Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2022 i Kitchen Garden

The lengthening days of April are a real delight; everything in the garden seems to breathe a sigh of relief that the long, dull days of winter have gone. Plants start to grow with a vigour that won’t be matched for the rest of the year and it’s just great to be outside pottering in the garden. Of course, there is also plenty to do now to fill your veg patch with the crops you’ll be picking all summer and we have all the advice to help you on your way. Ben Vanheems takes you through all the essential jobs for the month, and we rejoin Rob Smith on his garden plot to see what he is sowing and growing this month. KG regular Martin Fish reveals his favourite leek…

FAN FARING WELL I bought a bare-rooted maiden apricot tree three years ago. When it arrived, it had very little fibrous root and I was quite concerned whether it would survive. I dug the ground over, to which I added compost, fish, blood and bone and mycorrhizal to both the planting hole and tree roots. Once the tree was planted and the ground had settled I relaid the surrounding turf. The tree is against a south-east facing garage wall (I don’t have any suitable south or west facing walls) and receives sun from dawn to around 2pm. On a warm sunny summer’s day, the wall retains residual heat right into the evening. Last summer (2021) I was rewarded with my best ever crop to date, of around 25 apricots. I…

April is a month of two halves in the kitchen garden for me; one half is loving the fact I’m constantly sowing seeds and plants are growing, while the other half of me can’t stand the fact it’s still too cold to get crops into the unheated greenhouse or plant them outside due to the chance of frost! The small, heated greenhouse and propagators look like they are going to explode with plants and it’s always a challenge to keep them all happy, especially when some need potting up. However, we always seem to cope. That said, I’m potting tomatoes into two-litre pots and making sure the taller plants are potted deeply to increase the plants’ root systems. You are fine to do this with tomatoes as the little hairs…

If we are to ensure a secure, healthy food supply for a growing world population then diets must change dramatically to increase the consumption of foods such as fruit, vegetables, nuts and of course pulses. Here in Britain, and elsewhere in the world, poor diet leads to a range of health problems that create avoidable costs to our healthcare systems and is a leading cause of premature death. The necessary changes in diet mean there will have to be a considerable reduction in less healthy foods such as added sugars and red meat. All beans are a good source of protein compared with other plant-based products and a helping of beans will substitute for the meat and dairy intake that we should be reducing. Only 25-40% of beans (depending on…

Growing vegetables in your front garden evokes memories of the TV series The Good Life when Tom and Barbara Good turn their suburban front garden into a smallholding. The second episode has Tom driving a beast of a rotavator straight across his perfectly manicured front lawn much to the horror of his neighbour Jerry. There is something a bit rebellious about growing fruit and veg in the front garden. Many front gardens tend to be kept plain and simple often laid to gravel and paving or have a postage stamp piece of grass. What an amazing thing it would be if they were ripped up and packed with fruit and veg to create a sumptuous eye-catching edible feast. When you arrive home you could pluck a strawberry or two as…

The word ‘hybrid’ can bring with it some negative connotations when it comes to food crops. It conjures up images of some Frankenstein’s monster of a plant, perhaps with a dash of genetic modification, all carried out by an anonymous corporate monolith more interested in marketing and profit than taste and flavour. But for thousands of years, farmers and gardeners have been manipulating and interfering with nature, from the earliest practices of saving only seeds from favoured plants to the present situation where universities and organisations engage in extensive and highly complex plant breeding programmes. The results have undoubtedly changed the face of gardening and fruit production – if you only had the option of planting strawberry varieties from the 1800s, you’d be shaking your head at the meagre crops…

TRADITIONAL STAINLESS DIGGING FORK This traditional digging fork has a mirror-polished stainless steel head with four tines. The weatherproofed hardwood shaft has been created from a single piece of hardwood which has been split to form a wishbone handle. Especially suited to heavy digging. SPEAR & JACKSON www.spear-and-jackson.com * Prices TEL: Go online for store locator correct at PRODUCT CODE: 4550DF time of PRICE GUIDE: £20 publication KG VERDICT This is a well-made, sturdy and robust tool at a very reasonable price. The weatherproofed shaft is smooth in the hands with a strong, stainless steel head that offers smooth entry to the soil and good resistance to rust over time. The riveted connection of shaft to head is solid and secure. With a 10-year guarantee, this is definitely a tool…

