Vegetable garden in south Florida - can I do it?

We're in Orlando and have been successful with tomatoes and cucumbers. We were watering twice per day. I also have a pineapple plant growing now.

We were super successful with basil, parsley, and oregano if you want to get into growing some herbs.

All of our pepper plants died. We had a little baby watermelon at one point. Cilantro was very unsuccessful.

So it's a balancing act here in Florida, especially with summer coming up. It's super hot but can rain a ton. Last fall we did an outdoor garden and one of the tropical storms came through and killed all our plants. The next time we covered them and did much better. When we grew them potted in a screened in, covered porch area they did well being watered twice per day.

You have to watch the heat AND the rain.

I'd vote for tomatoes and beans. Maybe snap peas? I grew leaf lettuce pretty good too. Those are all veges you can put in right now and harvest before the big heat sets in. My peppers grew ok.

I only did it for 1 year, I didn't have it raised and had a big problem viruses in my ground soil. A raised garden will fair much better. 

And I agree with Lauren, spices are great. 

It's too late for tomatoes and peppers but beans would probably work. The problem is the heat, humidity and rain that are just around the corner. Plants don't dry out and get mold and root rot even in an open sunny location. I've only had luck planting things in the fall, but here's a chart I think is for zone 10.

http://myearthprints.com/2010/01/25/vegetable-planting-guide-by-month-for-south-florida/

Soil matters, big time. We've done tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, watermelon, and a variety of herbs in buckets. Bug reduction will go a long way as well, as will rodent & bird protection. You mentioned Home Depot, they may be somewhat helpful. We did a little research with the local garden supply guy, and they were more helpful with plant types, times, needs, etc.  Growing seasons are a whole lot different where you are then elsewhere, so keep that in mind as well. You actually get 2 seasons out of a year, so planning can be more involved. Your neighbor is right, do yourself a favor and start with plants. You can move to seeds as you become more practiced.

BTW, Watermelons need room, they took over the rest of the garden. 

look at Earthboxes, they make growing veggies easy, almost fool proof.

For the raised bed, peppers are easy and almost impossible to mess up.  Basil and rosemary are easy too.  Most of the big home improvement stores have the starter plants in stock right now.

I'm up in Gainesville, but have had some luck myself. My MIL in Orlando swears by the lasagna gardening book and she has a lot more luck than I do. I should prbably try that one myself this year.

You can totally do it, though! I found peppers to be the heartiest and we grew beans and tomatoes and cilantro. There's some good sites on the net if you google for info on what to plant in your area when - that helped me.

I had problems last year with something munching my veggies before I could, I think it was squirrels. Very frustrating to have a beautiful tomato disappear!