What's in, What's out for next year?

[PyreneesPlot]

Purple podded pea - out - horrid and mean
Celtuce - out - stringy and bland

My only other newie this year (I think) is crosnes de japon and they are yet to be dug up.

Pak choi also out, (sadly) as the flea beetles/slugs/heat have meant I've never got a crop in three years.

[brownfingers]

IN: meteor broad beans (autumn set). Kestrel spuds, don't think there is any better. Dwarf borotti beans. Not had any off to munch yet, but the plants look cracking. Stutgarter onions. I usually do Sturon, but these have done exceptionally well. Tigrella and gardeners delight toms.

OUT: roma toms. I don't care what thet taste like, they are hooligans! Nantes5 carrots. Poor showing even when grown in deep containers of fine new compost with a huge addition of sand.

[Dorothy rouse]

Out : - pak choi, rocket, ( flea beetle). Uncertain about Spring sown onions.

In : - Borlotti's, and all kinds of dwarf beans. Elephant garlic, was amazing, need more. Proper sweetcorn. Autumn sown onion. More potatoes in bags, much easier to cope with ( for me). Beetroot,carrot and parsnip and courgette and squashes.

Comfrey also beginning to grow well.

Also more flowers, in addition to Sweet peas, Cosmos, and Lavender, and marigolds, I love taking a bunch home.

[Scarlet]

Purple podded pea - out - horrid and mean.

I don't like the purple podded mange tout. (Shiraz?) horrible...

[rhonsal]

Out - Chinese broccoli, purple and yellow mange tout as didn't think any of them tasted nice so not worth giving growing space!

In - broccoli rabb patty pan squash and mini cucumber! Have all cropped well and have lots of flavour!

[sequoia]

On the potatoes I will be growing more of Charlotte, Apache, Maris Piper, and just waiting to see how the Marabel comes out,(jacket spud with a buttery taste).

[dim]

In ....

perpetual spinach, sungold tomatoes, courgette venus, courgette eclipse, peas (the ones with the fat pods that are sweet), hundredweight pumpkin, a cut and come again romainne type lettuce (I have the name written down in a book that I cannot find right now) .... nantes carrots, supersweet sweetcorn (grew them last year, and have them again this year ... have not eaten one yet this year, but perhaps in 2 weeks time as they are busy ripening and look good again) .... burpless cucumber

out:
cabbage and cauliflower (unless I net them) .... runner beans (no-one wants to eat them)... cucamelons (lots of leaves and no fruits yet) ...

[marchogaeth]

Lettuce/salad greens
Nasturtium flowers - I've previously been put off by these being described as "peppery" (I don't like pepper) but they have a lovely flowery taste and brighten up a salad no end.

OUT
Little Gem lettuce - IF I can get them to germinate they either succumb to aphids or go tough and bolt before they form any sort of heart.

A couple of comments, if it doesn't spoil the thread, if you like Nasturtium flowers have you tried growing land cress - similar taste IMO?

I used to be rubbish at getting any lettuce to germinate, then I read that the seed has to get down to 4C in something like the first 10 hours after being watered for the first time so now, whatever time of year, I plant the seeds in small (nay even tiny!) modules and stick them in the fridge overnight. I get a fantastic success rate, 3 seeds in a module and I'm nearly always thinning two out. I had one packet of seed I thought must be out of date because I'd never got anything to grow - couldn't bare to chuck it out without one last shot - sprinkled the whole packet on some compost in an old mushroom box - stuck it in the fridge and got about 1000 plants - only time I've resorted to eating microgreens!

[KevinM67]

My better half goes nuts about the amount of seed trays on the window ledges - if I started putting them in the fridge, I'd get murdered

[PyreneesPlot]

Ditto Kevin!
Also out asparagus pea.
In golden beetroot.

[BUFFS]

IN
has to be the black Russian/olympe crosses, just for their taste never mind their size..
yellow ringo and Hungarian wax peppers..

OUT
has to be shallots, I gave over half this years onion area to them, what a waste of space, I have seen bigger spring onions..

[marcofez]

I'm gonna say "cauliflowers" as I can't seem to grow decent ones. Bet I'll change my mind next year when I see the seed packet again!!!!!

[Noosner]

Feel sorry that I said 'Out!' to Maris Piper spuds earlier in this thread as I dug up an absolutely massive one today. Come back, MPs, all is forgiven.

[Penellype]

Update on my earlier post on page 1 of this thread:

IN Courgette Goldmine - lovely striped yellow courgettes with an excellent flavour and the fruit don't seem to grow too BIG. Described as spineless, the leaf stalks do have spines but are much less prickly than ordinary varieties.

IN Calabrese Sakura, which tasted as good as it looked.

IN Cucumber Vega (outdoor variety) - I don't really like cucumbers and only grew these as an experiment, but the ham and cucumber sandwich I had the other day was fabulous. Just my size and taste much nicer than the watery shop bought rubbish.

OUT Tomato Tumbling Tom red - the foliage is a most peculiar colour and the tomatoes are hard and lack flavour, and have greenback, which is not great in a cherry tomato. The pots they are in are deep 6 inch pots, containing at least as much compost as the pots my Shirleys are in indoors, and they have been given a "water slice" of water retaining gel each to help with irrigation. Disappointingly few fruit setting despite being covered in flowers.

OUT Onion red baron (sets) - half of them bolted, I'm trying to eat the other half before they go mouldy (lost 3 already and they have been out of the ground a week). It hasn't even rained here so I can't blame that.

OUT Aubergine plant bought from garden centre. Produced a fruit the size of an egg, then keeled over and died.

OUT Potato Pentland Javelin - rather taasteless and the outsides seem to fall apart before the inside is cooked sometimes. Some develop brown spots after cooking if you cool them for salads.

Worth another chance - Strawberry malwina. These survived the worst conditions in the tower pots, some of them with very little light and difficult to water. They did produce some fruit with a very nice flavour, but a couple of the fruit seemed to think they were runners and grew a mini plant on the end.

[Noosner]

Update on my earlier post on page 1 of this thread:


OUT Onion red baron (sets) - half of them bolted, I'm trying to eat the other half before they go mouldy (lost 3 already and they have been out of the ground a week). It hasn't even rained here so I can't blame that.

I had problems with my Red Barons too, Penellype. They produced hard stalks and didn't grow very big. The onions themselves are lovely and crisp, though.