Walnut Kitchen Garden

A blog about an ornamental walled kitchen garden makeover

Walnut Kitchen Garden
  • Intro
    • From lawn to kitchen garden
    • My Story
    • Welcome to my gardening blog
    • Remembering my Gardening Hero (Dad)
  • The Garden
    • Gardening Therapy
      • Gardening for your mental health
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 1 Spring
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 2 Summertime
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 3 Autumn
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 4 Winter
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 5 Spring 2021
    • Grow your own
      • Produce coming out of my ears!
      • The Kitchen Garden Produce is Ramping up!
      • Disaster in the Greenhouse
      • How to Grow Potatoes in a Container
      • Tomatoes in November!
      • 2022 – A Bumper Apple Season
      • Food from Flowers – With help from our little friends
      • Our Cherry Tree – It’s the cherry on the cake!
      • Now for something completely different – The Purple Potato Project
      • What’s growing in the kitchen garden 
      • The Greenhouse – My Happy Place
      • Growing Tomatoes from seed – Now is the time!
      • Growing Potatoes
      • Crop Rotation
      • Beans – French, Runner & Borlotti
      • Tomatoes – My first crop
      • Time to bring the chillies in!
      • Out with the Brussels, in with the beetroot
    • Present Day
      • Cosmos – Lost and Found
      • Dierama Plants – Fussy, but worth the trouble!
      • The First Week of July
      • Sentimental Plants – Plants that remind you of others
      • Last week of May
      • Rhododendrons and Azaleas
      • A Red, White & Blue Theme to celebrate the Coronation of King Charles lll
      • Dancing Under Falling Tree Blossom
      • Happy Easter from Walnut Kitchen Garden
      • It’s all go in the garden – Spring has Sprung!
      • Time to chop down Karl Foerster
      • So we did get snow this week!
      • Just as the garden is waking up from its winter slumber…
      • Pulmonaria – Perfect plant for a shady border
      • Demolition in the Garden
      • Another Late Holly Chop
      • First snow of the year – No Gardening this week!
      • The Garden Nurtures the sole
      • New years resolution? Get rid of the weeds!
      • Happy New Year 2023
      • Christmas Tree Celebration
      • Frosty Week – A Winter Wonderland
      • Time to put things to bed in the Winter Greenhouse
      • Gardening with Cats – The Original Stars of Gardeners World
      • Chilli Explosion
      • Heatwave – Monsoon. How the Flowers coped
      • The Big Lavender Chop
      • Wildflowers – My New Border
      • Mid-summer – Full Borders and lots to Harvest
      • Gardening in a Heatwave – Too much Watering!
      • Growing Dahlias – Why have I never grown Dahlias before?
      • Am I turning into a Flower Arranger?
      • Longest Day, Midsummer’s Day & Summer Solstice
      • Jubilee Garden Celebration
      • The Madness of May!
      • Sciatica Makes For A Frustrated Gardener!
      • Catching-Up With The White Garden – Part 2
      • Catching-up with the White Garden – Part 1
      • Muscari
      • Snakes Head Fritillary – ‘Fritillaria meleagris’
      • Early Spring 2022 – Let’s get back to the flowers!
      • Happy Birthday Walnut Kitchen Garden
      • Crocus – The First Vibrant Colour Of The Year
      • Discovering the Beauty of Hellebores
      • Snowdrops
      • When’s the most exciting time in the garden?
      • The Annual Holly Hedge Trim
      • Snow in the Garden. Love it or loathe it?
      • Making Compost
      • Gardening highlights of 2021
      • Late Autumn in the Garden – The big tidy-up
      • Early Autumn in the garden – Harvests, flowers & sunshine
      • Finally Growing Angelica ‘Gigas’
      • The Joys of June
      • Snowing in June?
      • Tulip’s – Rain stopped play!
      • Snow in April!
      • Springtime. The gardens bursting into colour!
    • Transformation
      • The Pizza & Olive Patios
      • Making a Mediterranean Bed
      • Planting the Magnolia border
      • Digging up the lawn
