What is your Favorite vegetable to grow? and eat?

[contadina]

I don't think there is a vegetable that I don't like and as they all taste so much better when you grow them yourself we give most things a go. Obviously, some things grow better than others. Seeing what your neighbours are growing is always a good idea, but there's no harm in experimenting.

Very hard to pick a favourite veg, so I'm going to cheat and say Mediteranean veg for the summer to include tomato, courgette, peppers and aubergine. Favourite dishes with them include baked pasta, auberine and tomato sauce pasta, parmigiana , courgette and tomato baked in the oven with a cheesy breadcrumbed topping, pizza, and all of them stuffed. We bottle a hundred or so jars of tomato sauce in the summer to keep us going in the winter.

In the winter favourite veg is cabbage (good stir-fried with garlic, ginger and a splash of soy) in soups or stuffed with either ricotta, a spicy rice mix, lentils or split peas and baked in a tomato sauce.

I could go on for days singing the praise of all veg but think it's probably better to post some good recipe link sources so that you can search by ingredient. Happy growing and eating.

http://www.recipezaar.com/
www.yumyum.com
http://allrecipes.com/
www.italianfoodforever.com

[Jandra]

Hi,

I like to grow courgette. I can't decide what I like to eat best. Probably mange-tout peas and sugar snaps.

Can you tell us wat you grew last year and which ones of those you liked/didn't like? That gives us something to go on when making a guess what might be great for you to try next.

Good for you that you're trying out new things!

Jandra

[wulf]

Another vote for Pak Choi.

It is a versatile vegetable and I have found it easy to grow (although hard / easy often depends on local conditions).

Don't plant all your seeds at once though - the optimum time to eat it is when the plant is still fairly small so it is better to stagger your sowing.

Wulf

[Mare Owner]

I recommend a good cookbook, like "From Asperigus to Zucchinni".

-Ellendra
PS: I'm from Wisconsin, just a few hours from you!

I do need a cookbook for vegetables! I have lots of cookbooks, but their veggies are mostly sides and your basic corn/peas/carrots.

Yay for the midwest, I was hoping there were a few more of us on here. :)

[Mare Owner]

Can you tell us wat you grew last year and which ones of those you liked/didn't like? That gives us something to go on when making a guess what might be great for you to try next.

Last year I grew sweetcorn, peas and tomatoes. The garlic got wrecked by the chickens. :)

the peas were a disappointment, I didn't know when to harvest them and left them too long, they were not tender.

[getting there]

Peas are easy to grow and taste delicious straight from the pod and kids love them that way too. My garden was badly neglected this year and the peas still flourished.

[Jandra]

OK, thanks for filling us in. I've already seen onion sets (= small onions that you plant which grow to full size) recommended. They're really easy. Try garlic again, that's good too. Carrots are nice too, but may need protection against carrot fly (I use an ultra thin non-woven insect net from the garden center). Definitely green beans; dead easy (but don't leave them on too long). Do you have a climate for strawerries? Courgette and squash/pumpkins are easy too but take a lot of space. I tried potatoes for the first time last year and I thought they were great.
All advice given in blissful ignorance of your climate, so what works for me might be a disaster for you :-)
Good luck,
Jandra

[Wombat]

Another vote for Pak Choi.

It is a versatile vegetable and I have found it easy to grow (although hard / easy often depends on local conditions).

Don't plant all your seeds at once though - the optimum time to eat it is when the plant is still fairly small so it is better to stagger your sowing.

Wulf

Good one Wulf!

The problem here at the moment is they tend to bolt due to the heat!

Nev

[Cheezy]

My advice is to grow things that are either expensive to buy or are best eaten after just picking, or picked when small. THere are lots of things also that are better grown by yourself than in a big commercial operation. It is also always much better to eat seasonally, rather than eating vege that has been grown in hot houses or flown half way round the world.

My top veges are : peas, make sure you eat them young, best way is to keep picking a pod and eating the raw pea's, theres no finer test!.You need to keep on top of them as they will soon get too big.When young put them raw into salads, whizz them up with olive oil and blanched garlic and parmasan and mint to go on pasta.

tomatoes: there is nothing more tasty than an own grown tomato, as long as you choose a variety that has been bred for flovour and not productivity.Not sure what varieties you will be able to buy, but if you like small orange cherry tomatoes try sungold. Check out on US websites for heritage varieties that mention flavour. Brandywine is a famous one, and the Italian ones like Roma
Eat raw in salads, semi dry out in the oven for "sun dried", make pasta sauces.

