Vegetable Garden

The kitchen garden, step by step and without useless romanticism.

Here we talk about what really works: when to sow, how to prepare the soil, which plant associations hold up, what you can preserve. Clear guides, tested methods, concrete results. The vegetable garden isn't a decoration — it's a tool.

Right now in the garden

October — autumn harvests and getting ready for winter

This month's tasks

Planting garlic and shallots Sowing broad beans Corn salad and spinach Bringing squashes in Lifting carrots as needed Clearing summer crops Sowing green manures Mulching the soil

Read in this notebook

Vegetable Garden articles

Garden

Harvesting Carrots: Why Mine Are Tiny (and Why I'm Leaving Them in the Ground)

Six months of waiting, baby carrots and a confession: I didn't dare thin them. When to harvest, and how to keep carrots in the ground all winter.

Garden

The Harvest Moon: Why the Full Moon of 26 September 2026 Is So Unusual

It rises at almost the same time several evenings running. A quarter of an hour instead of fifty minutes, and what that meant for farmers.

Garden

What to Grow in the Greenhouse This Autumn to Extend the Harvest

Cutting salads, pea shoots, radishes, short carrots: what you can still grow in an unheated greenhouse, and what it cannot do.

Garden

A Garden of Scents and Spices: Aromatic Plants, Differently

Patchouli, ginger, saffron, angelica, bee balm, lovage: growing plants you only know by their scent or their name on a packet.

Garden

How to Choose Your Tomato Varieties

Salads, sauces, preserves, stuffing, drying: start from the use, not the catalogue. With a free printable PDF guide.

A vegetable bed prepared for September sowing

Garden

What to Sow and Plant in the Vegetable Garden in Early September

Chervil, corn salad, spinach, radish, rocket: what can still be sown on the first of September, what to plant, and how to keep the soil moist.

Garden

Test Your Seeds Before You Start

Test your seeds before sowing — how to check if your seeds are still viable and avoid nasty surprises in the garden.

Vegetable Garden

Why Your Compost Isn't Working (and How to Fix It)

Smells, a frozen pile, too dry or too wet: the simple causes and practical fixes.

Vegetable Garden

No-Dig Gardening: Creating a Bed with the Layer Method

On a lawn, stony ground or even a paved area: how to create a productive bed without turning the soil.

Garden

Vegetable Garden Heatwaves: 5 Principles That Truly Cut Water Use

Mulching, deep watering, shade and variety choice: five reliable principles for keeping a vegetable garden productive during hot spells.

Garden

Should You Prune Cucumbers and Melons for a Bigger Harvest?

Cucumbers and melons don't prune the same way, or need it at all. What actually helps, and the mistakes to avoid.

Garden

Why Does My Zucchini Plant Only Grow Male Flowers?

Plenty of pretty yellow flowers but still no zucchini forming: a normal gap, unless it drags on too long.

Garden

Back to the Vegetable Garden After a Rainless Week Away: The Right First Moves

Limp leaves, dry soil, overripe vegetables: what to do, and in what order, to get plants back on track without panicking.

The kitchen garden, step by step and without useless romanticism.

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