(soft music) (upbeat music) - Welcome to Oklahoma Gardening.

Join us out in the garden as we plant some summer squash.

Bailey has a handy trick to store any leftover seeds.

I'll share a salvia that will keep blooming all season long.

Shelly shares how to start seeds in the classroom.

We have an early season perennial to introduce.

And finally, Kristy is cooking up another tasty recipe.

It's a full show.

So let's get started.

Underwriting assistance for our program is provided by the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry, helping to keep Oklahoma green and growing, Oklahoma Gardening is also a proud partner with Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust shape your future provides resources for Oklahomans to make the healthy choice the easy choice.

(upbeat music) I love sharing with you guys the cool things that plants can do.

(upbeat music) We're back here at the Student Farm.

I want to share with you a tropical plant that you might find in some Oklahoma landscapes.

(upbeat music) It's important to know which plants we are dealing with so that we can continue to maintain them successfully for years to come.

(upbeat music) Earlier this spring, we talked about different ways of starting your vegetable garden.

Well, we always recommend waiting till mid-April before you go out and plant your warm season crops.

And we're at that favorite time of year when we can now go out in the garden and plant freely.

It looks like the forecast is going to be okay, and we are not gonna have any late freezes at this point in time.

But who knows?

It can change in a moment here in Oklahoma.

But as of today, we are going to go ahead and do some direct sewing of some vegetables.

And we mentioned earlier that if you're doing transplants, that's kind of a great way to get instant gratification.

But if there is one plant to start from seed, I would highly recommend that you start zucchini and squash from seed in the garden.

So for the price of what one transplant might cost, you can easily get a packet of seeds that have several seeds in there, and it'll be enough to not only plant your garden this season, but also to go ahead and plant a fall garden later on in the summertime, or maybe even save the seeds for next year.

So you can see we've got our bed prepped here.

What we've done is we've taken this garden that we've grown different things in over the years, and we kind of transformed the soil a little bit so that we have mounds here.

We actually have 12 different mounds.

So we have three mounds that we're gonna plant, four different varieties, two yellow squash, and then two rows of zucchini in this bed here.

Now we've planted, we're gonna plant the seeds in mounds simply because it'll elevate the plant a little bit and allow that irrigation to almost sort of create a flooding effect around the root zone as they continue to grow deeper.

So when you're planting these seeds, they're pretty simple.

It's really not too much to it.

The nice thing about squash seeds are, is that they actually are large seeds.

If you think about if you've ever eaten squash, you can see the seeds in there.

So that's how big they are.

They're about a half a centimeter in length.

And so you're just going to make a little bit of a hole and plant a couple of seeds in the mound there.

You can do a couple of in each hole if you wanted to, you could do two in the center.

I've just got three here that I'm gonna plant in this mound.

And we might come back actually and prune some of those out if it gets too large and they're all successful.

But we're gonna go ahead and do that, and we'll just repeat this process over.

Because the seeds are very small, you're only gonna go about an inch deep in the ground, and we are gonna make sure to water them into ensure that we have good soil contact with that seed.

And as those seeds germinate, that's the most sensitive time to make sure that you are irrigating them well because they don't have very many roots established, so they can dry out rather easily.

So especially on those spring days where we can really get some high temperatures, make sure that you are regularly checking your seeds.

That will be germinating soon.

(upbeat music) - This is a really exciting time of year because we finally get to go back out in the garden, get our hands in the soil, and get to watch our little plants that we started from seed grow into the big plants that they will become over the season.

So if you started transplants over the winter time or over the last few months, you know that you didn't have to use all of the seeds that came in an individual packet.

So what do you do with them whenever you're done planting them inside or just trying to save them for next year?

- A lot of times we wanna keep them in the refrigerator because it's an optimal temperature to make sure that your seeds stay viable from this season to the next season.

And so, oftentimes if you don't have some kind of storage system, you can use just a plastic Ziploc baggie or some way instead of just throwing all of your seed packets inside of your refrigerator.

One way that I really like to store seeds because I've got a lot that I'm taking care of here, and so I have all kinds of different plants that I'm starting here at the Botanic Garden.

