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I love that you mentioned foraging. In the drought we experienced this year, my garden struggled but the wild plants were beautiful. It is nice to know there is food beyond my garden.

Jerusalem artichokes have become a real favourite. I ferment them in a cabbage/carrot/ginger/beetroot slaw and find them very digestible that way. If you slice them very thinly and then dry and grind them up into flour their flavour becomes really addictive when added to a flatbread mix.

Another benefit of the pumpkin/squash is that the leaves and stems are edible. Steamed, the hairs all soften and they hold their texture really well and add a new dimension to the leafy green taste. Full of nutrients as well, so an extra bonus harvest. Wish i'd known this a few years ago!

Turnips are really underrated. And in my cold Swedish climate nothing beats cabbages of different sorts.

In spring I always forage for nettles. I (wearing rubber gloves) clean them, rinse them and put them in boiling water for just a minute. Then I freeze them and use in omelettes with cheese, pasta dishes, soups... I also use Chenopodium album the same way. Every autumn I forage autumn chanterelles that I dehydrate. Even though I have several buckets full of dehydrated mushrooms from last year I can't stop getting more. A jar of dehydrated mushrooms is a great gift. Also my grown up sons love that I have a lot of mushrooms that they can get in my pantry whenever they run out of them. 😂

Honestly, as a parent, it's so encouraging to have watched you follow your passions like this, it is what any person would want for their children. Wishing you every success, and thank you for the inspiration.

I appreciate your willingness to make us aware of other people's good ideas and products, even if there is no financial incentive to you. You seem like a very good person.

Yes to foraging! This year I made friends with an older lady down the road and we've had lots of great foraging adventures- lobster mushrooms, morels, boletes, chanterelles, blueberries, wild plums, bee balm and anise hyssop so far. Looking forward to next year's adventures!

If you quick blanch pak choi and sundry them, it will lasts for several years as a dry vegetable to use in stews, soups etc. Or once it dries completely, steam it, dry it again, and preserved it in dark jars with salt or sugar it will last more than ten years. Same applies to mooli and some specific citrus (Kumquats, lemon etc).

For me my most valued crops are garlic & greens. Home grown garlic is a staple & I mostly grow varieties that store 12 months, so I have it all year round. But some other garlic tips: when your bulbs just start to shoot, don’t compost them! Garlic is especially nutritious at this stage (think sprouting micro greens), and you can preserve the rest of your garlic by splitting out the bulb into cloves, store them in zip lock bags in the freezer. Take out a few cloves as needed, leave to thaw on the bench for a few mins and use as normal. Cooks up perfectly! Greens like silverbeet, spinach, chard.. a little chopped finely in every dish every day. So much goodness, esp over the winter months.

On foraging, we have a a ton of wild grapes on the property which are great for jams but we also use the vines to make seasonal wreathes. This generates a bit of income for the things we absolutely could not grow. A bit of weaving and most woody trimmings make for fun center pieces.

i love nasturtiums: they provide flowers to pick, and leaves for salad and are very easy to grow.

Chard, easy to grow, pest resistant, cold hardy, space to yeild ratio will outperform every other crop over the entire season!

silent reader and watcher on your channel here. i learn a lot about gardening and inspired me to start my own gardening which i started 2 years go. I have to make raise beds because of bad soil with lots of stone. :) It is relaxing in mind doing gardening specially during harvesting time specially when my kid enjoying eating them so fresh and organic. Thank you!

I'd like to add gemsquash. Grows like a pumpkin, but in half the time. Produces loads on a single plant. And for places with sunshine, okra.

Foraging has become such a huge part of our diet this year. The humble hogweed has the most amazing flavor seeds. Its taste is exquisite. I have added them into the Christmas chutney and pudding. A cross between citrus and cardamom, really surprising. And pineapple weed, mugwort and mullien have been picked and dried for teas to aid various things. Our hedgerows have been laden with treasure theseast few weeks. Walnuts, acorns for flour, dock for flour (gluten free), rosehip and elderberry for syrup and cordial. And slow berries, Quince and plums, all there just free to take.