      • Creating a Woodland border
      • Creating the Pathways
      • Gardening on an Ice-Age Glacier
      • The White garden
      • Dreaming of a pond
      • The Fruit trees
      • Greenhouse – take two
      • The Holly and The Ivy
      • The Majestic Walnut Tree
      • Bamboo and Hosta raised beds
      • Creating a walled garden from scratch – The Great Wall
      • Creating a walled garden from scratch – The Shady Wall
      • Lady bricklayer ?
      • Building the raised vegetable beds
      • New garden, new cat!
      • Let’s get stuck into the garden makeover!
    • Weekly Garden Diary
      • Garden Diary – The white borders turned into a white garden!
      • Garden Diary – Beautiful sunsets & blue skies calling!
      • Garden Diary – A week of Remembrance & feeling grateful
      • Garden Diary – Halloween spiders & goodbye Tomatoes
      • Garden Diary – Say goodbye to the lighter nights!
      • Garden Diary – Pink for Girls? Not for this little girl!
      • Garden Diary – Another bizarre weather week
      • Garden Diary – A Week of Highs and Lows
      • Garden Diary – Rain, rain go away, we must be due a sunny day?
      • Garden Diary – Started in the pink, ended with thunder bolts!
      • Garden Diary – Two new Cat Faces in the garden!
      • Garden Diary – Finger Licking Raspberries hands, wave goodbye to the Rhubarb
      • Garden Diary – Tomato bonanza, there’s even enough for soup!
      • Garden Diary – Alfresco cooking with aliens lurking
      • Garden Diary – Insects and harvests
      • Garden Diary – Blue skies at last – but dragons on the horizon!
      • Garden Diary – All the B’s, Bees, Butterflies & Blueberry cake
      • Garden Diary – Figs, Blueberries & Tomatoes, not necessarily together!
      • Garden Diary – Rain, rain, the produce is liking it, but the bees are not!
      • Garden Diary – The Bounty begins and a Moth rescue!
      • Garden Diary – Let’s get you up to date!
    • Wildlife
      • My Wildlife Pond – Dragonflies, Frogs & so much more!
      • The garden is full of life
      • The Frogs have spawned at last – But there’s a problem!
      • The Geese are back in town! – Autumn is around the corner!
      • Hurrah, hurrah, it’s Damselfly Day!
      • The Frogs have Spawned!
      • Outdoor Wildlife Camera
      • Rare White Sparrow
      • Wildlife Finds the Pond
      • Ladybird plague? Hopefully not quite that many!
      • The bees are back in abundance
  • Outings
    • Carpet of Snowdrops at St. Mary’s Coddington
    • Christmas Tree Festival
    • Garden Visits
      • Visiting the Gardens at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons – Part 1
      • Visiting the Gardens at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons. Part 2 – Ponds, Herbs, & Saving Our Heritage
      • Visiting the Gardens at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons. Part 3 – Polytunnels, Compost, The Orchard & Tasting
      • Hodnet Hall Gardens
      • Wollerton Old Hall Garden
      • Dorothy Clive Garden
    • Garden Shows
      • RHS Chelsea Flower Show
        • Visit to The RHS Chelsea flower show 2021 – Part 1
        • RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2021 Part 2 – The Great Pavilion
        • RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2021 Part 3 – Smaller Gardens & Shopping!
  • Reviews
    • Gardeners World, an inspiration!
  • Contact
  • Recipes
    • Fragrant Summer Bean Curry
    • Salmon Pasta with Broad Beans, Soy & Honey
    • Stewed Rhubarb & Yogurt – Breakfast of Gods!
    • Rhubarb Fool – A speedy pudd when unexpected guests turn up
    • Bramley Apple & Calvados Cake
    • Polly’s Simple, Mild Chilli Sauce
    • Super, Simple, Hot Habanero Chilli Sauce
    • Pear & Raspberry Cake – Gluten Free
    • Courgette & Cauliflower Cheese Vegetable Lasagne – You’ll never want a meat one again!
    • Tomato Sauce – A Very Simple Recipe
    • Simply Delicious Cauliflower Cheese – Recipe
    • Brandywine Tomato Salad – It’s too easy to be so delicious!
    • How to Pickle Gherkins – The quick & easy way
    • Cherry and Courgette Cake
    • Super Simple Bean Salad with Mint & Thyme dressing