And so, what I like to use are these photo storage containers.

You can get them at a variety of places, you can find them online.

They're pretty cost effective and they do a really good job of keeping your seeds organized and stored together.

What I like about it is that it is fairly airtight, so you don't have to worry about moisture getting in there and molding any of your seeds.

So, whenever you do this, I bought this size because I knew most of my seed packets would fit in these, but I have all of these different, all of these different containers within here.

So, I'm able to organize them by the type of seeds that they are, by the time that I'm planting them or whatever other ways that you would want to organize them.

So, for example, I have some of my cool season on this side 'cause that's whenever I would start them is together, then I have my warm season over here.

And I have them separated by type, depending on how many seeds I have.

So, there's all different kinds of options.

So, there's this option, and then this one, the packages or these little storage containers are a little bit bigger so you can store bigger seeds in them.

So, another reason that I really like these is because these are really easy to take to the greenhouse or to take outside.

So, if you're direct sowing a bunch of spinach or lettuce outside, you can just grab one of these that's designated for your lettuce or spinach or whatever you're wanting to direct sow, and you can just easily carry this outside.

It keeps all of them together and it keeps all of the dirt off of it.

And it helps also to repel some of the water that might happen if you're taking these around the garden.

So, whenever you're storing your seeds, you wanna make sure it's an airtight container and that you wanna keep it in a cool place like your refrigerator.

But I highly suggest giving these a try so that way you can keep your seeds organized and ready to go for next season.

(upbeat music) - As you guys know, every year we like to introduce you to some of the All-America Selection winners that we have on display here at the Botanic Garden.

And this year, I wanna showcase this one that we have here.

It's already blooming well early into the spring.

It's a Salvia nemorosa, and it's called Blue by You.

And you can see, it's similar to the May Night, but in fact May Night was the comparison plant for this one, and it actually starts blooming a couple of weeks ahead of May Night.

Now, you can see it just gets shy of about two feet in height, and half of that is actually these flower spikes that it produces.

It has a lot of pollinators all over it, so it's really good for the pollinator garden, your your cut flower garden, or just along a perennial bed also.

We've got it here and, in fact, we haven't even finished planting our garden yet, you can see how well these are doing here.

Now, this is actually only the second season, so they're gonna get a little bit bigger probably this year.

The nice thing about this salvia is not only does it bloom early in the spring, but it'll continue to bloom for us throughout the season.

So, as these spikes sort of decline, we'll come through here and sort of deadhead these just to encourage that re-blooming.

But it can bloom up to several, almost five times throughout the season, continue to bloom into fall for us as well.

And at that point, it'll just sort of dive back to the ground and then resume next spring again.

It is hardy from Zones 4-9 so it can handle both our heat as well as our cold winter temperatures as well.

So, if you haven't checked out this salvia, it's called Blue by You, and it's a great selection to add to your garden.

(upbeat music) - There's a lot of people who like to start seeds before it gets to planting season so they can get a jumpstart.

And there's several ways you can do it, and I'm just gonna show you a way to be successful.

(birds chirping) So, a lot of people, when they're planting seeds, they just plant them, doesn't matter what you plant them in, but they plant them and then they water it and they think they're watering it enough, but they aren't.

(birds chirping) So, a lot of people, when they're starting seeds, they have a spray bottle and every morning, (water sputtering) maybe two times a day, they spray it down and then after a few weeks they're like, "I am not seeing any growth, how come that is?"

So, I'll show you what we do.

In the professional world when we have access to a greenhouse, we use something called a mist bench, and a mist bench mists periodically throughout the day, every 15 or 20 minutes depending on what's growing and so it stays moist.

Like this will not stay moist, so it's not gonna have much success, but if you have access to a mist bench.

- Then you would have something like this sprout up so it stays moist enough for everything to keep sprouting.

Now of course, not everyone has access to a mist bench.

So one thing you can do is you can basically make a terrarium so it'll grow.

So after you get your seeds planted, you can make a terrarium with a little bit of cling wrap.

You just put it over here.

All right, just in a little bit, you'll see condensation forming.

