Pot to Plate: container gardening to change how we eat
Grow, harvest, eat. An adventure in container gardening and flavour.
I’m excited to tell you more about Pot to Plate, a new way to combine our love for both container gardening and good food.
Each month paid subscribers to Vertical Veg will get a fact sheet with step by step details on how to grow one of the best edible plants in containers. We will then grow the plant, compare notes while growing, and later share simple and creative ways to use what we pick in the kitchen.
We will grow a mix of ‘classic’ container crops alongside more unusual - but also very rewarding - edible plants. Each plant has been chosen because it can:-
1) be planted in the relevant month (in the northern hemisphere), and
2) has at least three of the following qualities:-
Easy to grow and / or low maintenance in containers.
Productive - producing an abundant or a prolonged harvest from one container.
Hard to buy in the shops - adding a novel ingredient and diversity to our diets
Great to have in the kitchen - for extra flavour and / or for it’s versatility.
Attractive to grow on your balcony, patio or yard.
How it will work
Each month I will share with you a ‘How to grow’ guide for the month’s plant. This will include initial thoughts on using it in the kitchen - which I hope we can add to together over the year.
You grow the plants - all of them, or just any you particularly fancy or have space for 🙂, completely up to you.
We share our experience in the Chat and in monthly Zoom meet ups - where I will also answer your other container gardening questions and sometimes have special guests and features.
This is a completely new adventure - which I hope will evolve as we find out what works well (and what doesn’t) and learn new ways to do things on Substack.
What we will grow this year
We will grow one plant each month until October, except August - and two in March as I catch up.
Early March - Chillies
A classic container crop. The best varieties of home grown chillies are in a different flavour league from supermarket offerings. Just one chilli (or even half) can lift a dish to new levels! One plant will typically give you 30 - 100 chillies, so it’s quite possible to grow all your chillies you need, particularly as they dry and freeze so well.
Late March - Scot’s Lovage - Ligusticum scoticum
An unusual herb that is rarely, if ever, seen in the shops. It’s a pretty plant (sometimes sold as an ornamental by the National Trust in the UK), easy to grow, and great for adding a base flavour (a bit like celery) to stocks, soups and risottos; or it can be finely shredded and added in moderation to salads. The pretty flowers are edible as well and, unlike some edible flowers, have loads of flavour, too.
April - Nasturtiums
A container classic: an attractive plant with edible leaves, flowers and seeds. Looks so pretty in salads and adds a spicy zip of flavour, too. Grow a bushy variety or one that climbs or trails - or perhaps Blue Pepe with it’s dark blue, almost purple leaves.
May - French / String beans
Another container classic - attractive, highly productive and great in the kitchen. You can grow a tried and trusted variety or try one of the many unusual and heritage varieties with coloured pods, pretty purple flowers or stripy beans!
June - Endive / chicory
Chicory grows productively in containers and there are many culinary varieties that never make it into the supermarkets, some exquisite to look at. The leaves have good flavour but are more bitter than some - so we will learn together how to make the best use of them in the kitchen. I am recent convert to chicory myself and looking forward to learning more. If you are unsure, like I used to be, I hope you might become a convert, too.
July - Winter Savory - Satureja montana
Sometimes known as the ‘bean herb’, because it pairs so well with pulses. It’s easy to grow, perennial (so it returns every year) and has pretty flowers which bees like. The flavour is similar but different to thyme - and is almost impossible to buy in the shops.
September - mixed mustards
These make excellent late autumn and winter salads. Varieties include mizuna, mibuna and mustard red giant, as well as many more. All have a slightly spicy flavour and some have pretty leaf shapes and colours, too.
October - sunflower shoots.
We finish the season by growing one of the very best microgreens. It has a nice nutty flavour and a crunchy texture, easy to grow but only rarely seen in specialist food shops.
Do join us!
If you fancy joining us, I really looking forward to growing these with you! And learning together how we make can make the best use of these plants - and how we can use home growing to make a real difference to the food we eat.
Really excited for this and especially so that chillies are our first sowing. I made a list the other day of what I wanted to grow this year and they were top of this list.
I'm excited to get started! One thing I always wonder about is where best to source seeds and what to look for to get good quality seeds. I'm hoping you'll be offering some tips on this topic!