Most of what fills grocery store produce sections was selected for uniformity, shelf life, and ability to survive a supply chain — not flavor, nutrition, or visual interest. Growing your own opens the door to varieties that have been feeding people for centuries, developed in wildly different climates and cuisines, and that taste like genuinely different foods — not just variations on the same bland baseline.
Here are 25 varieties we're growing this year, what makes each one worth the effort, and where to get seed.
Tomatoes
Deep burgundy-black skin with greenish shoulders, brick-red flesh that darkens near the skin. The flavor is one of the most complex of any tomato — smoky, rich, slightly salty, deeply savory. Named for the Crimean Peninsula where it originated. Excellent sliced raw, roasted, or made into sauce. Seed source: Baker Creek, Johnny's Seeds.
Lime green with darker green stripes, turning slightly yellow-gold when ripe. Tangy, bright, acidic flavor profile that contrasts beautifully with the sweeter red and black varieties on the same plate. Ripeness is harder to judge visually — feel for slight give and look for the color shift. Seed source: Baker Creek.
Peppers
The backbone of traditional Peruvian cuisine. Bright orange-yellow when ripe, with a fruity, tropical heat that's unlike any common North American pepper. Heat level is moderate — present but not punishing. Excellent in sauces, ceviche, and roasted. Harder to find transplants, so start from seed early (12 weeks before last frost). Seed source: Semillas.com, Baker Creek.
Small, wrinkled Japanese pepper — thin-walled, mild, sweet, excellent blistered in a hot pan with flaky salt. About 1 in 10 is noticeably hot, which is exactly what makes them interesting to eat. Enormously productive; a single plant produces hundreds of peppers. One of the easiest exotics to sell because everyone at a farmers market knows them now.
Root Vegetables
Deep purple exterior with a bright orange-yellow interior — the cross section is genuinely beautiful, especially in a salad. Rich in anthocyanins (the same antioxidant compounds in blueberries). Flavor is sweeter and slightly more complex than standard orange carrots. Heat destroys the purple color, so eat raw or lightly cooked for full visual impact. Seed source: Burpee, Johnny's.
Red exterior, bright pink-and-white candy-stripe interior rings. Much milder and sweeter than standard beets — often tolerated by people who claim not to like beets. Stunning raw in salads. Like the purple carrot, cooking mutes the visual drama — slice thin and eat raw or lightly pickled to showcase the color. Seed source: Baker Creek, Fedco.
Brassicas
The most visually spectacular vegetable in the garden — lime green with recursive spiral fractal heads that look genuinely alien. Flavor is between broccoli and cauliflower: nutty, delicate, slightly sweet. Requires a long, cool season — best as a fall crop started in late summer. The heads are dense and slow to form but absolutely worth the patience. Seed source: Baker Creek, Botanical Interests.
Specialty and Unusual
Small golden fruits wrapped in a papery husk, related to tomatillos. Flavor is vanilla-pineapple-tropical — unlike anything else in the garden. Used raw in salads, made into jam (extraordinary), dried like raisins, or baked in desserts. Extremely prolific once established and self-seeds readily. One of the most underrated homestead crops. Seed source: Baker Creek, Adaptive Seeds.
A Japanese herb with a flavor profile unlike anything Western — anise meets basil meets mint with a savory edge. Used in sushi, salads, Korean cuisine, and as a garnish. Both red and green varieties are worth growing; red has more intense flavor and adds dramatic color. Self-seeds aggressively, which means one purchase of seed is potentially permanent. Seed source: Kitazawa Seed Co., Baker Creek.
Not a true spinach but a tropical climbing plant that thrives in the summer heat when regular spinach has long since bolted. Thick, glossy leaves with a mild flavor — slightly mucilaginous when cooked (similar to okra) but completely neutral raw. Grows vigorously on a trellis and produces all summer. For regions with hot summers, this is the answer to the "no summer spinach" problem. Seed source: Baker Creek, Southern Exposure.
Where We Source Seed
For heirloom and exotic varieties, we rely primarily on a short list of specialty seed companies that maintain genuine open-pollinated stock:
- Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds (rareseeds.com) — the best single source for exotic and rare varieties in the US
- Kitazawa Seed Co. — Asian vegetable specialists, particularly Japanese and Korean varieties
- Fedco Seeds — strong on cold-hardy varieties, excellent quality control
- Southern Exposure Seed Exchange — excellent for heat-tolerant and Southern Appalachian heirlooms
- Adaptive Seeds — Pacific Northwest focus, excellent specialty items
- Seed Savers Exchange — member-based, enormous variety library
We save seed from at least 30% of what we grow every year. Open-pollinated varieties come true from seed, which means after the first year's purchase, many of our most interesting crops cost us nothing to maintain. Learning to save seed from exotic varieties is one of the highest-leverage homestead skills you can develop.