It'll show you that it's becoming a terrarium and it'll stay moist.

And so you can do that.

Or if you don't wanna do that, you can also just use a Ziploc bag.

So I've done that.

I planted these, I watered them once, I put 'em in a bag and I never touched them again.

So this is what we got with that.

Okay, no mist bench, they still came up just fine.

But you will notice that these guys are leaning and growing one direction.

That's because I had it next to a window sill.

So that's another thing you have to deal with.

They get really long, this is called etiolation.

They get really long while they're reaching for the light, whereas if you have light coming from the top, they grow up nice and straight.

So one thing I did as another experiment, I had not a mist bench, just a bag.

And I put a light really close to it like that far from the tops of the seeds.

And if you do that, there's no sunlight on one side and not on the other.

So things tend to grow up straight.

So this has just been a few days, but notice they're growing up straight and they're not growing out sideways.

So if you're gonna start seeds indoors, keep 'em moist, keep 'em away from the window and just a regular light, just as long as it's like 5,000 K regular daylight.

You just keep it really close and it'll grow straight.

So that's the best way to start seed successfully.

(soothing music) - You might remember a couple of springs ago, we planted up a container and I used perennials in that container.

And one of the things that I talked about is how you can utilize perennials in a container.

And if you want, you can either leave them in that container or then plant them in the garden and give them another life.

And so that's what I wanna showcase here is some of those perennials that were originally in those containers, we've planted them in the garden and I wanted to show how well they're doing here.

So if you remember, we had a Summit Alyssum down in the front to give us a bright yellow pop of color.

That's what I love about this plant still.

And you can see that it's just thriving here in the garden.

It does like kind of well drained soil.

So we have it in a slightly elevated garden here.

We still have it in a container also, so it's getting well drained soil there as well.

But it is just thriving in both locations.

Now this Summit Alyssum shouldn't be confused with the Sweet Alyssum as that is actually a different genus, but this one is hardy from zones three to eight.

And so you could leave it in the container, it still does well, 'cause remember, when we're planting in a container, we wanna make sure that we're planting to a zone colder than what we are because it has that ambient air around it.

So we wanna make sure that it is hardy in there.

However, here in the ground you can see how it's really created a nice drift of yellow color here.

And so you might've seen some of the other segments we've done on phlox, how phlox makes a nice colorful drift in the spring.

But one color that flocks does not come in is this bright yellow.

So you get this nice cheery yellow here early in the springtime and you can see the foliage below it.

It's kind of a gray green color, almost a little bit of a blue tint to it as well.

So after it's done blooming, we will cut this flowers back to allow that foliage to recover.

The thing about this is because it's hardy from zones three to eight, it can get a little sensitive to the further south that you get in the hot, hot southern sun and also in really humid conditions, it can suffer as well too.

But right here in north central Oklahoma, it's doing fine.

This has been in the ground for two years and it's looking great.

Now to another plant that we had in that container also was this April night.

It is a salvia, so you can see it here behind us.

It's just starting to come on it early April and blooming.

And you may be asking about the salvia behind this.

This is actually a different salvia.

It's called Blue Bayou that blooms even earlier in the spring.

So for the same reason we put 'em together in the container, purple and yellow makes a great combination.

And if you're looking to add yellow into the garden around a rock garden or over a wall, try this Summit Alyssa.

(soothing music) - Today we're making honey mustard chicken.

And joining me in the kitchen is Julie Bisbee with TSET.

- Yeah, TSET, the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

And one of our programs is Shape Your Future.

So we're gonna talk about some of the recipes today.

- Yeah, and I'm excited for making this.

What I really love about this recipe.

- Is that everything that we make, the entire meal is gonna be made in one pan.

- Excellent, helps save time, save on the dishes afterwards.

- Yes, the dishes especially.

So if you're somebody that likes to cook, but you don't like to do the dishes, this is the perfect, perfect recipe.

We've already preheated the oven to 425 degrees.

We lined our pan with foil, which if you don't have aluminum foil, you don't have to do that step.

But I really recommend it.

It's gonna make cleanup so much- - Yes.

- So much easier.

