Kitchen Gardener Rob Smith is growing chillies, potatoes and even his own scourers!
I'm even growing my own scourers along with chillies and potatoes
Can you believe we’re already into February? Thankfully the days are getting longer and the light stronger, which all point towards us gardeners starting to sow more seeds and getting things ready for the season ahead.
I would urge you to work with your own environment; don’t feel pressured to sow or plant anything unless you think it will grow well, after all, the aim is to have healthy plants which are ready to plant out after the last frosts, not leggy plants which will struggle and won’t perform. Waiting a week or two before sowing won’t affect your harvest, but it may well improve your plants.
That said, if you have a heated propagator or sunny windowsill, you should be able to start seeds off successfully. I’m sowing a few more chillies and some sweet peppers as they need a longer season to successfully crop; they’ll grow on my greenhouse benching. ‘Popti’ is a really nice sweet pepper which won’t take up much space and will provide me with quite a few sweet red peppers, while ‘Jalapeño’ is one of my ‘go to’ chillies as it’s not that hot and therefore can be used in most dishes.
I’ve also decided to have a go at growing my own pan scourers, in the form of luffa (Luffa cylindrica)! This relative of the squash family needs a long, hot season, so starting seeds inside now is a must. I’ll be using a heated propagator to start them off, two seeds per 9cm (3½in) pot; simply sow them as you would a courgette or pumpkin and make sure you have space on the greenhouse floor for them to crawl, or hang some twine netting from greenhouse supports for the plants to scramble up. If you’ve never seen a luffa before, they look like a thick, long cucumber which you harvest and leave to go brown later in the season. Once the skin is brittle and brown you peel it off to reveal the luffa skeleton inside which is what we’re all familiar with. This process can be a little messy, but it’s worth growing my own scourers to reduce the number of plastic ones I use!
I’ve already started chitting a few potatoes in the shed, but depending on your school of thought some people do and others don’t. I’ve tried both methods before and haven't seen a great difference in yield, in fact, as some tubers chit I’ll plant others in a large container in the greenhouse; I do this every year as it
provides me with extra early potatoes. Fill the container a third with compost, place two seed potatoes in and cover with more compost, then drape a double layer of fleece over the pot to keep the frost out and top up with soil as you see the plants breaking through as normal. Use a salad or first early for best results.
It’s not just potatoes you can chit now – oca (Oxalis tuberosa) can be started the same way (they taste almost like new potatoes roasted with lemon) and will produce shoots from their eyes just like the potato. If they sprout a little too quickly, tubers can be potted into 2 litre pots and grown on a sunny windowsill until they’re ready to be planted out after the frosts; the plants don’t
grow that tall so they shouldn't become triffids!