food lover's garden blad

8/8/2019 Food Lover's Garden BLAD

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food lovers garden

Mark Diaconohead gardener, river cottage

amazing edibles You Will love to groW and eat

ForeWord bYHugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

the


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contents

introduction 6

what to grow 10

the food 20Soft Fruit 22Autumn OliveChilean GuavaEdible HoneysuckleFuchsiaGoji BerriesMignonette StrawberriesRhubarb

Wineberries

Tree Fruit 50ApricotsMedlarsMulberriesPeaches & Nectarines

Quinces

Beans & Greens 70AsparagusBorlotti BeansCardoonsGlobe ArtichokesKai LanPeas

Purple Sprouting Broccoli

Buried Treasure 106

Egyptian Walking OnionJerusalem ArtichokesOcaSalsifyYacon

Salad & Flowers 128DayliliesMicroleavesMizunaNasturtiumsSorrel

Nuts 142AlmondsChestnutsPecansWalnuts

Herbs & Spices 154Carolina AllspiceChervilLovageSweet CicelySzechuan Pepper

the directory 170acknowledgements 192

Lie is too short to grow ordinary ood. Why

spend all that time, eort, and money growing

ruits and vegetables that can be easily purchased

and which taste pretty much the same whether

home grown or shop bought? InThe Food

Lovers Garden, River Cottage head gardener

Mark Diacono reveals that it is no harder to

grow the unusual and utterly delicious than it is

the entirely ordinary.

Filled with practical growing advice and

mouthwatering recipes, this inspirational book

urges gardeners to orget those oods that

they normally grow, instead suggesting they

challenge their taste buds and expand their

culinary horizons by cultivating little-known

gourmet delights such as kai lan, salsiy, Chilean

guava, daylilies, and Szechuan pepper instead.

Whether gardeners have a large growing space,

a small kitchen garden, or even a selection o

containers, Mark oers suggestions or oods that

provide a quick return and will leave the kitchenully stocked throughout the year. Over 40

extraordinary crops are included, complete with

speciic growing advice and mouth-watering

recipes or putting the harvest to best use.

The Food Lovers Garden encourages gardeners

to share Marks sense o culinary enthusiasm. Its

a sumptuous and lyr ical invitation to garden, eat,and live more adventurously.


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12 what to grow

getting startedFor most o us, going about deciding what to grow usually

starts with a drawing o your veg patch. This then gets

divided into quarters, beore each is assigned a plant group

based on the rotation that most horticultural books suggest.So brassicas here, potatoes there, and so on. Its what I did in

my irst year at Otter Farm and, rankly, all it does is to lay

the oundation or the unspectacular.

I the sun shines when it should and it rains when youre

at work, you may well get exactly what you asked or:

a perectly respectable harvest dominated by maincrop

potatoes, onions, carrots and cabbages with a ew salads

round the edge. Im not saying that these crops wont make

beautiul ood French onion soup can be abulous and

theres nothing wrong with a jacket potato. But unlessyoure striving or sel-suiciency, why put lots o eort

into growing something which, at best, promises to be

indistinguishable rom the shop-bought when you could

be adding wonderul alternatives such as oca, yacon and

Egyptian walking onions to your larder instead?

Here at Otter Farm I sidestep the mundane, the cheaply

available and the ordinary in the hope that you might too.

Every ood here is remarkable in one way or other and is

drawn rom my own wishlists (see opposite).

Im not saying you shouldnt grow the perectly amiliar,just gently encouraging you to actively chooseto grow

everything that makes it into your garden, rather than simply

automatically including the usual suspects. I you do, you too

may delight in the subterranean potatoes that taste o pear,

or the spicy warmth o Carolina allspice. Or perhaps youll

rediscover the orgotten ruits o the mulberry, quince and

medlar, or gamble on the summer ripening the very inest

peaches, apricots and kiwis that money cant buy instead.

Whatever you opt or, you can be assured that all o these

incredible underappreciated herbs, salads and vegetables will

taste sensational, as well as being completely dierent rom

anything available in the shops.

So why not try and think a little more imaginatively, grow

and eat a little more adventurously, and set about creating

your own unique edible garden?


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getting started 13

making a wishlistThe moments you spend drawing up a wishlist

of foods you would love to grow will define

everything that follows. Forget techniques and

timings, planting and pruning: get your wishlistright and youll be on your way to the best an

edible garden can give. Here are a few tips to help

you create your own wishlist:

GROW THE UNBUYABLES

Supermarkets require a reliably high yield, easy

harvesting, simple preparation and a long shelf

life. This limits the selection of crops available to

buy and is the reason that most of us havent had

access to the stunning flavours of artichoke hearts,

cardoons and medlars, for example, all of which

can be easily grown.

TRY SOMETHING NEW

There are always new foods to discover, so

grow a few things you like the sound of, even if

youve never eaten them before. Its a fine rule of

thumb that if youve never eaten a food, it will

be delicious. My first wishlist included quince,

mulberries, apricots, medlars, peaches, pecans,

Szechuan pepper, mizuna, day lilies, kai lan and

Chilean guava many of which I hadnt tasted

before growing.

PRIORITISE PLOT-TO-PLATE VEG

Grow as many of the foods that decline rapidly

such as asparagus, peas and sprouting broccoli

as you have room for. Because of the way these

crops lose flavour and texture as soon as they

are detached from the plant, each of these is

unbuyable at the top of its game.

GET READING

Be nosy when looking for seeds. Talk to suppliers,

search the internet and get a selection ofcatalogues everyones will be different. Take the

best from each and create your own menu the

service takes a little longer but youll be eating

what you order just the same.

Why put lots of effort

into growing the mediocre,

the cheap, or anything

indistinguishable from the

shop-bought when you

could be adding wonderful

alternatives such as oca,

yacon and Egyptian walking

onions instead?


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158 the food

Native to southern India, the black pepper (Piper nigrum) that most of us have

in our grinding mills at home is sadly beyond viability away from tropical climes.

Fortunately however the livid red berries of the Szechuan pepper grow perfectlyhappily in most temperate areas and make for a delightful alternative.

Szechuan Pepper


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About the AuthorMark Diacono is head gardener at Hugh Fearn-ley-Whittingstalls River Cottage enterprise run-ning the growing courses, giving talks, and hostingevents at River Cottage HQ and appearing in theRiver Cottage TV series.

The Food Lovers GardenAmazing Edibles You Will Love to Grow and Eat

THIS SUMPTUOUS BOOKsets orth a stunninglysimple vision or todays edible gardener: Lie is too short togrow ordinary ood. Why grow plain old potatoes, carrots, andonions, when its just as easy and so much more gratiying to

cultivate extraordinary avors like sweet and crunchy daylilies,nutrient-packed gojiberries, and the perect peach. Te FoodLovers Garden oers growing tips, avor profles, harvesting ad-vice, preparation notes, and recipes or truly amazing edibles thatexperienced gardeners and adventurous cooks will love to grow.

ISBN: 978-1-60469-229-7

$27.95, CAN$34.95, hardcover, 192 pp, full color throughout

Ships February 2011

www.timberpress.com

A SWASHBUCKLING and DELICIOUS ADVENTUREwhere you travel the world and taste its nest fruitsin your own backyard.

Press contact: Emma Alpaugh

[email protected]

Publicity & Promotion

National publicity

Online marketing and promotion

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, founder of River Cottage

and author ofThe River Cottage Cookbook

Timber Press books are distributed in the gift and book tradeby Workman Publishing. PLEASE SEE YOUR SALES REPTO ORDER, OR CALL (800) 722-7202.

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