KMHG helps educate community on growing food

Juanita Jones has been doing what she can for more than a decade helping either keep the youth of Jackson off the streets or at least give them a healthy alternative to gangs and committing crimes to spend their time with her non-profit, Keep My Hood Good.

One of the ways she does that is with the community garden that sits at the corner of Buchanan and Chester streets in East Jackson.

“We’ve had this garden here for a few years now, and we use it to teach children and some of our younger parents about growing their own food,” Jones said.

In the spring, Jones and a few friends will plant a few rows of different vegetables to grow in the garden, and she spends the bulk of her time each morning in the summer tending to the garden.

“That’s the most peaceful time of the day for me, honestly,” Jones said. “Because it’s just me and God out here, so I spend that time talking to Him and doing what He tells me to do.”

The garden isn’t the only thing in the plot of land KMHG uses in that spot. There are a few picnic tables and a walking trail that was recently paved with concrete through the area that weaves among the trees on the lot while also staying away from the garden.

“I spent probably a half-hour to an hour walking the trail too just to get moving before I tend to the garden,” Jones said.

Recently, Jones and a few members of a group of young mothers she meets with regularly gathered at the garden to celebrate the harvest of the summer crops and to show anyone who came by some of the dishes that could be made with them.

There was corn, okra, tomatoes and squash, and a number of different things to be made with them.

“We try to do this at the end of each season to show that if you grow certain vegetables, then there are different options of different foods you can prepare with them – more than simply cooking or frying or boiling that vegetable by itself,” Jones said. “And it works because there’s usually at least one who finds out something they didn’t know before.”

Jones said she’ll plant a new garden for the fall to be harvested later in the year.

“The fall garden is when a lot of the greens – turnip, mustard and collard greens – will be grown because they do better later in the year,” Jones said. “So those are always good for people in the community.”

Brandon Shields, brandon@jacksonpost.news