Veg Patch

We’ve built our own kitchen garden at The Pipe and Glass, which includes a small veg patch and a herb garden. It’s no Kew Gardens! But it’s big enough to keep me interested and supply readily available ingredients in the kitchen. We grow veg and a range of herbs that are different to the run of the mill. We have lovage, bronze fennel, lemon thyme, purple sage, salad burnet, sweet cicely, rainbow chard, red kale and purple carrots, to name but a few. We generally use them as garnish and decoration, creating an added dimension to a dish. In summer, I grow nasturtiums and use the leaves in salads and, as a garnish, the brightly coloured flowers to add colour, and its peppery leaves to add a rocket-type flavour. Blue borage and viola flowers are also a firm favourite, adding a really summery feel to a dish. Unfortunately, the size of our garden is limited which makes it unrealistic to produce all of our own veg and herbs - we’d probably clear out our entire kitchen garden in just a few services in the restaurant.