The book

Backyard Food Factory: The Art (and Science) of Self-Reliance

A practical guide to transform your backyard (or balcony, or patio) into a productive food-generating system. By Erik Brassell, chick'n farmer.

Coming soon Book cover: Backyard Food Factory, The Art (and Science) of Growing and Producing Your Own Food at Home

This isn't about planting a few tomatoes.

It's a comprehensive guide to turning whatever space you have into a food-producing system. It combines the art of gardening and food preservation with the science behind successful growing, and ties both together with the thing that makes the whole system work: a flock of chickens closing the loop.

Every chapter answers two questions. What do I actually do? And why does it work?

What's inside

Five parts, following the flywheel from the ground up.

1

The Science of Growing

The fundamentals of plant biology, soil science, and ecology: how plants grow, why soil health matters, and how plants, insects, and the environment interact.

  • Soil testing and amendment
  • Nutrient cycles and fertilization
  • Pest and disease management using integrated pest management
  • Plant propagation and seed saving
  • Hydroponics and other alternative growing methods
2

The Art of Gardening

The hands-on, experiential side: the techniques you learn by doing.

  • Garden design and layout: sunlight, water access, and looks
  • Choosing the right plants for your climate and space
  • Planting, pruning, and harvesting techniques
  • Creating garden spaces that are both beautiful and productive
  • The edible landscape: perennials that produce every year
3

Food Preservation and Processing

Getting the harvest onto the shelf and keeping it there.

  • Canning and preserving, and the science of doing it safely
  • Freezing, drying, and fermenting, and how each affects food quality
  • Making jams, pickles, and other preserved goods
4

The Self-Reliance Aspect

Why any of this is worth doing.

  • Increased food security and self-sufficiency
  • Fresh, healthy, organic produce on demand
  • Reduced environmental impact
  • The satisfaction of producing your own food
  • Community building through sharing and bartering
5

Factory Design and Optimization

The "factory" in the name means efficiency: maximizing output from the space you have.

  • Space optimization for small gardens
  • Vertical gardening and other space-saving methods
  • Season extension with greenhouses and cold frames
  • Closed-loop systems: chickens, composting, rainwater harvesting

Who it's for

  • The backyard beginner who has a patch of grass and a feeling it should be doing more.
  • The gardener with a few beds who wants to add chickens and stop buying fertilizer.
  • The chicken keeper with a coop full of litter and no plan for it.
  • The apartment or patio grower who wants the same loop at container scale.
  • Anyone who wants to take control of their food supply and understand why each piece works.

About the author

Erik Brassell keeps chickens, composts everything the kitchen and yard produce, and grows food in a backyard greenhouse. Backyard Food Factory started as a notebook sketch of how the pieces fed each other, and became a system worth writing down.

More about Erik and the project →