SAVE UP TO £38 (AGM is the RHS Award of Garden Merit. Under RHS garden trials these varieties performed particularly well) FREE WITH EVERY ORDER 10 STRAWBERRY ‛CHRISTINE’ FRUIT PLANTS Nothing beats the flavour of freshly picked strawberries and some say that ‘Christine’ is one of the tastiest varieties available! Early season strawberry ‘Christine’ is a prolific cropper which is typically ready for picking from early to mid-June and has wonderful large, firm and flavoursome fruits. Highly recommended! ‘Christine’ has also proved itself to have strong resistance to many of the common diseases of strawberries. *Just pay £4.95 p&p CURRANT FRUIT PLANT COLLECTION The collection contains one bare root plant each of: ■ ‘BEN CONNAN’ This excellent and reliable blackcurrant tolerates frost and resists mildew to produce a heavy crop…

SHAVED FENNEL & PARSLEY GNOCCHI A delicious dish of sweet fennel and plenty of fresh parsley. VEGAN RECIPE SERVES 4 Preparation time: 15 minutes Cooking time: 20 minutes ■ 100g (3½oz) green beans, trimmed ■ 2 tbsp olive oil ■ 1 fennel, very thinly sliced ■ 2 shallots, thinly sliced ■ 1 garlic, sliced ■ 500g (17oz) gnocchi ■ A big bunch flat leaf parsley, chopped (about 50g/1¾oz) ■ 50g (1¾oz) vegan cream cheese ■ 30g (1oz) vegan Parmesan ■ Salt and pepper 1. Bring a large pan of water to the boil and add the beans. Boil for five minutes, then add the gnocchi. Once the gnocchi rise to the surface they are ready. Drain and set aside, reserving ¼ cup of cooking water. 2. Meanwhile, heat the oil…

SUPPORT PEAS Early sowings of peas need supporting to keep them from flopping over on to the ground. Twiggy sticks are easiest for this purpose – just push them into the soil alongside plants. HARVEST ASPARAGUS The first asparagus stalks will be ready from midmonth. Cut them no taller than 18cm (7in). Use a sharp knife and cut about an inch below the soil surface. FEED FRUITS Prepare fruit bushes, trees and canes for the season ahead. Tickle in a slowrelease general fertiliser around plants then apply a mulch of well-rotted manure or compost. PLANT BROAD BEANS Plant out broad beans that were begun under cover. Set plants out about 23cm (9in) apart in both directions. Protect young plants from cold with fleece. MAKE EARLY SOWINGS April is notoriously unpredictable…

THYME FOR SOWING Time or even thyme is always an issue for me. I never seem to have time and I can never seem to grow thyme. It is one of those plants that seems to elude me. If I buy a plant from the garden centre it invariably does not thrive so I am having a go at sowing some seeds this year to try and get a few plants which I can plant in different situations and hopefully create a lot more thyme for myself. If only I could create the same with time! GROW YOUR OWN TOMATOES! Hi! I’m Belle and I’m here every month to share lots of fun activities for you to do at home, on your own or with your family Put your hands…

Get in touch by post, email or via our Facebook page: Facebook.com/kitchengardenmag ★ STAR ★ QUESTION WINS £25 VOUCHER FOLIAR FEED FOR SPUDS? I have been growing potatoes in pots for some years and I find ‘Charlotte’ and ‘Maris Piper’ tend to give the best results, but still sometimes the yield is poor. They are grown in a mixture of 50:50 old potting compost and garden compost with a little general fertiliser mixed in and watered well. Should I give them a foliar feed? Paul Manning, Kent STEVE SAYS: I think the key is lots of watering and plenty of food. I also mainly use ‘Charlotte’ for pots and find it to be very good. I tend not to fill the pot (a large patio tub or sometimes old compost…

SOW: JAN-APRIL HARVES T: SEPT-MAY As winter vegetables go, leeks are one of the best. They are easy to grow, reliable and hardy – and of course supply you with fresh, tasty, nutritious leeks for at least six months of the year. A member of the onion family, leeks are biennials, although we grow them as annuals. The fleshy white shanks are harvested in the first growing season before they flower. If left to grow into a second season, they will produce a tall flower spike and seed. When it comes to varieties, the seed catalogues carry a good range. Some are tried and tested old varieties and other modern hybrids. There are also some very good British-bred leeks available that have been grown especially for our winters and perfect…

