Recommendations

[MamIDdau]

I'm probably going to experiment with growing veg next year but wanted to know which types of each thing I actually eat are the easiest but tastiest to grow?

Can anyone give me suggestions on Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Potatoes and Onions please? Also, how easy are peppers and sweetcorn to grow? Is garlic easy to grow? I'd so much like to be able to eat things I've grown myself but don't know where to start.

I'd also like to grow raspberries but as with the veg, I worry about how I can keep them free from nasty lil insects which make me paranoid about eating them...

[MamIDdau]

Oh and I'd like to grow some carrots for my rabbits <G>

[jlottie]

Best you get started now then -

I have just put in my onion sets today for over wintering and harvesting next June and garlic will be in next weekend. Raspberries can be bought as bare root stock and can be planted in the next couple of months. Sweetcorn can be sown in April so can tomatoes & peppers if you have somewhere sheltered like a cold frame or inside on a window sill if you don't have a greenhouse or poly tunnel . I don't bother with peppers as they are so cheap in the supermarket but chilli's can be grown in pots on a patio. Leeks are easy to grow, sow in spring to harvest September onwards. Carrots need a really fine tilth so the soil needs to be well dug for a spring sowing.

Hope that helps

[Dr Bill]

What aboiut french or runner beans? They are easy to grow as long as you have a rich moisture retentive soil (or compost if growing in containers). Runner are much heavier croppers but for flavour I prefer french beans

[MamIDdau]

Beans!! <shudders> lol only beans I eat are baked and covered in heinz tomato sauce in a tin. Actually, that's a lie, my gran and grandad used to grow them years ago and I used to help her harvest them and cut them up.

Thanks JLottie and Dr Bill xx Which varieties are easiest and tasiest? I know that taste is a personal preference but I'll go for the majority in this case ;-)

[jlottie]

Best thing is to get yourself a veggie book which will tell you what to do and when, I have an awful habit of buying seeds and then forgetting to label them so I can't remember which variety does best. (that going on my New Year resolution list). I have grown tomatoes this year for the first time in my poly tunnel and now its time to pull them out have just worked out how to prune them for the best crop, but there is always next year

[Deleted]

Hi

For a tasty tomato I'd try 'Gardeners Delight', it's a cherry tomato with a good flavour and it can be grown in a greenhouse or outside in the garden, it's the tomato I first grew when I got keen on gardening!!

Cucumbers I'm not so sure about, I think if you want to grow them outside then you should look at the 'ridge'varieties.

Potatoes, I grow International Kidney (it's very similar to what they grow on Jersey and charge the earth for in supermarkets!!) and Pink Fir Apple. I'm not a huge fan of potatoes but I do like both of those. I've also heard that Charlotte is a good early potato.

Onions, I usually plant sets of Sturon in the spring and White Lisbon as salad/spring onion.

Garlic - If you want to plant it now then try Thermidrome, I've had a great garlic harvest this year from 3 heads

Carrots - your rabbits won't get a look in!!! , fresh carrots are so tasty!! You can grow early/maincrop/late maincrop. I'd suggest looking through a few seed catalogues. I grew Nantes 2 this year and have been very pleased. Carrots don't like rich soil otherwise they'll grow with many 'legs'!!

Good Luck
GH

[Deleted]

I liked my Setton onions this year but am trying to Autumn Champion and Swift this year (sets still to arrive).

My Early Nantes 2 and Autumn King 2 carrots did really well (well really well for me being a first year grower) and were grown in virgin compost (I didn't have available open ground). Yeah, some were forked, but interesting !

My Gartenperle tomatoes just kept on producing vast amounts until this week really (but did I really need that many?), and the other variety Totem, produced nice fruits. I've begged and borrowed different varieties for next year as only trying two was an embarrassment.

I've yet to harvest one pepper (just one is growing on about 5 plants just now), but my cayenne and numex twilight chillis have produced LOADS ! but as they are still ripening now, I've been using loads green.

I put my garlic in very late, but notwithstanding that, I've got enough to keep me going for a few months yet. Am going to do it right this year and plant in November. Last year's variety Asda's own, this year Purple Wight and Solent Wight.

I was really impressed with my Green Windsor broad beans (something I hadn't had since childhood) and will definitely be growing them again next year.

Oh and I discovered I liked fresh beetroot (Perfect 3), and so easy to grow.

Pound for pound, it would have been cheaper at the supermarket but I wouldn't have got the biggest of grins everytime I spotted something I could pick/pull.

Things I WON'T try again until I've got a lottie, suede, cabbage, early PSB.