    • Easy, Purple Sprouting Broccoli Soup
  • Intro
    • From lawn to kitchen garden
    • My Story
    • Welcome to my gardening blog
    • Remembering my Gardening Hero (Dad)
  • The Garden
    • Gardening Therapy
      • Gardening for your mental health
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 1 Spring
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 2 Summertime
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 3 Autumn
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 4 Winter
      • Gardening through a pandemic – Part 5 Spring 2021
    • Grow your own
      • Produce coming out of my ears!
      • The Kitchen Garden Produce is Ramping up!
      • Disaster in the Greenhouse
      • How to Grow Potatoes in a Container
      • Tomatoes in November!
      • 2022 – A Bumper Apple Season
      • Food from Flowers – With help from our little friends
      • Our Cherry Tree – It’s the cherry on the cake!
      • Now for something completely different – The Purple Potato Project
      • What’s growing in the kitchen garden 
      • The Greenhouse – My Happy Place
      • Growing Tomatoes from seed – Now is the time!
      • Growing Potatoes
      • Crop Rotation
      • Beans – French, Runner & Borlotti
      • Tomatoes – My first crop
      • Time to bring the chillies in!
      • Out with the Brussels, in with the beetroot
    • Present Day
      • Cosmos – Lost and Found
      • Dierama Plants – Fussy, but worth the trouble!
      • The First Week of July
      • Sentimental Plants – Plants that remind you of others
      • Last week of May
      • Rhododendrons and Azaleas
      • A Red, White & Blue Theme to celebrate the Coronation of King Charles lll
      • Dancing Under Falling Tree Blossom
      • Happy Easter from Walnut Kitchen Garden
      • It’s all go in the garden – Spring has Sprung!
      • Time to chop down Karl Foerster
      • So we did get snow this week!
      • Just as the garden is waking up from its winter slumber…
      • Pulmonaria – Perfect plant for a shady border
      • Demolition in the Garden
      • Another Late Holly Chop
      • First snow of the year – No Gardening this week!
      • The Garden Nurtures the sole
      • New years resolution? Get rid of the weeds!
      • Happy New Year 2023
      • Christmas Tree Celebration
      • Frosty Week – A Winter Wonderland
      • Time to put things to bed in the Winter Greenhouse
      • Gardening with Cats – The Original Stars of Gardeners World
      • Chilli Explosion
      • Heatwave – Monsoon. How the Flowers coped
      • The Big Lavender Chop
      • Wildflowers – My New Border
      • Mid-summer – Full Borders and lots to Harvest
      • Gardening in a Heatwave – Too much Watering!
      • Growing Dahlias – Why have I never grown Dahlias before?
      • Am I turning into a Flower Arranger?
      • Longest Day, Midsummer’s Day & Summer Solstice
      • Jubilee Garden Celebration
      • The Madness of May!
      • Sciatica Makes For A Frustrated Gardener!
      • Catching-Up With The White Garden – Part 2
      • Catching-up with the White Garden – Part 1
      • Muscari
      • Snakes Head Fritillary – ‘Fritillaria meleagris’
      • Early Spring 2022 – Let’s get back to the flowers!
      • Happy Birthday Walnut Kitchen Garden
      • Crocus – The First Vibrant Colour Of The Year
      • Discovering the Beauty of Hellebores
      • Snowdrops
      • When’s the most exciting time in the garden?
      • The Annual Holly Hedge Trim
      • Snow in the Garden. Love it or loathe it?
      • Making Compost
      • Gardening highlights of 2021
      • Late Autumn in the Garden – The big tidy-up
      • Early Autumn in the garden – Harvests, flowers & sunshine
      • Finally Growing Angelica ‘Gigas’
      • The Joys of June
      • Snowing in June?
      • Tulip’s – Rain stopped play!
      • Snow in April!
      • Springtime. The gardens bursting into colour!
    • Transformation
      • The Pizza & Olive Patios
      • Making a Mediterranean Bed
      • Planting the Magnolia border
      • Digging up the lawn
      • Creating a Woodland border
      • Creating the Pathways