I live on a rented property, therefore can't implement all my gardening desires and grow as much as I would like to. I let some plants to go in seed, then collect the seeds and grow microgreens - red cabbage, sunflower, kale, raddichio, raddish, even dandelion. I grow dandelion and nettles intentionally and add the young leaves in salads. Never bought tomatoe seeds, all sprouted from store bought, and this way I can have so many different varieties, especially with cherry tomatoes. And also size changes if grown in a raised bed or container. Definitely preparing to continue most varieties indoors over winter. Nasturtium leaves are rich in vitamin c, I air dry them and make powder, the flowers infused in vinegar or oil are good antibiotics and great for hair. I forage blackberries, rosehips and hazelnuts. And also regrow store bought lettuce, green onions, cabbage, potatoes and sweet potatoes. My garden looks like a jungle, veggies and herbs interplanted with begonias, roses, nasturtiums and other flowers. It looks aesthetically pleasing and is so useful. When I come from work, I let my 2 dogs in the garden and spend some time tidying up the plants, it is such a healing activity.

You mentioned that the golden beet is less ‘earthy’ than the typical red. I just grew the white ones this year and had one tonight. It’s even less earthy than the golden. I want to a do red/gold/white roasted medley next.

Beetroot greens can also be cooked. Also, there are recipes for tender pumpkin leaves and stem if you like Indian style vegeterian cooking. Try the male pumpkin flowers too, you can make fritters!

Storing sugar snap peas has never occurred to me. I have trouble enough saving them long enough to get to the kitchen because I snack as I pick. They are so good! As a friend said to me, "People who don't like vegetables haven't eaten garden fresh ones."

I abandoned my first garden and learned that without tending or watering at all that Basil, Mint, Cilantro, and Marigolds do fine. Anything that is categorized with "grows like a weed" is also an excellent grower. I've found that set and forget is the best way to deal with high stress situations. Dinner included.

I love fresh mint tea. Another easy to grow is melissa, it's an easy plant to grow (not that easy to get rid of 😅), but tea made from fresh leaves is delishous, it has a slightly lemon taste in it. Another great tea is a mix of dry apple, fresh mint and a bit of dry elder flower (flower, not fruit), it's absolutely amazing!

Pumpkin leaves. are delicious and nutritious. There are heaps of delicious recipes from Papua New Guinea, Mauritius, Ghania etc to try and enjoy.

Winecap mushrooms (Stropharia rugosoannulata) have been an amazing crop for me. Bought mushrooms are quite costly to eat as frequently as I like. Winecaps are ridiculously easy to grow, super productive and they make amazing soil! I also love that they're nearly impossible to mistake for other mushrooms. If you already have woodchips in your garden, it's as easy as finding a good spot, burying some winecap spawn, keeping it watered and waiting! I've heard blewits are also fairly easy to cultivate in piles of mixed leaves, woodchip, etc. There are some dangerous look alikes with them though.

One of my favorite crops for self-sufficiency is winter squash. They store all winter long, and are great meal staples. In addition to baked squash, the make great pies. This year we harvested 7 Cushaw, 9 Red Kuri, and 13 Butternut squash from 4 plants.

Huw, I had to laugh out loud, hearing you speak about the beauty of Jerusalem artichoke while the beautiful blossoms were actually attacking you 😂. Did grow them the first year myself and the variety I choose is getting huge apparently! I am looking very much forward to the harvest in winter. Thanks for the lovely video!

It has been a fabulous year for foraging Huw, and I wish more people would follow the correct code, however on the other hand I have seen people look questioningly at what I'm up to 🤣. Just recently I've had guelder rose berries, rosehips, Hawthorn and rowan. Today I had a marvellous haul of crab apples, and most of them were windfalls. I left a tidy pile in the hedge too for blackbirds, mice and voles etc. Anything left are great for insects too. After I have processed them there is another great self-sufficiency thing to do - my hens absolutely love the leftovers. Especially because it is such a natural thing for them to eat this time of year. Thank you for bringing up foraging Huw - it is my favourite subject and has been ever since I found a copy of Food For Free when I was about 13. Little did I know then how iconic it would become 🙂 Take care, thank you for the video!

Beetroot: try sugar beets! Looks like a parsnip but it's sweet! Pumpkin (I think any winter squash) is soo versatile!

I absolutely love your channel because you get right to the information and the layout is super with great camera work. It's prefect!