- Especially when you're trying to avoid the dishes.

- Right, right.

- Yeah.

- So we drizzled a little bit of olive oil on the pan and then added the chicken.

Now, unlike the vegetables that we need to wash before we prepare those, chicken, we don't need to wash. - We don't?

- So we put that directly on the pan, no.

It's actually recommended that you don't wash chicken, because you actually can increase the risk of contamination when you wash it.

When you wash chicken under water, the splatter that it creates- - Splatter.

- It can contaminate your kitchen surfaces, you know, your countertops, utensils, or even the food that's nearby.

So we just put that directly to the pan, no prep.

Now, we've got a variety of some different kinds of potatoes.

We've got, you know, some as small as this or the larger ones.

For the smaller potatoes, I'm just gonna cut these in half.

But for the larger ones, like this guy here, I'm gonna cut that probably into quarters, just to make sure that it's, you know, pretty similar in size so that they cook more evenly.

We want everything to turn out about the same.

Actually, I might cut some of these pieces in- - That's such a beautiful purple potato.

- It is, isn't it?

It's a pretty color.

- Yeah.

- But while I cut up the rest of these potatoes, would you want to share a little bit of information about TSET or Shape Your Future?

- Yeah, so TSET is a state grantmaking agency, and we do a variety of programs.

And the one that we're here to talk about today is Shape Your Future.

In an effort to help families live healthier, eat more nutritiously, be physically active, we have a lot of resources available on ShapeYourFutureOK.com, including recipes, things that you can make with your kids, or busy weeknight dinners.

These are all things that we know families struggle with when it is: How can we eat healthy?

How can we make a healthy choice?

Let us do the thinking.

Come to ShapeYourFutureOK.com and find easy resources to help stick to that goal.

- That's great, 'cause I know a lotta families are looking for more resources, more recipes, especially, you know, if they're wanting to, their families to eat a little bit healthier and do more cooking at home.

- Yeah, and you kinda get stuck in a rut sometimes, so it's nice to have some inspiration, incorporate different vegetables.

It's important that our kiddos are trying lots of different vegetables, lots of different times, so they take those healthy habits into adulthood.

- Yeah.

Well, and what I like, you know, besides the easy cleanup with this recipe, I like that it's so versatile.

So like, we're using potatoes and broccoli, but if your family didn't have, you know, broccoli or wanted to make, you know, maybe carrots or green beans, they could switch that out.

So we're gonna, you know, we wanted to save room on the sheet pan for our broccoli.

So we're gonna go ahead and add some seasoning to the potatoes.

Thank you.

And we'll just add the seasoning, and then, we're gonna add our broccoli later to the pan.

For this recipe, the broccoli is gonna be added towards the end so that it still has a little bit of crunch to it.

But if you were gonna switch out some of those vegetables, like we talked about, I think you might want to add those at the beginning, kinda like the potatoes.

So like if you were gonna use carrots, you might want, you know, would wanna go ahead and add those now to allow them more time to cook.

- Okay.

And what are you seasoning with?

- [Chef] Oh yeah, the seasoning is a mixture of sea salt, black pepper, and garlic powder.

- Great.

- Yeah.

- Just things most folks have already, yeah.

- Yeah, yeah, really versatile seasoning, yeah.

Most people have that.

- Okay.

- Okay, so now the topping for the sauce for the chicken, we're going to mix a sauce of two tablespoons of honey with a tablespoon of honey mustard.

So if you'll go ahead and if you wanna mix those up.

And I really think that this is a great sauce.

It tastes good and it is so easy to make.

And again, it's something that a lotta people will already have at home.

(spoon clicking) - All right.

- Thank you.

And I'll go ahead and, if you don't have one of these brushes, you could just use a spoon.

But this basting brush, it really does, it helps to, you know, to make sure that you get it evenly on the chicken.

Okay, now that we've got those ready to go, we'll just need to put this in the oven and at 425 and bake it for about 25 minutes.

- Okay.

(light music) - Well, now that our chicken and our vegetables have started to brown a little bit and the juices are running clear, we're gonna go ahead and add the broccoli.

- Okay.

