Last week spotted the first hedgehog in our garden that we've seen for several years. Have put out lots of meaty catfood to try and encourage it to become a regular, but all the foxes seem to have arrived first and gobbled it up.

Yes, I got a freebie packet too. Germination was very poor due to the freak weather conditions, but have now cropped a few and the flavour is certainly mind blowing. Did carrots always originally taste like this or have we become so used to eating tastless supermarkets carrots that we've forgotten w...

Have just discovered Kitchen Garden Magazine,(courtesy of Daily Telegraph) and this this forum. Now I can sneak away and enjoy hours of pleasureable websurfing during winter evenings while my husband watches football on TV !! Nice to feel I'll be in the company of unknown friends who share my veggie...

Jams & marmalades can be made easily in the microwave. A LARGE bowl or casserole two or three times as large as the volume of jam /marmalade should be used and small quantities made at a time. Remember that when you add the sugar to the boiled fruit, the bulk will double. Recipes made in the mic...

Am new to this marvellous site. Have have lots of Hungarian Wax chillis ripening. Can anybody please give me a home tested recipe for sweet chilli sauce. Thanks.

I use my surplus soft fruit to make fruit syrups which are delicious in winter as a hot drink with a slice of lemon or for pouring over ice cream and puddings. Use virtually any combination of blackberries, raspberries, red, black or white currants. Simmer the fruit & strain through a jelly bag ...

I find green peppers rather tart and I do know a lot of other people who feel similarly. Could you let them ripen, then they can be sliced up and cooked with tomatoes, onion & garlic to make a splendid pepperonata sauce which can be used fresh with pasta, or mixed into a minced beef & chilli...

We tend to enjoy ours quite simply, serving them freshly cooked with egg and bacon for breakast.
But has anybody else noticed that too much beetroot tends to have a rather laxative effect in the bathroom department ??

Oh dear - I'm afraid this is just part of having a cat and if you've already attached a bell on the collar you've probably done as much as you can do, apart from not letting your cat out in the garden in the early morning when the birds are at their most hungry and needing to feed. I had a cat who o...

Most of my runner bean flowers failed to set in July because of the heatwave but now the weather is getting cooler some are coming. However, for the first time this year I grew some Thompson & Morgan Blauhilde purple podded climbing beans. They didn't fail in the heat at all and are still croppi...