The last time I had a garden was a few years back. I made 2 raised beds out of landscape timbers, they were 1' tall x 12' long x 4' wide. I grew mostly peppers: bell, jalapeno, habanero, cayenne, thai, and serrano. I also grew a few tomato plants. I used most of it for making salsa and hot sauces.

The raised bed system makes it a lot easier in my opinion. And I bought pretty much everything from Burpee. I built a grow-light table so I could start the seeds in February in my basement, then move them outside once it got warmer and have a good head start.

I made the table from 2x4's and plywood and hung 2 - 4' long florescent fixtures from it with swingset chain so the lights could easily be raised or lowered. I used a cheap Walmart timer for the lights to turn them on and off. It worked extremely well with no problems whatsoever, despite how cheap it was to build. I recommend putting 2 or 3 seeds into each hole and culling them back to 1 plant each once they start growing, remove the weakest ones.