When considering a greenhouse for your garden, you’ll rightly think about the cost and the fact that they demand space – often the sunniest spot where the rest of the family would love a patio. There’s no doubt also that you can grow a great range of hardy fruit and veg without one. Yet for any gardener worth their salt, the advantages outweigh any of these considerations. A greenhouse can stretch the short UK season by as much as two months and help you to grow lots of tender crops that you could never attempt outdoors – even in the most lacklustre of seasons. Don’t tell everyone, but it also supplies you with some cosy all-weather gardening space so that you can enjoy your growing even on the rainiest of…

Climbing beans are easy to grow and they produce lots of beans for the space they take up. Runner beans and climbing French beans are two favourite types. Runners are more failsafe but they do produce larger and coarser pods. Climbing French beans can be prolific too and they produce thinner, juicy, tender pods. Whichever type of bean you choose, climbing beans need something to support them as they twist upwards. Plants can grow a mass of foliage, so they do best with a strong frame that will stay upright even in strong winds. Frames are simple to make – just be sure there is enough space in the structure for air to circulate and be sure you can reach in to pick all beans. STARTING OFF ■ It’s worth…

We really hope that most gardeners are aware of the issues with extracting peat by now. We know that we are plundering a non-renewable resource from a valuable wildlife habitat, but most alarming are the vast quantities of CO2 released from peat bogs drained for extraction. Perhaps, this is the issue that has finally pushed the Government to propose a ban on the sale of peat-based composts to amateur gardeners by the end of 2024. We ask a lot of a potting compost. We want it to hold water, but also drain well. We need it to hold nutrients and retain air spaces, while still supporting the plant. It should also be free of pests and diseases. Peat has been used in growing media since the 1960s. It can be…

These spaces are fantastic and give us an area to play and grow, as well as perhaps an ‘in’ with getting to know our local community or neighbours. But, throughout having my allotment and towpath garden I have definitely had moments where I do wish I had a more private space. I’ve wondered if I would feel less pressured about how tidy everything looks and if I’m doing it in everyone’s ‘right’ way. Because, let’s face it, I’m sure many of us have been told once, twice, or maybe even more, how we should be gardening. I also think it would be lovely to be able to just sit and relax, or do my own thing without strangers’ eyes on me. Not for any other reason than because it would…

WORTH OVER £937 WOODCARE IN COLOUR Protek’s range of woodcare products is available in more than 100 stunning colours, so it will not only protect all areas of exterior timber, but also enhance your garden. Colour plays a key part in a stylish garden scheme that can be enjoyed all year round. All garden wood, from fences and gazebos to decking and summerhouses, requires protection. Why not revamp and protect a planter or potting bench in an inspiring colour for the new season? Your garden plants, pets and wildlife will also benefit, as all Protek products are water-based and manufactured with environmentally considerate processes and raw materials. The Protek brand is lovingly produced by a Somerset family firm that has been making timber preservatives and coloured treatments for more than…

START OFF SQUASHES The squash family – courgettes and marrows, cucumbers and, of course, summer and winter varieties of squash – offer an abundance that’s difficult to match. Sow now with a little warmth to get seedlings off to a good start and so you have strong plants ready to set into their final positions next month. The recommendation is to sow seeds on their edge, so water doesn’t pool on top of the seed. Sow into small pots or large modules of multipurpose compost to a depth of about 1cm (½/in). Plants go out after the last frost following hardening off but may need potting on into larger pots before this point. Do this carefully to avoid any accidental damage to roots or leaves. Cover plants with fleece for…

NEW SERIES Making new no-dig beds on weedy grass is quick and simple. Here in my new garden I plan to turn the whole of the back garden into a productive veg plot, one bed at a time, without lifting a spade. You can start no-dig beds whenever suits you best – I’ve even made new beds on frozen ground in previous gardens, although best not to if the weather conditions are really severe! The first thing I did here was set up some compost heaps. I had brought ‘Dalek’ style composters from my old allotment. It is always reassuring to have somewhere to make compost; they make a new garden or allotment feel like home. I decided to make my beds vertically across the garden so that the paths…

Here is a small selection of peatfree composts. This list is not exhaustive; there are other composts available and more will likely come on the market as we get closer to going peat free. It can be confusing what type of compost to buy. Multipurpose compost used to be, as the name suggested, good for every stage, including seed sowing. However, some multipurpose composts you see for sale state that they are not ideal for seed sowing. This may be because they are high in nutrients that can inhibit seed germination. It is worth checking the bag. When buying peat-free products you could buy a seed sowing compost and also some cheaper peat-free multipurpose for potting on seedlings and plants. Use the seed sowing compost sparingly by sowing in trays…

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