homegrown
Raised in your own garden or yard, not bought at the store.
Also called home-grown, garden-grown.
Updated September 24, 2026
homegrown pronunciation
/HOME-grown/
Meaning
Homegrown means you grew it yourself out back: tomatoes, peppers, corn, whatever the patch puts out. In redneck and Southern talk it is a badge of pride. Store tomatoes get shrugged at; a warm homegrown one on white bread with mayo is summer itself. The word can stretch to anything local or homemade, but the garden sense is the one that makes people brag.
How folks use it
- “These are homegrown tomatoes, so don't you dare put them in the fridge.”
- “We ate off that garden all summer: beans, squash, and plenty of homegrown corn.”
Origin and etymology
Plain English compound of home plus grown, used for home-raised plants since at least the 1700s. Southern and Appalachian foodways made it heavy with garden pride. Guy Clark's song "Homegrown Tomatoes" and writers like Lewis Grizzard helped nail the Southern feeling that a garden tomato beats anything trucked in.