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[pigletwillie]

Courgettes, despite what people say, you can never have too many of. They make a great bulker and filler for many dishes and are great in their own right. With so many shapes and colours on the market now, there are varieties to suit most culinary situations from courgette crown bread to Wellies yellow courgette soup.

They are at home in pots or in the ground, are quite ornamental so dont look out of place in a mixed border or even in a pot outside the kitchen door.

[SueA]

It's worth sowing chillies now as they need a long growing period. I start mine off early as I don't have a greenhouse & grow them on in the kitchen until it's warm enough to put them out in the summer. I've grown 'Twilight' in the past with some success & am trying various assorted packs which I've got free with magazines this year.

[susieq100]

Do you have a conservatory that is not used much in the winter? I do and it is now my posh greenhouse. Put seeds for salad leaves (mix them up - rocket, mizuna, frisee, lambs lettuce, corn salad) into one of those 'shaker' pots that you buy dried herbs in and use a large shallow planter to grow your salad in. No slugs or pests - grows even in Jan and Feb and soooo convenient!

[Mark Durham]

My favourite veg' is Kohl Rabbi because it brings back back memories of the Czech Republic and wandering around food markets and being unsure what these odd looking but enormously poplar vegtables were called. I nearly fell over in Wilkinsons when I saw a packet of seeds and realised the term was "Kohl Rabbi".

[nemo]

fresh garden peas

fresh garden peas picked and eaten straight away.i would love to bring a bucket full to the cinema to eat it would be far better than popcorn fresh
peas cannot be topped ash any toddler once they try them there is no looking back
from nemo

[bluemoon]

My favourite is the blueberry. They grow in pots if you haven't much space, need little in the way of care and attention, provide you with glorious autumn foliage, pretty red or apple-green stems in winter, they are worth growing just for the scent of the spring flowers alone and then they produce lots of lovely healthy berries in late summer........which can be preserved in copious quantities of alcohol and spooned onto ice-cream or pancakes. Why would anyone want to grow anything else?

[RedThorn]

Have to say that the Gold rush courgette will have to have my vote! Fantastic in a risotto with chilles and as a newbie it produced fanatastically and refused to die even with a novice tending it the taste is brilliant and even my OH now eats them. She would never touch them before

[Storming Norman]

Has anyone mentioned kale? It's not sexy but it's a very long lasting crop.

I was musing this week when cutting some more kale how a spring sowing of cut and come again salad mix produced a year round crop.

A pack of niche salad mix from T&M bought, I think, a couple of years ago and sowed in containers introduced me to kale. Amongst this sowing was some Kale that were still alive and kicking after the rest of the salad leaves were over so I replanted them.

These have been giving food for my neighbour & us for nearly 6 months now and possible have another month or two to go. That's pretty good going.

In this time I have learned to make kale & lemon soup, Chinese seaweed, and Chinese potsticker dumplings all using this kale, as well as using it as a side vegetable or stir fired with garlic and soy sauce.

It doesn't cost a fortune to buy in the shops, but is much nicer when freshly picked. I would recommended this easily grown vegetable to anyone to try.

Ann

[smallblueplanet]

Has anyone mentioned kale? It's not sexy but it's a very long lasting crop....In this time I have learned to make kale & lemon soup, Chinese seaweed, and Chinese potsticker dumplings all using this kale, as well as using it as a side vegetable or stir fired with garlic and soy sauce...

Wow! Sounds sexy to me! Any chance of posting the recipes for kale & lemon soup and chinese potsticker dumplings in the recipes section (season to taste) please?

[Storming Norman]

OK will do - not sure what I've done with the soup recipe but will give some ideas.

Also have remembered a pumpkin kale & parmesan salad - pretty good as well.

[wellie]

Mine too, bluemoon. Homegrown far outweighs shop-bought every time.....
The fruit you can harvest from one Blueberry bush (costing approx. £8.99) will virtually pay for itself in the first year from the fruit you'll harvest. Absolutely fabulous purchase!
And when I finally get the Blueberry and Vanilla Jam recipe sorted, I'll pass it on!

Another of my favourites, is the Cape Gooseberry fruit, which still seems to be fairly unknown to a lot of British Home-Growers, and whilst dead easy to grow in a large greenhouse, it's wildly expensive to buy the fruit in the shops, but you can make a magical jam from it, or just grow it and sell the fruits at a huge profit to your local greengrocer/restaurant-johnny or publican. Quite frankly, homemade Cape Gooseberry & Passionfruit Jam is exquisite, and you'll never ever see it for sale anywhere - unless you happen to bump into me in The Royal Forest of Dean.... and then I'd have to kill you of course!....
X

[nomad]

got to say the easiest things to grow are chillis my faves are demon red and tokyo hot.both grow with relative ease and one is big an the other small.both have a decent heat to them and look lovely,

[crichmond]

Growing tomatoes in the greenhouse, you can use canes but I prefer to use those greenhouse channel eyes across the roof of the greenhouse and put wire from one end of the roof to the other then tie string to this which dangles down and as the tomato vine grows just wrap the string around the new growth. If there is heavy trusses such as on beefsteak varieties or the newer centiflor types then you may have to support individual trusses as well, in which case when you tie the string round the truss make sure it isnt tied tight round the truss.

[snakeshack]

butternut squash are really good as they store so well over winter.we ate our last one two weeks ago from last years crop.
they are also very versatile in the kitchen,we like them roasted or in soup though.

[pol]

I have just entered my email address to subscribe to the newsletter and keep receiving an email saying cllick to unconfirm subscription.Is there a fault on the webpage.
I am clicking the right button.