NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Ruth Torres is so devoted to her garden that a knee-high cast after foot surgery failed to deter her from planting and tending to it for the past three months.
Her 8- by 4-foot raised bed in the incubator garden off English Street run by New Haven Farms is full of healthy Swiss chard, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes, Japanese eggplants and zucchini.
“I have already harvested four pounds of eggplants,” Torres said at a recent tour of the site.
A 2.5 pound zucchini was turned into bread and cookies, while some of it was added to a vegetable lasagna where Torres substituted eggplant for the traditional sheets of pasta.
“I love to garden so much. I don’t like being stuck at the house. I like being out and about,” she said of her routine, even though she worked with the cast on until two weeks ago
Torres is one of 30 families who are participating in the incubator garden, where they have their own plots that help feed an estimated 200 people, said New Haven Farms Executive Director James Jenkins.
Last year, there were 20 such families and next year, 20 more are expected to join the harvest at a separate site at Grand Acres off Clinton Avenue.
The growth of the garden and new ways to help low-income families access healthy foods has been made possible by New Haven Farms’ partnership with the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Foundation, the Livable City Initiative and the New Haven Land Trust, among others.