I love that you included mint and herbs for tea (tisanes). I grow lots of herbs and dry them for use throughout the year. A mesh bag hung on the washing line usually does the job without a dehydrator in the warmer months (unless it's raining).

So Nice! I have 5 square meter lot to grow only. But I am thankful.❤ Cultivating is meditation, healing.

I found a new way to use the melons (both cantaloupe and honeydew) that didn't fully ripen last year. I pickled them in a sweet brine and added mint and dried chili flakes. They tasted amazing on New Year's Day. So happy to see that you and Gaz have become friends. Sending much love to you and your family from Washington state, USA ♡♡♡

My underrated crop that even shows up in your video (but isn't mentioned) is nasturtiums - if you live in a milder climate, nasturtiums are self-seeding, incredibly prolific. You can eat the flowers and leaves (I use them as a substitute for arugula when they're in season) and if you pickle the seeds they make great capers you can add to rice, noodles and many other dishes.

I like to grow mint and lemon balm and mix them to make a lovely tea. Put some honey and lime juice in it and it'll warm your bones AND clear your throat!

pumpkin cream soup with mascarpone cheese, bacon, and croutons also try fresh lemon balm tea. Yummy.

Congrats on the launch of your online shop! So exciting to see you grow over the past few years.

I’m a big lambs quarters fan. I agree with the mint and beets being underrated for sure! …love sugar beets❤ I will definitely do Sun chokes next year🥰

Huw you are awesome! I'm so excited about this contest, your products are beautiful! 😃👍

Thank you for offering the contest. It inspired me to take time to look at your store. I put your books on my Christmas list. So this year, when the kids ask, I am ready with ideas.

Great information! Thank you. Glad I found you channel.

I never tire of your videos. Thank you for your integrity, respect for nature and genuine enthusiasm... so happy you mentioned nettles! 💚🌱💚🍃

What a great way to promote your store and get a feel for what people like. I had not seen the store b4 so glad i have

This video is brilliant, I agree with all your choices as the underrated crops and for mentioning foraging, thank you for all your help, much appreciated.

Thank you for creating such wonderful videos! They have been so helpful to me as I expand my garden and learn to grow, harvest, and cook things I never have before! What amazing variety!

Huw, thank you so much for your inspiring videos. I love the fact that you're gardening in Wales where the climate must be the same as here. Sadly I never had success with Pak Choi.

The comments from this kind of community are a wonderful resource, too. So much knowledge, freely offered. Gratitude.

New subscriber here, just watched some of your videos as we recently returned to the UK after 8 years in New Zealand and we are on our own sustainability/ growing journey which we vlog. All fun in the learning, so thank-you for sharing.

Big fan of foraging, and thank you for including the wildlife sharings. Love the bitters, especially the shaded, leggy dandelion leaves to add to salads, and the wild grape leaves and oak leaves for the crunch in sour pickles. Top keepers and super foods are sweet potatoes and beets( including the beet leaves, and anything in the cabbage family. I found that almost all root veggies and fruits are best roasted or grilled, bringing out the sweetness. Pickled beets, ferments for gut health, sugar pumpkins (not the jack'o lanterns)are all favorites. Dillweed for sours and ferments, (fresh will make the brine cloudy but still taste wonderful) and the monarch butterfly catapillars love it. And my too pollinators, catnip, and your feline friends will love you!

I did so well with tomatoes, that I have had 14kg today, but 61kg on only 1 week. Still got around 2 weeks to finish them.

Thank you so much Hugh. Sharing this sort of information is so helpful. You are a credit to the gardening community 🙏🏼

Sunchokes dont plant them in a spot you want to move eventually. Even if you dig them all out they find a way to regrow from there.

Thanks for mentioning drinks. I use herbs from my garden all the time for teas. Keeps us healthy, I think. My favorite is lemon balm. I love your tip for cooking beets!

I love my Sunchokes. I grow Pok Choy indoors. I love your pumpkins. I always had luck with them. My winter greens are growing very fast. I always enjoy your videos. Thank you

I can recommend Black Peppermint for a good tea. It grows well in pots and I think it's a beautiful herb. I'm potting some on for the kitchen over winter. Thanks for the tips, Huw.

