Posts Tagged “gardening”
A Christmas cracker of a treat for garden lovers this December. At Barnsdale Gardens all of the 38 individually designed gardens come into their own no matter what the season. But the magic of December cannot be ignored when it comes to the magnificence of Barnsdale, infact this is one of the busiest months for…
60 Travel Experiences to Uplift and Inspire. Well, summer is over. Halloween is almost upon us and then it’s Christmas. Now is the season to start thinking about gifts, and here is a suggestion for a garden or a travel lover – The Joy of Exploring Gardens: 60 Travel Experiences to Uplift and Inspire. This…
The legacy of Geoff Hamilton Barnsdale Gardens in Rutland, in the East Midlands, has been enthralling garden fans since 1983, when Geoff Hamilton, the much-loved presenter of BBC Gardeners World, bought a Victorian farmhouse with over 5 acres of land. Barnsdale was Geoff’s ‘great experiment’ in peat-free and chemical-free growing, and so this continues today….
Using vegan-organic techniques for a planet-friendly, wildlife-abundant, beautiful and productive garden. It’s been a strange few years, but these taxing times have offered new opportunities and a chance to ‘reset our lives’. Some of us have taken up painting, others have dusted off long-forgotten musical instruments and many have rediscovered the joys of gardening to…
The Illustrated Botanical Shakespeare Gerit Quealy, the author of the best selling illustrated compendium, ‘Botanical Shakespeare’ will be bringing a taste of the Bard and the botany that infuses his works to the ‘Urban Tree Festival’ this year. After the success of sharing the world-famous canon’s literary-inspired flora at Chelsea in 2018, Gerit & the…
Cucumber ‘Prolific’ (sometimes also known as ‘Brocade’) A fascinating and useful cucurbit originating in South East Asia. It is a versatile variety known locally as ‘Sambar Southekai’ that can be used in a wide range of dishes. Fruits can be stored in cool dry conditions for months after harvest. Plants are similar in growth to…
It is that time of year when we are all enjoying the great outdoors, which must mean tucking in to picnics with gusto too … hurray! And as the mode du jour for 2021 is bringing the inside out…it is not only food that we can grow for our dining table in the sun, but…
It’s been a strange year and Christmas will likely continue in the same vein. But these times have given us the chance to re-evaluate our lives and what matters. Our gardens have become a focus and Kikkerland have a little Seeds Garden Kit that will remind the lucky recipient of summer days. This is a…
The team at Jack Dunckley know how important it is to get away on a relaxing holiday and we all probably need this now more than ever! But with the stress of face masks, sanitisers and the possibility of quarantines after our holidays, for many of us, this will not look likely this year. A…
We live in strange times and just now gardens are more important than ever. Grow Fruit & Vegetables in Pots: Planting Advice & Recipes from Great Dixter will thrill those of us who are lucky enough to have a garden. One doesn’t need a lot of space to grow vegetables. Grow Fruit & Vegetables in…
Courgette and Peppers to Tickle the Taste Buds from Burpee Seeds Europe Not only does growing your own bring you a sense of achievement and wellbeing, but vegetables also keep much more of their vitamins when eaten quickly after harvesting. The courgette and pepper below are the perfect additions to a superb recipe (at the…
In truth this isn’t an ancient plot cultivated and tended by legendary Mediterranean traders, but the land does belong to the celebrated Hotel Phoenicia in Malta. All good chefs will agree that freshness is key to good dishes. That philosophy cuts across all ethnic culinary persuasions. Malta has a climate that any keen gardener would…
The title might conjure images of cows grazing in Hyde Park or pigs on Richmond Green. But this particular urban farmer is cultivating an allotment in north London and Celia Brooks Brown is the aforementioned ‘farmer’. My reader from beyond the UK might not even know what an allotment is. It’s truly an allotment of…
There is so much talk these days about healthy eating and home cooking. We are told to guard against waste and to use what we have to hand. Food should be our most important purchase but we don’t want to throw money away. So what to do? It’s all about flavour. A sprinkle of a…
This is a lovely book to snuggle up with on these long winter evenings. Forgotten Fruits has a beautiful cover and the feel of an old-fashioned quality volume. The off-white paper suggests a well-loved tome kept in a glass-fronted bookcase in a Victorian drawing room. But what is it all about? Forgotten Fruits could be…
The “ultimate” anything has got to be good. What would this Garden Designer variety have to offer? It needed to be a comprehensive tome covering every aspect of the subject. Needless to say I had visions of a book the size of a small garden shed or at least a rabbit hutch. This is a…
This is the revised edition of the original Fork to Fork of a decade ago. A few things have changed on the home-growing front in those ten years. We are all a lot more mindful of food miles so a book that presents a real opportunity to pare those miles to yards is bound to be…
This magnificent volume has already sold over half a million copies. Hardly seems like Jekka’s Complete Herb Book needs another promotion but I guess there might be someone who doesn’t already own it or has not yet come across it. Jekka McVicar is a familiar face to UK TV viewers. She has oft graced our…
Celebrity chef Rick Stein counts her among his “food heroes”, Jamie Oliver wouldn’t trust the design of his herb garden to anyone else. Jekka McVicar started her herb farm over 20 years ago at her home near Bristol; it now has the largest collection of herbs in the UK with more than 600 different varieties….