Page 34 - Simply Vegetables Summer 2022

Trying new things
EMILY PLUMB
Although there are definitely some staple varieties that feature in our garden every year, we also think it’s quite fun to try a few new things each year. That might be new varieties
of a vegetable we already grow, or something entirely different. Some of the new varieties turn out to very much be “one-year-wonders” (or not as the case may be, seeing as they don’t get onto the list for the following year) but others might be a new “staple” that we’d never have discovered unless we’d given them a try. In this article,
we are sharing a couple
of the new varieties we’re
trying for 2022, with
progress updates to follow
in a future SV magazine
(assuming there is some
progress to share!)
Vampire chilli peppers
These caught our eye as
they have purple foliage,
stems and flowers. We
can say they’re certainly
delivering on the purple
vibes so far, so we’re
continuing to follow their
development with interest.
Fingers crossed their purple
flowers and black fruits
(which we are led to believe later turn bright red) are forthcoming over the next couple of months between writing this and publication of the July issue of SV.
They were sown back in January, pricked out after a couple of weeks and potted up at the start of March to reach this size by
the start of May. As always with peppers, it’s definitely a long game. However, the weather starting to warm up should help give them
a bit of a growth spurt in the coming weeks hopefully. Providing that’s the case, they’ll get potted up into their final pots and kept fed and watered from there to maturity.
Nimrod cucumbers
We grew a couple of different cucumber varieties in our greenhouse last year, and particularly enjoyed growing the “mini” cucumbers. Although they are described
The Nimrod cucumbers are supposedly extremely heavy cropping, with the plants able to sustain lots of fruits at once
One ball
there for long. They were potted up into
3” square pots and will stay in these until they’re ready to be planted out. They were potted up into our usual compost, but with some perlite added to try and prevent the compost getting too moist around the cucumbers’ roots.
These are an indoor grown variety,
so some photos to come in a future SV article. We look forward to putting that heavy cropping description to the test this summer!
as mini, they’re not as mini as the gherkin-sized ones they like to sell in little Aldi during the summer months which are more “bitesize”
in my view. Nothing wrong with the bitesize ones by the way, and I’m sure they’re great for packed lunches, etc. but I can eat a whole pack at once (no doubt more a reflection of me than anything else!), so tend to find that I’m better off with a slightly larger cucumber to snack on.
The Nimrod cucumbers are supposedly extremely heavy cropping, with the plants able to sustain lots
of fruits at once, with 3 or 4 fruits per node. They are also resistant to powdery mildew which is an added bonus.
These were sown on 24 April and didn’t hang around when it came to germination. They were put on the propagator but pricked out by the 28 April so they weren’t
Nimrod
34 Simply Vegetables