By Jen Pennington

Jennie, remember to tell ‘em these vegetables are organic and they can’t buy ‘em in the stores.” My father, Ralph Siegel was well ahead of his time. As kid in the 70s, I didn’t really understand the consequence of what he was saying. We just knew Dad didn’t use pesticides and that he was crazy about something called “organic gardening.” He grew way more than we could possibly eat and if I helped pick the countless rows of string beans, I could sell some veggies and keep part of the profits. I was a door-to-door-10-year-old-organic-vegetable-salesgirl with a wagon filled with zucchini, peppers, tomatoes and orange, acid-free tomatoes he told me to charge an extra dime for. I dragged my cart around our Northport, Long Island neighborhood, heading first to the Italian ladies who would always buy the most and lighten my load sooner. Continue reading Growing up Green