Broad beans are my all time favourite again eat when small. Boil/microwave until just tender, whizz up to make a pasta sauce with bread soaked in milk and garlic,parmasan and mint (you can use a mix of peas as well). Cook with chorizo and bacon add to a warm salad.

French climbing beans (aka "bobby or fine beans") good variety is blue lake or cobra. These are great and can produce beans for 3 months. If you let them go very big they are stringy, but the white bean inside can be podded then and is a haricot bean (you must cook these beans dont eat raw.) great for making baked beans. When young, (pencil thickness) eat the cooked pods and bean whole. 3 mins in microwave or boil until just tender. I eat as a warm salad, add a little balsamic vinegar and olive oil and parmasan. If you like chinese add soya source and sesame seeds. Nice with just butter and salt.

A little more adventurous asaparagus, but unless you've tasted just picked and cooked , you've never lived. Will take upto 3 years to establish, after that very little needs to be done just pick. eat raw when really small, or steam/boil until tender and eat with lots of butter. Good in omletttes, risotto's and as a pasta sauce.

Carrots, just picked are so sweet, same as sweet corn, you must pick and eat sweetcorn within 30 mins to get the benefit of growing your own, as the sugar turns to starch.

lettice/rochett/herbs, easy to grow, sucession sow and you can have fresh salads and herbs vertually all year round.

Cabbages are easy along with brocolli (purple sprouting). Celary was my last years revalation just about to finish the last. And I like to grow leaks, as you can get something to eat vertually all year round with sucessional sowing.

[Enormous Sage]

Been growing veg for a couple of years in my vegetable patch, made from waste soil (mostly clay).

Potatoes, Peas and Spinach worked well the 1st year. I had no idea whatsoever what I was doing, but it worked!
I didn't buy seed potatoes, I just chucked some in the ground I found sprouting in the cupboard and they went crazy.

Last year, I tried all manner of things - the local garden centre was selling off their end of season (though OK for the coming year) seed.
What worked :
Sweetcorn - very well. Doing it again this year.
Leeks - still harvesting them, overwintering.
Kohl Rabi (though it's an... aquired taste.)
Strawberries from seed.
Kale
Radish - easy.
Beetroot (sort of)
Lettuce - Little Gem.
Tomatoes (planted in tyres that someone had fly-tipped.)
A couple of random sunflowers.
Cabbage
Swiss Chard / Perpetual Spinach - Keeps going and going.

What didn't work
Broccoli - went rotten due to excessive rainfall.
Cauliflower - ditto
Chinese Radish - bolted : planted too late in the season
Carrots - a complete no show. Planted too early and I have stony / clay soil.

I bought another fistfull of seed pack from the same garden centre for a bargainous 10p each, though from experience I will tell you that it's worth buying seed for stuff you actually want to grow, rather than just planting stuff because you have the seed.
Most of the seed I had, I did want, but I made a big mistake using the variety of tomato that I got on the cheap (moneymaker) - they were bland.
Consider the time and effort you're investing in growing the stuff.
Though this year I got to the special offer bin early and managed to get 3 different types, all of which are better.

[Smooth Hound]

courgettes, parsnips and garlics i enjoy growing, also i like growing herbs.

[ina]

Kohl Rabi (though it's an... aquired taste.)

One of my favourites! But then, I grew up with them. And I don't seem to be able to grow them, which is really daft, as they are difficult to buy...

Kohlrabi are very versatile, and can be eaten raw as well as cooked.

[British Red]

I think it depends on the time of year. Right now its got to be parsnips - we lifted some for last nights dinner and roasted them coated with some honey from a friend. Gorgeous.

Red

[Smooth Hound]

I think it depends on the time of year. Right now its got to be parsnips - we lifted some for last nights dinner and roasted them coated with some honey from a friend. Gorgeous.

Red

MMM

[Millymollymandy]

You called?