Your best bet is going to be the system with several decades of a good track record, engineer-designed (rather than tradition-designed), where you mix your own soil: Square Foot Gardening.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5Lu-7FIj_g

In Square Foot Gardening, you don't use the existing soil, but a mix that is meant to 1) retain moisture (you use less water); 2) provide more nutrients (so your vegetables are more nutritious and disease-resistant) and 3) keep the weeds down (because you didn't uncover dormant seeds so they could grow). Engineer Mel Bartholomew realized back in the 70's that the usual gardening style wastes 80% of the growing space for rows, which then are wonderful places for weeds to sprout, while compacting the soil as it's walked on. So he came up with the system for gardens where you use every inch of space without loosing plant growth, and you don't walk on it so the soil remains nicely loose, so the plants grow better.

And there is much less work than the traditional garden, because you eliminate most of the potential weeds before you even start by first killing the grass using black trashbags and good ol' sunlight. You then lay down landscaping weed barrier, build a box on top of it, fill it with the soil mix (which is supposed to include as many kinds of organic compost as you can find), and divide it with a grid into 1' squares. This lets you see exactly how close you can place different kinds of plants. You can plant 9-16 lettuce plants in a square, for example, or four herb plants, but only one tomato plant.

You can also succession-plant, where you reseed something several times in a season (like lettuce), or pull out one crop to be followed by another, on a square-by-square basis.

In Arizona, you can pretty much garden year-round. You can do things like peas, spinach, and lettuce in the winter and maybe into the spring, and again in the fall. In the summer, in the squares where you planted these, you can grow just about anything. In addition, in the early fall (late summer in cooler climates), seeds will sprout in days instead of weeks, so you can plant summer things that will sprout quickly but mature more slowly as the temperatures cool. Even in the Midwest, you can be harvesting summer veggies into December if you cover your garden with clear plastic, making a mini-greenhouse!

If you want lettuce, I'd definitely look at the Heatwave blend from Cook's Garden. It will go through very hot temps without bolting (sending up stalks with seed heads, when the plant then turns bitter)--maybe not through an Arizona August, but it may get you through June!

Some good sources for organic, heirloom seeds are Seeds of Change and Johnny's Selected Seeds. The Cook's Garden and Renee's Seeds have some organic seeds, but what their strength is varieties that they've traveled around the world for, selecting what is selling best in local street markets from Paris, Rome, Amsterdam, and various Asian cities, where taste and appearance matter more than portability. No bland Styrofoam tomatoes in these catalogs! You'll also find many interesting heirlooms and worldwide varieties in Baker's Creek Heirloom Seeds.

This year I'm doing two 4' x 4' Square Foot Gardens. You don't have to settle for the typical garden center offerings, which tend to be those varieties that "travel". They're usually not organic, nor are they very interesting. In contrast, so far I've got two blends of 7 lettuces; red and green scallions, red, flat sweet Italian onions, French radishes and 12 herbs. This week I'm planting snap peas. Next month I'll be planting 5 tomatoes, including a striped, a golden plum, a peach, a red that matures in 45 days (Siberian), tiniest cherry (called currents--about the size of raisins) and an heirloom red slicer. I'll also be planting 5 peppers in my flower beds, including true Paprika, and a *sweet* Habanero, as well as one with mango overtones, a multi-colored and a striped. I'll also be doing two colors of French filet beans (haricots verts), round French zucchini, striped Italian eggplant, cornichon-type cucumbers, and an heritage squash (Delicata). In late July/early August, I'll be pulling up what's done and planting carrots, striped beets, turnips, cauliflower, and more lettuce. I'm not going to try corn until I get another garden built.

http://rareseeds.com/images/catalog/TS102.jpg

http://www.cooksgarden.com/images/508.jpg

http://www.cooksgarden.com/images/351.jpg

http://www.cooksgarden.com/images/524.jpg

I really like these unusual varieties. People are really stunned when I take a plate of striped, sliced tomatoes to a picnic, or a salad made with teeny-tiny multicolored beans, or beets that have bulls-eyes in them. And then they taste them and can't believe the terrific flavor!

I'll list some good sites on Square Foot Gardening and sources for seeds/plants below. Good luck!
Source(s):
http://www.squarefootgardening.com/ The original

http://timssquarefootgarden.com/

http://www.reneesgarden.com/

http://www.seedsofchange.com/

http://www.botanicalinterests.com/

http://www.johnnyseeds.com/

http://www.cooksgarden.com/

http://rareseeds.com/

For great organic pepper and tomato plants:

http://www.thechilewoman.com/

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