Bravo for tomatoes, beans and kale. But what’s next for the ardent home gardener? Wheats, including farro, spelt and kamut, are surprisingly easy and very rewarding backyard crops. They can be planted as early as the ground can be worked in spring and harvested mid-summer to make room for fall crops. These ancient food sources can be milled for flour, sprouted or eaten as whole grains to retain their natural amino acids, fibre, vitamins, omega-3 fatty acids and probiotics, among other benefits.

In addition to wheat, there are also heirloom cultivars of barley and oats that offer an abundant way for gardeners to harvest fibre, protein and carbohydrates. Buckwheat makes an excellent grain substitute and attracts many beneficial insects. Seeds like soybeans, flax, amaranth, quinoa and Styrian pumpkin are very high in protein and there are many beautiful types that are easy to grow. Expert gardener Dan Jason provides gardening advice and recommends varieties that are adapted to Canadian conditions.

Once the harvest is in, it’s time to celebrate with Michele Genest’s fifty vibrant vegetarian recipes featuring the garden’s bounty. Ranging from the simple (Pumpkin Seed Butter Cookies) to the sophisticated (Beet and Triticale Gnocchi with Kale Pesto), the recipes in this exciting garden-to-kitchen volume will inspire readers to expand their horizons when it comes to growing and cooking grains and seeds.

Dan Jason has been gardening since childhood, but most avidly for the last twenty years since he moved to Saltspring Island, BC and began to study and develop bean varieties. After his first discovery, the Black Jet soybean, he never looked back. He opened a successful seed business, Salt Spring Seeds, in 1988, which still specializes in seeds for high-protein plants. Jason is also a director of Canada's Heritage Seed Program, a national network of organic growers dedicated to preserving our heirloom seeds.

Dan Jason's profile page

Yukon author and cook Michele Genest has lived in Whitehorse since 1994, where she moved from her hometown of Toronto in search of winter. She has written about food and culture for the past 25 years, and cooked ever since she can remember. Her past experience includes a four-year stint as dining editor of enRoute Magazine, and another as chief dishwasher and fish-cleaner in a waterfront restaurant on a small Greek island. She was co-editor of two anthologies of Yukon writing, Urban Coyote and Urban Coyote, New Territory, and has written several plays, including Fasting Girl, Gulf and Magic Box, all produced by Nakai Theatre. She writes a regular cooking column for Yukon, North of Ordinary Magazine, and her print credits include the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, the Montreal Gazette, enRoute, Flare and Geist. Her first cookbook, The Boreal Gourmet, is a national bestseller and won a Canadian Culinary Books award in 2011. She is releasing her second book on northern cuisine, The Boreal Feast, in June 2014.

Michele Genest's profile page

• Winner, Gold - Independent Book Publisher Award (Cookbooks - Specialty)
• Short-listed, Taste Canada Award in Single-Subject Cookbook Category

The perfect handbook for the good food revolution—one backyard at a time. Dan Jason demystifies how to grow ancient grains and staples, and with recipes included, it's everything you need for farm-to-table living. Utterly unique!

Alisa Smith, co-author of The 100-Mile Diet: A Year of Local Eating

Jason and Genest give you the power to control what is on your plate, with both quality nutrition and great satisfaction in this comprehensive DIY sure to make you a pro at garden-to-table.

Patricia Green and Carolyn Hemming, bestselling authors of Quinoa 365: The Everyday Superfood