Easy vegetables to grow for beginners
11.04.2024One of the great joys of gardening is watching the things you’ve planted blossom and grow – and that’s perhaps doubly the case when we’re talking about vegetables. There is no tomato quite like a homegrown tomato. No feeling of triumph quite like that which comes when you pull up a carrot and find it full-sized and ready to eat. Oh, the pride you’ll feel when you see the tiny seed you potted begin to sprout, grow shoots, get big enough for planting out and eventually large enough to eat. Have we convinced you yet? Yes, it is time to start growing your own.
Limited growing space?
The good news about vegetables is you don’t actually need a lot of room in which to grow them. Patio planters, hanging baskets and containers can provide a good home for a range of herbs, fruits and vegetables if you don’t want to go to the trouble of digging up a portion of your lawn to put in a raised bed. Just make sure you choose the right plants for the space you have – you’d be lucky to grow one butternut squash in a hanging basket, whereas you could produce quite a lot of tomatoes in that space. Remember, also, that your crops can grow up as well as across – beans are prolific and don’t need a very big footprint to produce a bumper crop.
A quick note on compost
Lots of councils collect food waste these days, but if you have space for a compost heap/bin in your garden, make the most of it. It’s great for green kitchen waste, grass clippings, garden waste and wildlife. Plus, it saves you from buying compost from the garden centre!
If you are buying compost, make sure to choose peat-free. There’s really no reason to be digging up precious carbon sinks in this day and age.
Which vegetables should I grow?
First things first, when choosing what you’re going to grow – don’t choose vegetables you don’t like to eat. Sod’s law dictates you’ll end up with a glut of the things you don’t want, which will become a freezer full of things you don’t want until eventually you concede and throw them away.
If you’ve got kids, try growing family favourites or things that you think they’ll like – that will also help them engage with the process of planting and growing! Staples like carrots, potatoes, beans and berries will always go down a treat and are relatively reliable.
Carrots
Carrots grow from seeds. You might be surprised by how many you get in a packet and how tiny they are! You can grow carrots in containers, but you won’t get a very big crop so if you can spare some land for it, dig them into the garden. You don’t need to start them off inside or in seed trays – just sow them directly into the ground and away you go.
Are carrots easy to grow? Well, yes and no. They don’t require much in the way of maintenance. They only need watering when the weather is really dry. But they are susceptible to a pest called carrot fly, which likes to eat your hard-won crop. And, of course, with root vegetables, you don’t know what’s going on beneath the surface until you start harvesting. Still, if it works, you get a good crop of a popular, versatile vegetable that, in the right conditions, will keep for a while. Definitely worth a try. Check the seed packet for timings but expect about a three-month growing period from sowing to harvest.
Beans
French beans, green beans, runner beans – whatever your preference, you’re unlikely to be disappointed with beans. Grow them up bamboo canes or similar for best results and let them run wild. Harvest regularly to avoid growing giant beans, which can be a bit tough.
Start your bean plants in seed trays or small pots inside or in a greenhouse before planting out. Some varieties can be planted in containers, so do your research before you buy to get the best plant for your space. If you stagger the planting – i.e. plant a crop every three weeks – you’ll get beans all summer long. Some varieties – like French beans – provide a double crop; eat them fresh or let them dry to make haricot beans.
Berries
You may already have berries growing in your garden – since brambles often check in where gardeners check out. If you do, make the most of them! Berries freeze well and can be turned into delicious desserts, like this blackberry bombe.
Raspberries grow tall and don’t take up very much space – until they do. They’re notorious runners and may take over any flower bed or veg patch they’re put into, so keep an eye on the suckers they send up.
Strawberries can be grown in the ground, in containers, and even in hanging baskets. Even if the fruits of your labour are small, they’re bound to be delicious and certainly worth a try.
Keep an eye on your berries and harvest them regularly. They don’t stay good for long on the bush.
Potatoes
If you have a lot of good compost waiting to be used, grow potatoes. If you don’t, and you’ll be buying compost, you might find yourself spending more on compost than you would if you were buying organic potatoes from the supermarket. Of course, if you’re just in it for the experience, then cost may not be a factor, in which case proceed!
Potatoes grow from potatoes, so you can wait for some of your store-bought potatoes to grow eyes and use them, or you can buy chitted seed potatoes. Supermarket potatoes may carry bacteria you don’t want in your soil, so think about whether or not you’re willing to take the risk and maybe do a bit of research before you begin.
Potatoes work well in big containers – even old dustbins – so you don’t need to dig up lots of lawn to start living the good life. Put in a layer of compost, then the seed potatoes, then cover with compost. As the shoots show, cover them with compost again. Repeat until you’re at the top of your container and then wait for the potatoes to start flowering. The flowers indicate they’re ready to harvest.
Tomatoes
Tomatoes can be an incredibly rewarding crop. Bountiful and delicious, they are best fresh off the vine and if you end up with a glut you can, of course, turn them into sauces and can freeze them.
Tomatoes are best started off in seed trays and indoors, or in a greenhouse. They like to be warm, in a sunny position and sheltered from the frost. There are hundreds of varieties to choose from, from very small to very big, in a range of colours. Why not try growing a few different types and see how they fare? After a few weeks in a seed tray, they should be ready for potting– planted individually in slightly bigger pots – before going to their final destination, whether you’re putting them in the ground, in a container, or in a tomato bag.
Important things to know about growing fruit and vegetables
And finally, here are some valuable life lessons about growing vegetables:
- Sometimes it doesn’t work out. Everything dies and you have to start over. It’s disappointing, but don’t let it put you off. Try again or try something else.
- You might be surprised by how attached you get to your seedlings. Talk to them. Visit with them. It’s good for you.
- If you’re using your own compost – and that compost includes green waste from your kitchen – you’ll probably get tomatoes whether you intend to or not. They’re survivors!
- You can buy seedlings if your seeds fail, or bypass seeds altogether. It’s not cheating.
- If you lose interest in your vegetable garden and your broccoli goes to flower or the birds eat all your berries, take comfort in the fact that you’ve created another haven for nature.
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