- Now again, the reason that we're just adding the broccoli at the end of this instead of at the beginning is that we just want it to soften a little bit.

Now, usually people will tend to overcook their broccoli.

- Yes.

- So adding at the end, it will keep, you know, from it being overcooked.

But again, if you were using something else, like maybe frozen vegetables, like if you had frozen broccoli or a different kind of vegetable, you might wanna add that a little bit earlier on in the cooking, just to give it a little bit more time.

- So you could use- - Frozen if you had it, if that was what you had available.

- You could definitely.

- Okay.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Very good.

- And that would be a good option, yeah, if that's what somebody had available.

So now, we're just gonna add the broccoli to the pan, and then we'll just drizzle about a tablespoon of olive oil (lid crackles) on top of the broccoli.

(lid snaps) - [Julie] Yeah, I think you're right on the cooking time.

People have, you know, strong memories of overly cooked vegetables.

- Over-cooked broccoli.

- Yes.

- Yeah.

- But just through the oven, just a little tender crisp, excellent.

- Yeah, that way it still has a little bit of texture and crunch to it.

- Uh-huh.

- Mm-hm.

(foil scrapes) Okay, now we'll put these back in the oven for just about five to 10 minutes.

- Okay.

(jazzy upbeat music) (jazzy upbeat music continues) Now the chicken and the potatoes look nice and brown.

And the broccoli looks like it's softened a bit.

So it looks like we are ready now, and we can add some Parmesan cheese.

- Oh, yes, the cheese.

- Thank you, yeah.

And really this adds another food group to the meal as well.

- That's right.

Little extra flavor.

- And then we're just gonna sprinkle this around, get some on the potatoes and the broccoli, and then we're ready to, I'm gonna check the temperature of - Yeah.

the chicken.

- That's important.

- It's really important that, you know, to check the meat just to make sure that it's done.

And it's a good idea to insert a thermometer into the thickest part of the breast.

And it should be 165 degrees, which it looks like it is.

- That's good food safety.

- That is.

- Yes.

Excellent.

- So I'll go ahead and plate our meal.

And Julie, while I'm plating this, would you like to share a little bit more about where people might find some of these recipes?

- [Julie] Yeah, these recipes come from Shape Your Future, which is A Program of TSET.

All of these things can be found on our website for free at shapeyourfutureok.com.

We also have resources on how to get your family moving, shopping lists, a lot of things to help families have healthy, full lives, and tips and tricks to make it easy.

(plate clinks) - Yeah and I'm sure people are gonna wanna find those tips.

There's a lot of great recipes on your website, like this one that we made today.

- Yeah, smells great.

I can't wait to dig in.

- It does.

(upbeat music) - Well, Julie, thank you again for joining me in the kitchen today.

It was fun making this new meal.

- That's right, thank you.

- For more information about Shape Your Future, visit their website.

For this recipe and more like it, scan this QR code.

(upbeat classical music) There are a lot of great horticulture activities this time of year.

Be sure and consider some of these events in the weeks ahead.

(upbeat classical music) (upbeat classical music) Join us next week as we share more spring gardening tips right here on Oklahoma Gardening.

(jet roars) - Let's just wait.

- And can I redo the ending?

(upbeat classical music) (upbeat classical music) - To find out more information about show topics as well as recipes, videos, articles, fact sheets, and other resources, including a directory of local extension offices, be sure to visit our website at oklahomagardening.okstate.edu.

Join in on Facebook and Instagram.

You can find this entire show and other recent shows as well as individual segments on our Oklahoma Gardening YouTube channel.

Tune in to our OK Gardening Classics YouTube channel to watch segments from previous hosts.

Oklahoma Gardening is produced by the Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service as part of the Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources at Oklahoma State University.

The Botanic Garden at OSU is home to our studio gardens, and we encourage you to come visit this beautiful Stillwater gem.

We would like to thank our generous underwriters, the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture Food and Forestry, and Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

Additional support is also provided by Greenleaf Nursery and the Garden Debut Plants, the Oklahoma Horticulture Society, the Tulsa Garden Club, and the Tulsa Garden Center.

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