Chillies and Vietnamese mint

[Does the Cooking]

Does anyone know a good place to get chillies. I particulary like the very small ones that the Thais call 'mouse dropping'. Yum.
I particualrly lile Vietnamese mint. It's mint with a chillie tast. I really like it.

Anyone ever grown lemon grass or ginger?

[nick the grief]

DTC,

Robinsons do some chillies (they're just up the road from you if you fancy a trip out directions on their site)

http://www.mammothonion.co.uk/

or HDRA sell some seeds

http://www.organiccatalog.com/catalo...th=21_22_23_36

For other herbs try Jekka McVicar's site (don't know the address but you can google it I guess)

ntg

[Lesley Jay]

For chillies Simpsons have a great selection. www.simpsonsseeds.co.uk Ginger is easy to grow www.plantcultures.org.uk will give you the instructions and lemon grass just buy it from the supermarkets, trim the bottom and stick it in compost. I haven't tried it but this is the way I have been told to grow it.

[poultrychat]

I put some ginger in a pot last year that had been sitting in my fridge, so supermarket bought, ignored it for ages and then it just started sprouting, I kept it going through the summer but it never did anything and I didn't know what to do with it, harvesting etc

[andrewo]

Chillies

I found the most extensive listing of tomatoes and chillies at:
http://www.plantsofdistinction.co.uk/
Request a Simply Vegetables catalogue - fantastic. Remember though that you cannnot grow tomatoes and chillies next to each other in a greenhouse (a fellow gardener told me that they will produce poor crops).

If you are growing chillies, you could get a simple pop up greenhouse, that way you have somewhere to propagate all your seeds, as in the following:
http://www.chaselink.co.uk/HTML%20fi...eenhouses.html
If you have a Wilkos in your area, you can get them cheap here, remember to weigh them down with bricks or the first wind they will fly! Also, chillies prefer being grown in a greenhouse unless we have a roaring summer!

Andrewo

[GardenFan]

Jekka's site is - http://www.jekkasherbfarm.com/

I recommend POD for toms and chilli's, growing 2 different toms and a chilli from them this year, all are a bit different from the norm. These will source the smaller tai chillis you want.

Lemon grass you can grow from seed, plant from late march\april time, if you live in the south of the UK you can get away with early March but it needs a plentyful supply of light and heat and my first attempt failed (living north UK), i'll try again.

Ginger you can grow using supermarket tubers but its recommended you buy it as organic as you can to increase your chances. This needs constant heat to sprout and then a lot of light, your mileage will vary.

[Lesley Jay]

You can also grow lemon grass from the lemon grass purchased at the supermarket. Either put the lemon grass stalks into a glass of water until the roots start growing and then pot it up or simply stick it into a pot of compost and water it.