Allotments

Root Parsley Hamburg is an off-beat, dual purpose vegetable that deserves to be better known. The root can be left in the ground all winter and dug up as and when your Sunday roast requires and the luxury of having plenty of leaves to snip from the garden in winter can’t be overstated.

The colourful 'Watermelon Radish' of historic China. The magic is in their bright-magenta interior which is so sweet, crisp, and delicious. A winter radish, for autumn and winter sowing they will tolerate temperatures down to around -3°C. The bright pink and white flesh makes a beautiful accent for any salad. They are also good for pickling. 45 to 55 days.

'F1 April Cross' is a Minowase type hybrid daikon radish. A market leader for its extra-slow bolting habit, tender mature flesh and reliable harvest. Recommended for late summer to early summer harvest and for early winter harvest, they are an excellent variety for home gardeners. Sow seeds after the last frost in spring or in late summer to early autumn. They have a mild taste that is tender, buttery, and mild. 60 days.

Pumpkin 'Wee-Bee-Little' is an award winning little pumpkin that is very endearing. Remarkably miniature and averaging 8 to 9cm in diameter, they are delicious and decorative, they are the perfect size for children to grow and for small hands to hold. 12 weeks to harvest, each plant producing an average of 9 fruits per plant

Looking exactly like fairy tale pumpkins in children’s storybooks, Musquée de Provence is a gorgeous French pumpkin that is one of the only pumpkins that is eaten raw. Sweet with a light crunch and typical nutty taste, the very fine-grained flesh is considered by many to be superior to any other.

Rated the best miniature pumpkin ‘Munchkin’ has a bright tangerine-orange colour with deep sutures. Although it is tempting to grow them for their looks alone, they make fantastic eating. The pretty, small, abundant fruits have flesh that is reminiscent of sweet chestnut.

Jack O' Lantern is a traditional pumpkin, especially bred for carving out Jack O'Lanterns for Halloween. A long established favourite, with medium orange colour and sweet flavoured flesh it makes a superb carving pumpkin and a tasty cooking pumpkin.

If you have always wanted your very own pumpkin patch then Pumpkin F1 Mars is a great place to start. Bred to be a good performer even during difficult production seasons, An very early variety that produces uniform, 2 to 4kg dark orange fruits. Sweet and tasty and great for roasting or for Halloween carving.

Baby Boo is a charming, all-white, miniature pumpkin that is popularly used for table arrangements for Weddings, or for Halloween and for Xmas. Children love them because of their miniature size and they make wonderful Halloween 'Ghosts'!

Imagine, You’re reading the paper and suddenly your eye is drawn to a picture of this giant orange thing about the size of a truck with a guy half its size standing next to it grinning like a lunatic. “I’d like to grow one of those,” you think.

Many gardeners may find it difficult to get excited by a new variety of pea but this new variety really is something different. ‘Shiraz’ is the first modern purple-podded mangetout pea. The attractive purple and pink flowers are followed by a heavy yield of deep wine red pods.

Pea 'Sienna' is a superstar - an excellent hardy, early variety that is well adapted to cool soils and early spring weather, and produces a very fast crop. Very easy shelling, with excellent sweet flavour - open the medium sized, blunt pods and enjoy the first, sweet, plump, green peas of the season!

Round seeded 'Feltham First' can be relied upon to produce a substantial crop of large pointed pods packed with tasty, sweet peas early in the summer. It is a traditional high-yielding favourite with good cold tolerance. Suitable for autumn or spring sowing.

Pea 'Douce Provence' is a compact variety which is extremely versatile. Consistent and reliable it produces large crops of sweet and succulent peas. Strictly speaking it is a round seeded first early variety but it can also be grown as an over-winter pea to produce of the earliest harvests of the season.

‘Blauwschokker’ produce good yields of succulent, bright green peas with an abundance of red and violet flowers are followed by deep purple pods. Dual purpose it is delicious when harvested young as mangetout or can be left to mature to shell the delicious green peas.

Pea 'Alderman' is a well known and reliable variety that produces heavy crops of large, curved, dark green pea pods of the highest quality. It a tall growth habit that will require supports but is well worth the effort for the extended cropping period and the huge yields that it produces.

Dwarf Canton White is a short and squat variety, often known as Baby or Squat Pak Choi. Tender and delicious, with a compact habit, this fast growing vegetable can be harvested at any stage, for 'baby leaf or left to mature to thick succulent white stems.