      • Gardening on an Ice-Age Glacier
      • The White garden
      • Dreaming of a pond
      • The Fruit trees
      • Greenhouse – take two
      • The Holly and The Ivy
      • The Majestic Walnut Tree
      • Bamboo and Hosta raised beds
      • Creating a walled garden from scratch – The Great Wall
      • Creating a walled garden from scratch – The Shady Wall
      • Lady bricklayer ?
      • Building the raised vegetable beds
      • New garden, new cat!
      • Let’s get stuck into the garden makeover!
    • Weekly Garden Diary
      • Garden Diary – The white borders turned into a white garden!
      • Garden Diary – Beautiful sunsets & blue skies calling!
      • Garden Diary – A week of Remembrance & feeling grateful
      • Garden Diary – Halloween spiders & goodbye Tomatoes
      • Garden Diary – Say goodbye to the lighter nights!
      • Garden Diary – Pink for Girls? Not for this little girl!
      • Garden Diary – Another bizarre weather week
      • Garden Diary – A Week of Highs and Lows
      • Garden Diary – Rain, rain go away, we must be due a sunny day?
      • Garden Diary – Started in the pink, ended with thunder bolts!
      • Garden Diary – Two new Cat Faces in the garden!
      • Garden Diary – Finger Licking Raspberries hands, wave goodbye to the Rhubarb
      • Garden Diary – Tomato bonanza, there’s even enough for soup!
      • Garden Diary – Alfresco cooking with aliens lurking
      • Garden Diary – Insects and harvests
      • Garden Diary – Blue skies at last – but dragons on the horizon!
      • Garden Diary – All the B’s, Bees, Butterflies & Blueberry cake
      • Garden Diary – Figs, Blueberries & Tomatoes, not necessarily together!
      • Garden Diary – Rain, rain, the produce is liking it, but the bees are not!
      • Garden Diary – The Bounty begins and a Moth rescue!
      • Garden Diary – Let’s get you up to date!
    • Wildlife
      • My Wildlife Pond – Dragonflies, Frogs & so much more!
      • The garden is full of life
      • The Frogs have spawned at last – But there’s a problem!
      • The Geese are back in town! – Autumn is around the corner!
      • Hurrah, hurrah, it’s Damselfly Day!
      • The Frogs have Spawned!
      • Outdoor Wildlife Camera
      • Rare White Sparrow
      • Wildlife Finds the Pond
      • Ladybird plague? Hopefully not quite that many!
      • The bees are back in abundance
  • Outings
    • Carpet of Snowdrops at St. Mary’s Coddington
    • Christmas Tree Festival
    • Garden Visits
      • Visiting the Gardens at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons – Part 1
      • Visiting the Gardens at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons. Part 2 – Ponds, Herbs, & Saving Our Heritage
      • Visiting the Gardens at Le Manoir Aux Quat’Saisons. Part 3 – Polytunnels, Compost, The Orchard & Tasting
      • Hodnet Hall Gardens
      • Wollerton Old Hall Garden
      • Dorothy Clive Garden
    • Garden Shows
      • RHS Chelsea Flower Show
        • Visit to The RHS Chelsea flower show 2021 – Part 1
        • RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2021 Part 2 – The Great Pavilion
        • RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2021 Part 3 – Smaller Gardens & Shopping!
  • Reviews
    • Gardeners World, an inspiration!
  • Contact
  • Recipes
    • Fragrant Summer Bean Curry
    • Salmon Pasta with Broad Beans, Soy & Honey
    • Stewed Rhubarb & Yogurt – Breakfast of Gods!
    • Rhubarb Fool – A speedy pudd when unexpected guests turn up
    • Bramley Apple & Calvados Cake
    • Polly’s Simple, Mild Chilli Sauce
    • Super, Simple, Hot Habanero Chilli Sauce
    • Pear & Raspberry Cake – Gluten Free
    • Courgette & Cauliflower Cheese Vegetable Lasagne – You’ll never want a meat one again!
    • Tomato Sauce – A Very Simple Recipe
    • Simply Delicious Cauliflower Cheese – Recipe
    • Brandywine Tomato Salad – It’s too easy to be so delicious!
    • How to Pickle Gherkins – The quick & easy way
    • Cherry and Courgette Cake
    • Super Simple Bean Salad with Mint & Thyme dressing
    • Easy, Purple Sprouting Broccoli Soup
  • Asparagus berries in late autumn
    The Garden

