Among the many reasons to yank your dollars from Big Ag: pervasive pesticides, chemical runoff into rivers and streams, and all that oil needed to get mass-produced goods from farm to market. How to pull free? Raise some of your own food. Here are four products to get you started.

Cloudfarm Seedsheets

CLOUDFARM's Seedsheets look simple: Organic, non-GMO seeds and small clumps of compost are embedded in a cloth that doubles as a weed barrier. But a thriving garden requires an array of considerations, including how much room vegetables have to grow and which plants live near each other. So the seeds on each sheet—you get beets, carrots, cucumbers, and kale—are carefully arranged for the best possible harvest.

All you have to do is unfurl, secure with stakes, and water. $54, seedsheets.com

 

Windowfarms system

Vertical gardens are an elegant way to grow produce in cramped spaces. Fueled by a water pump and window-streamed sunlight, WINDOWFARMS' system lets basil, cilantro, and other crops flourish year-round—et voilà, your trip to the store just became a few steps across your living room.

Subscribe, and a new shipment of leafy seedlings arrives monthly. $180, plus $22 per month for the subscription, windowfarms.com

 

Visualingual seed bombs

VISUALINGUAL's seed bombs are "throw and grow." Toss the gumball-size clay balls onto the ground, and the seeds inside sprout when watered. Their soil comes ready-made, nourished by worm castings, helping the flowers blossom even in seemingly infertile dirt.

Use the resulting nasturtiums and marigolds in salads and teas. $7, visualingual.com

 

Flow Hive

Raising backyard bees may help prevent colony collapse disorder—and you get delicious honey. But first-time beekeeping can be daunting. So Cedar and Stuart Anderson, an Australian father-son beekeeping team, designed the FLOW Hive, a wooden box that drips the sweet stuff from spigots into jars, letting you fret less about the mess of extracting honey and focus more on tending to your bees' health. $699, honeyflow.com