap them up in rows.It is difficult to grow vegetables successfully in Malaysia without raising the bed.The abundant rainfall here can easily cause waterlogging even in one heavy shower.

This is about the hardest labour you will experience in preparing a vegetable plot - it is actually easier than than it looks...

Then we dig a few pits to make our compost in.Even Philene appears to enjoy this activity...

In the first month the first 6 short plots looked rather pathetic ...

With a little patience,and the charm of the fresh morning beckons us to the field each day,the bed started to look greener...Notice the rainwater that collects on the right after a night of rain...


My 80+ year-old mom is an avid and fantastic gardener who does not waste a single thing in her life.She saw my month-old long beans and taught me to pick one leave out of each stalk of 3 leaves to encourage flowering and fruiting.And with the young leaves she plucked she cooked a soup with it !


Then the long beans soon bore fruit and now the garden is beginning to take shape ...

This is the first time in my life I have ever grown a purple-coloured long beans variety and they are very prolific producers !

This curly variety of long beans also makes history. This is by far the best long beans I have ever grown! Crunchy and sweet ! and almost double the size of the normal long beans! And they are expensive in the market !



This is the normal variety - and just how long is long !

Philene thinking aloud, " Would you grow quickly ,Cucumber ! We need you for salad ! "

While the soil is not extremely fertile yet - we did get an extremely successful crop of Kai Choi on the right.This is the bitter vegetable we use to do our Emperor's soup with the left-over Christmas roast turkey !

With some extra harvest, my mom taught me to cure them as kiam chai ! ( salted veg )

Curing Kai Choiin an earthen pot - after a week - they turn light yellow and taste delicious cooked with some meat or prawns! This is one of my favourite veg.Teow Chew porridge won't taste the same without this dish.



This foot-long ladies finger started off very promising but I had to fight a frustrating battle with tiny black caterpillars that attacked the buds every day on almost every one of them !! Finally I gave up ! I just let them devour the ladies fingers...and patiently waiting for bigger predators to eat them up soon...the ecosystem will balance itself,this is a fundamental principle in organic farming.( bad news for those who eat inorganic ladies fingers - they have to be regularly sprayed ! )



This is the second phase of our garden expansion - we made an additional 7 beds,each more than double the length of the first 8 beds we made in the beginning ! Tess is a patient and ardent gardener too.In her early 30s she is a most marvellous help and can make a bed in 2 mornings. We started some 20 over tomato plants,calculating that many of them may not survive - I was looking for just one plant that could survive...

All looked very promising until the first truss started to form and one by one they died of viral diseases of the roots...:(
I am not giving up yet - since the first tomato plants Cheng Swee and I grew in our first veg garden were such prolific producers they grew up to 13 feet long and lasted more than 8 months! I hunted down recipes in the library - making fresh and very delicious tomato ketchup,tomato paste, tomato sauce.And we were able to drink freshly pressed tomato juice everyday !

This is Ulam Raja - King of salad,the fragrant local raw vegetable,a favourite of the Malays.I bought some for my salad and patiently planted the stems until they produce seeds.These plants you see here have been raised from these seeds over a couple of months...

The patience pays off ...now I can pluck a handful of them in juice them with Granny Smith apples - delicious and full of zest!



This is the first time I have ever raised this variety of salad - Fire-Red variety and surprisingly they are quite easy to raise !

Look see how wonderful when they grow...

I potted a few and gave them as New Year 's gifts

Trying my hand on Sweet Corn at my daughter's request...while they are growing I transplanted some extra seedlings of veg in the bed.

Young Asparagus establishing itself. Radish in the background
Growing seedlings in modules - about 4 days old .


After about two weeks they are ready to be transplanted,with minimal damage to the roots.And they grow superbly !


Tess transplanting them on to the beds


Newly transplanted seedlings are best covered with dark aerated plastic for about 3 days to establish their root system

This is the longest row of lettuce I have ever grown in my whole life !There are 5 different varieties.

Watching a young Winter Melon grow day by day is a phenomenal experience...

Matured Winter Melon with powderly skin ! They are superb in soups !

These are Chinese Cabbage - Wong Nga Pak.Their seeds are so expensive.And they are very beautiful plants.Unfortunately they do not form heads in this tropical weather....

The centre row is White Stem Chinese cabbage with very lovely flavour.

A close up look at my green letteuce.

Look closely these are very delicious curly pak choy - I harvest them leave by leave so that we can have a continuous supply.

This is the first time I have been able to raise these Broccoli from seeds.They take 3 to 4 months to flower...( patience.....)



These dark green Choy Sam are so healthy and abundant and are fantistic tasting, harvest 2 weeks after transplanting !



This light greeen Choy Sam reach beautiful heights and size.They are a true joy to harvest !

The 3 plants are Ya Ch'e Chai,with a slight bitter taste.They can be used in soup,stirred fried.I use them in my green juice.

Brinjals are a great joy to grow - currently bearing thier first brinjals in the garden- I bag them with paper to prevent fruit flies from laying eggs on them...

Trying my hand on a beet root plant I bought from a nursery - 3 plants for RM8.They seem to grow quite well and doesn't this plant look glorious ?!I use their leaves for juicing.

Herbs used to be a challenge to grow.This is the first time I manage some decent looking corinader plants,one of my favourites in Salsa and juice.

These are cinnamon basil plants I bought from Cold Storage imported from overseas.I gave it a shot and I am not disappointed at all - they grow so beautifully and are so delicately fragrant.

They give a high note to my Vegetable juice concoction !besides being full of anti-oxidants.

Local celery - another first ....raised completly from very ,very tiny seeds ! I am so proud to see them grow each time.They transform a dish like Soup kambang or beef soup freshly cut in and they add fabulous colour to the dull dark coloured soups! I am raising a lot more seeds currently in modules so I can juice them regualarly.They are quite slow growers...patience....!



Red Basil - another live herbs sold in module in Cold Storage.I am waiting for them to be a bit more established before harvesting them.Cutting usually encourage the herbs to grow faster.


Live Celery Leaves plants bought from Cold storage - this variety is gorgeous and the plants establish themselves rather well in my composted bed.


French Beans - just starting to flower..They look very promising ! Love French Beans.


The garden at its full splendour...a gardener's joy and pride....

And time to pick lettuce for lunch ...... Bon Appetit !