    Late Autumn in the Garden – The big tidy-up

    5 December 2021 / 0 Comments

    Late autumn is a strange season of conflicting emotions for me. To be honest it’s my least favourite time of the year. I know we have the spectacular colourful displays from the trees, as their leaves blaze with fiery reds, golds and coppers. And when they first drop to the ground, dry and crispy, I can’t resist the temptation to run through them kicking them up in the air. But once on the ground they become soggy and slimy! I find it rather depressing as the garden starts dying back and everywhere looks a mess! But it’s necessary! We all need a rest, even the garden. I’m much happier once…

    read more
    Polly Gardener

    You May Also Like

    Growing Dahlias – Why have I never grown Dahlias before?

    17 July 2022

    The Madness of May!

    29 May 2022

    Discovering the Beauty of Hellebores

    20 February 2022
  • a flower boarder with Asters, achillea, & crocosmia with bamboo in the background
    The Garden

    Early Autumn in the garden – Harvests, flowers & sunshine

    28 November 2021 / 0 Comments

    Still feeling like summer These days, early autumn is indistinguishable from summer. In fact we regularly have better weather in early autumn than we do in mid-summer. The only real clue to the season is the shortening day length.  Initially, hardly noticeable until we head into late autumn and the time change. It was so warm in September that our al fresco eating carried on well into mid-autumn – including some breakfasts! September is the month of bounty. Back in the days when we used to go on holiday, we’d come home to courgettes transformed into giant marrows. Which resulted in stuffed marrow and marrow chutney – we do hate…

    read more
    Polly Gardener

    You May Also Like

    Large round purple flower heads of plant Angelica 'gigas'

    Finally Growing Angelica ‘Gigas’

    21 November 2021

    Food from Flowers – With help from our little friends

    21 August 2022
    Tree blossom

    Dancing Under Falling Tree Blossom

    30 April 2023
  • Large round purple flower heads of plant Angelica 'gigas'
    The Garden

    Finally Growing Angelica ‘Gigas’

    21 November 2021 / 1 Comment

    I’ve lost count of how long I’ve been trying to grow Angelica ‘Gigas’. From when I first saw a picture of one, I knew I had to have it in the garden. I love tall plants anyway, and this statues plant can grow up to two and a half metres high. With its red stems and stunning dark plum-purple domed flower heads, it was an absolute must have! Angelica is a biennial plant, meaning it doesn’t flower in its first year. It puts its roots down, ready to flower the following year. Once it has flowered it dies completely, hopefully having set seeds to create next years plants. Take One…

    read more
    Polly Gardener

    You May Also Like

    Magnolia

    It’s all go in the garden – Spring has Sprung!

    2 April 2023
    Wildflower Border

    Wildflowers – My New Border

    28 August 2022

    Muscari

    10 April 2022
  • Current

    Time to bring the chillies in!

    31 October 2021 / 0 Comments

    When we lived at our last house, we had no greenhouse, but we were desperate to grow chillies. We decided to have a go at growing them on the window sill. There was however a slight issue. The plants looked really healthy and were growing well, we just couldn’t understand why all these flowers weren’t producing fruit. Then it dawned on us, there were no insects in the house to pollinate them! We got one of my makeup brushes, and did a gentle dust on each flower. Eureka, fruit appeared! Keeping Chilli plants over winter All the guides talk about discarding the plants at the end of the season, and…

    read more
    Polly Gardener

    You May Also Like

    Out with the Brussels, in with the beetroot

    24 March 2021
    A basket full of apples

    2022 – A Bumper Apple Season

    27 November 2022
    Evergreen shrub Skimmia

    Where’s January going? It’s disappearing at an alarming rate!

    20 January 2024
  • Gardening Therapy

    Gardening through a pandemic – Part 3 Autumn 2020

    22 August 2021 / 0 Comments

    September, October, November Sadly three months after lockdown easing at the beginning of summer, the infection rates are climbing sharply. It’s hard not to fear the worst, that we are sliding headlong into a second wave. We knew the pandemic was far from over and we’d all resigned ourselves to this happening come the winter, but we certainly didn’t expect it so soon. Luckily the garden is still providing me with a refuge from all the bad news. And after such a fabulous weather year, it just carries on giving. The late flowers of the Heleniums, Asters and Rudbeckias, just to mention a few, are still providing lots of colour.…

    read more
    Polly Gardener

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    Gardening through a pandemic – Part 2 Summertime

    15 August 2021

    Gardening through a pandemic – Part 4 Winter 2020/21

    29 August 2021

    Gardening through a pandemic – Part 1 Spring

    8 August 2021
  • Transformation

    Let’s get stuck into the garden makeover!

    21 March 2021 / 0 Comments

    Garden transformation Part 1 – 2013 the first few months We moved to our new garden in August 2013. Chop, chop and yet more chopping. As it was summer we were outside very early every morning. It was hard to know where to start at times on our garden makeover, as there was so much to chop back and take out. We would fill the back of the pick-up until it was nearly toppling over, strap it down then put a second load on top, this did make it a bit slower at the recycling centre, but it was much more efficient. It was truly incredible how much we took…

    read more
    Polly Gardener

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    Greenhouse – Take two

    23 May 2021

    Lady bricklayer ?

    11 April 2021

    Gardening on an Ice-Age Glacier

    20 June 2021
  • Polly Gardener busy in her greenhouse telling her gardening story
    About me

    My Gardening Story

    14 March 2021 / 0 Comments

    I’m Polly and you are so welcome to my gardening blog. I had a happy privileged childhood, the privilege was nothing to do with money and everything to do with the people that surrounded me. I started gardening as a toddler following my dad around his vegetable patch, helping him – well at least I thought I was helping. I just loved getting my hands dirty. I grew up in an idyllic Cheshire village, where people knew each other and looked out for one another. This made it a safe place to go off exploring and pond dipping. As a teenager I decided that gardening was the most boring activity…

    read more
    Polly Gardener
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