If you’re a novice gardener, first of all, welcome! Gardening is a wonderful leisure activity that reaps actual rewards. Just wait until you taste the first bite of your home-grown salad. All the work will be a distant memory as you enjoy juicy tomatoes, colorful greens, and other awesome garden vegetables. People who garden find it to be one of the most soothing activities they can do. It’s a fun after-work and weekend routine that reduces stress and makes good use of our lawns.

Everyone who wants to start a garden dreams of vegetable plants full of a bountiful harvest. They often don’t, however, realize how much work gardening is. Some plants take a lot more intensive care and attention than others. Picking the right vegetables to grow will make all the difference. We think beginners should start small and work their way up to more complex vegetables. Yes, the climate has an impact on which vegetables will grow better, but some easy vegetables will grow in most conditions. Here are the five easiest vegetables to start your backyard garden.

Salad Greens
Lettuce and salad greens are the perfect vegetables to start with on your gardening adventure. Lettuce grows at a healthy rate and all you have to do is snip or pull pieces of lettuce from the plant to eat. One of the best things about lettuce and salad greens is that they can be put in a gardening container or a yard garden. They fit around or underneath other plants and have decent success growing in the shade.
Lettuce and other salad greens are so much fun to grow because, first, they look great. Salad greens make a garden look full. As opposed to other vegetable plants where you’re watching for a bud or small beanstalk to grow, lettuce is there front and center.

Cucumbers
Growing cucumbers is a fun endeavor. To be successful, cucumbers need something to grow on. The vines need to grow vertically to get the best results. You can make latticing or plant your cucumbers next to a chain-link fence to support the plants. Cucumbers grow best in warm temperatures with good light exposure, so put them in the yard where the sun sits most of the day. They’re a great plant to start with because they respond well to gardening care. The more you water and tend to them, the faster they tend to grow.

Tomatoes
Tomatoes are the go-to vegetable to grow in your garden. Chances are if you’ve known anyone who had their garden, there were tomatoes in there somewhere. Tomatoes can grow in baskets, pots, and other containers, so they are pretty resilient. You can buy seeds or starter plants at any nursery. Tomatoes are another plant that needs to grow vertically, so you’ll need some sort of structure in your garden that fines can crawl up. The main thing you have to worry about with tomatoes is the bugs getting to them. You’re not the only one that loves to bite into a juicy red tomato.

Green Beans
Green beans or snap peas should be a staple in any home vegetable garden. They look terrific hanging along with the plant fines ready to be plucked for an afternoon snack or evening meal. There’s something so satisfying about working your way through the plant snapping beans off the stalk. Vine plants are typically easier to grow than bushes that support their weight. It’s a bit more work setting up, but you’ll get faster and better results with vines. Beans need a lot of water and good sun exposure to grow. Once you’ve got things rolling, though, it’s a pretty low maintenance plant.

Summer Squash
Summer squash will have you smiling ear to ear as you look over your brightly colored garden in the summer. These bright yellow and green vegetables are a great addition to any garden. They do require a bit more space to grow than some other beginner vegetables on this list, but you get nicely sized vegetables in return. There are a bunch of different kinds of summer squash including zucchini and yellow crookneck. Take your pick and have fun giving them lots of sun and water. They’ll sprout throughout the summer. It’s fun to see the various shapes summer squash grows in. They can give your garden a distinct garden that’s fun to work in.

Growing vegetables in your backyard garden should be fun. Not everything’s going to work the first time, but that’s ok! Just keep trying and stick with what works. Soon enough you’ll have enough vegetables to harvest to have friends and family over to share with. You’ll master these easy to grow vegetables and work your way up to more complicated plants as you become a master gardener.

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