Desert Island Vegetables 6

I am choosing eight vegetables to take with me to a fantasy desert island in a similar way to how I select for my home vegetable patch. Firstly by simply going for vegetables that I enjoy eating and secondly keeping an eye of good husbandry especially crop rotation. The basic idea is not to grow the same vegetables in the same ground year on year. The main reason is to prevent a build up of pests and diseases it also has some benefits with soil fertility as well. That said, some vegetables such as rhubarb and asparagus are grown in permanent beds.

A four-year rotation is the traditional ideal but this requires dividing your vegetable garden in four plots to rotate plus a permanent bed. An alternative is to rotate using three beds especially if your garden is too small to realistically divide into four plots.

To keep the four-year rotation simple you use one plot for brassicas (cabbage family), one for legumes (beans & peas), Alliums (onion family) in the third and for the fourth I have a plot for potatoes. It does take a while to work out what bed some vegetables should go in. For example Beetroot goes in the potato bed, lettuce with the onions – I initially regarded both as salad vegetables and grew them in the same bed.

So with crop rotation in mind by next choice of vegetable comes from the legume family but which to go for? On the one hand my favourite bean to eat fresh is the Runner closely followed by French; on the other I do like my baked beans so perhaps Haricot beans would be the better choice. Chickpeas would be a good choice especially for North African and Middle East dishes that might better suit the climate of my island. The fact that they can be dried also gives them versatility – I am assuming I will not have a freezer. Add to this that I have never grown Chickpeas and I like to grow something new every year then they are my sixth choice.

(photo above) Scarlet Emperor Runner beans - "a traditional old favourite" as it says on the packet and my choice for my home veg patch.