6 OF THE BEST... easy-grow vegetables

1 BEETROOT Sow direct in spring and you’ll be enjoying tiny, delicious salad leaves by June and earthy, sweet beetroots not long after.

2 LETTUCE Look for ‘cut-and-come-again’ seed mixes. Rather than growing individual lettuce heads, these varieties are grown as a dense bed that you graze, taking leaves that’ll regrow in a matter of weeks.

3 ROCKET A salad leaf that really lives up to its name; sow the seeds anytime from spring onwards and it will be ready to harvest in six weeks. If you’re impatient, you can eat the baby leaves after two or three.

4 CARROTS Spring-sown Chantenay and Nantes will be ready for early summer but mix it up with multi-coloured, round and late-autumn bloomers such as Autumn King, or try Amsterdam Forcing under cover for a year-round crop.

5 RADISHES There’s a surprising variety of radishes on offer – from the tiny, punchy Rosa to the sweet Pink Beauty. They’re fast-growing and are ready to harvest in about four weeks from sowing. Keep sowing every few weeks and you can still be nibbling them in November.

6 PERPETUAL SPINACH A spinach-flavoured leaf that’s actually a chard in disguise. It’s a vigorous grower – the more you pick it, the more it will keep coming. Use in salads and cooked.