Early on, just about everything I planted was overdone.
Now my grandparents had big vegetable gardens so I don't know why I didn't remember, but my grandmother also canned and preserved a huge amount ... so she probably did fine with whatever amount was planted.
That's interesting about the watering. Kinda goes against some of the expert advice ... but I'm going to try it next year too if we're dry. We were only dry for about four weeks this past summer and then there was plenty of rain throughout the rest summer.