Grow to Eat

Grow to Eat is the definitive seasonal guide to edible gardening in South Africa, brought to you by your favourite gardening magazine, The Gardener. A practical, non-nonsense guide, Grow to Eat is filled with growing, harvesting and cooking tips for seasonal fruit, vegetable and herbs.

Welcome

Sneak Peak Spring 2023 • Need some more colour in your life after the gloomy winter season? We’ll look at the ways you can brighten up your edible garden with colourful plants that also translate to more colour in the kitchen.

BLAZING A TRAIL • Set in the rolling hills, this gorgeous vegetable garden delivers all year round.

SPICE mixes • The joy of using spice mixes is that you can season your food just as they would in any country or for a specific dish, gathering all the flavour in one jar of aromatics. Here are some of our favourite mixes.

Curry Leaf Masala Spice • Place the seeds, coconut and chillies in a dry pan and toast until they are fragrant and smoking. Cool and grind in a spice grinder with the curry leaf. Store in glass jars.

Fish Spice Mix • Blend all the spices together and keep in jars. To use, oil the fish lightly and cover in the spice mix. Cook under a grill or on a braai until just cooked through and serve with extra lemon wedges and some bread and homemade jam.

Hot Taco Spice Mix • Taco seasoning can be used for any Mexican-style dish to give it a more authentic flavour. Try it when preparing chilli con carne, tacos, chicken enchiladas, veggie and cheese burritos or bean dishes. Mix all the ingredients together and store in jars in a cool, dry place for 3 months.

Winter Glühwein Spice Mix • Gluhwein as it’s traditionally called in Germany and Austria (or mulled wine elsewhere) is a spicy warm alcoholic drink that is perfect for a cold winter’s night celebrating around a crackling fire. It’s easy to make and totally delicious.

VEGETABLES

The best of the brassicas

Take your pick • Kale can have flat or curly leaves, ranging in colour from purple to blue-green, dark green and very dark, almost black leaves, each with a variation in flavour.

Start an indigenous vegetable garden

Durban Curries • From humble beginnings to internationally famous, Durban curries are considered some of the best in the world and unique to this little eastern corner of South Africa.

Key spices and ingredients • There are certain spices and spice mixes that make up the flavour that is unique to Durban curries. These are our top 10:

Subscribe and win! • Stand a chance to win a gardening hamper from GARDENA.

Keeping Brassica Pests at bay • When it comes to pests that prey on brassicas, there is good news and bad news.

LEEKS

NO DIG Gardening

HERBS & SPICES

Rosemary for the cooler months

Zero-waste veg • The concept of zero-waste cooking is finding ways to use more of a product and reducing the amount of waste that gets dumped in landfills. Just like top-to-tail cooking with meat, there are also ways to use just about every piece of a vegetable beneath the dirt you wash off it.

GARDEN infused

Curry Leaf • A Durban curry would not be finished without the subtle flavour of curry leaf to complete the taste.

Anoint yourself from the garden • Combining garden plants and a little kitchen alchemy can lead to healthy skin and the alleviation of everyday aches and pains…

FRUIT

Start a home Orchard • Few things are as rewarding as picking the sun-ripened fruits of your labour.

KIWI

Fruit trees but no fruit • Having planted and pampered stone fruit trees and then not being able to harvest their sweet fruit by the bushel full in late summer is disheartening. Why do they sometimes give so...