Wow that's so amazing having a Farm..... well done my friend 👍🏿👍🏿👍🏿

Great video, thank you for sharing your knowledge

So glad you mentioned that when foraging it is important to leave enough for others especially wildlife!

I loved it! Thanks from Portugal!

Such a brilliant video Huw! I will incorporate some of these tried and true vegetables but also take a stab at some newer ones mentioned! I like the idea of venturing beyond the garden gates.😎

My husband and I have been watching you since you were very young. Like your parents, we too, are SOW very “ proud” of you!! Blessing and Grace to you!!

Thank you again for another interesting and informative video! I grow beets, mint, ramp and other items mentioned and will use them in recipes suggested.... I would like to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Mine was yesterday and I understand Mr. Richards has one in a few days. Looking good! Again thx for the info! 😊

Love this segment!! I grew up with a dad who gardened, then married into a family of biologists! I just harvested a fall flush of nettles from my yard, and brought a small batch of Jerusalem artichokes to my new garden, along with perennial kale, good king Henry and a bunch of perennial herbs! (Between 75 & 100 plants in pots!!)

For the mint - great for mojitos:)

Thank you Huw, great information as always. I really think Silverbeet and Spring Onions are really under rated. Especially when grown as cut and come again crops.

I've got to say my no 1 is the nobal onion. You can make so many different delisous dishes and especially the simple cheese and onion sandwich 🥪😋😊

Interesting selection, I love foraging, really good year for hedgerow apples

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge! I love the scene where you're speaking about mint and the sun chokes are dancing in the wind behind you! How beautiful! Thank you Huw! Nettles, mint, garlic! Delicious! Your video quality and content is awesome!!!

Two large patches of wild purslane gave us gobs and gobs of foraged harvest from our meadow out back. The plants were so large and healthy. We harvested BUSHELS and froze, ate, dehydrated, ate some more, and made into powder until I finally gave up and told my husband, "don't bring in anymore!". It will all be great additions to our soups, smoothies, breads and whatever stands still for winter cooking and baking. Thank you for another outstanding teaching.

SO true, Pak Choi or also Tat Soi, a variation, grow SO quickly, they are must-have´s at the beginning and end of a year! The fresh leaves can also be added to a salad. If you grow it shady, the leaves become more tender (good for salad) I found out this autumn.

Excellent! Sincerest Thanks for these suggestions. Some of us have done just occasional gardening, when our circumstances allowed us BOTH some time and land to cultivate. It has been my joy to garden with just a few hundred square feet of soil. But trying to garden with just a few planters seemed to require Much Greater attention to the selection of items growing together. Your information is helpful, if a person is able to take the time to view your posts. (Subscriber)

very interesting and helpful as always

I tend to like winter squash better than the big orange pumpkins, especially as many varieties seem to keep longer.

Good video. Sunchokes or Topinabor as they're call here in Sardinia are a great crop. Fry them up with your sundried tomatoes and pasta.

I always really enjoy you videos. In addition to your list, I think that delicate squash are also great. They grow so easily. They can be sliced and placed in the oven for 20 min. They taste similar to sweet potatoes and they are easier to cut and handle than pumpkins.

Now that it's cooled down here in the desert southwest I sowed some beets. Red and golden. I'm excited!

I like watching and listening to your channel which is so helpful. Am going to give the golden beetroot a try next year. I have different kinds of mint which I use in cooking and mixture into sauces. I love chopping chard up in stir fry.

Very nice info, well done 👍

Some interesting crops mixed in there. I love lima beans but rarely see anyone growing them on the podcasts out there. They are relatively easy to grow bush or pole varieties as long as your soil is not to rich in nitrogen. They are high in calories so are a good thing to incorporate into your garden to help in being self sufficient.

I LOVE sunchokes! I enjoy watching them grow, as well as digging them up. They're even more plentiful than potatoes I also love mint, which I planted on Huw's recommendation a few years ago. My brother calls the tea "Encouragement in a cup."

Excellent video! And love the little cooking tips.

It is very generous of you to have this drawing. It was fun looking through the items and deciding which ones to choose (even though there is a strong likelihood someone else will be chosen). I hope the items are drop shipped from somewhere in the USA for American recipients because customs can take FOREVER and a day.

I LOVE Beets or as y'all say in the UK - beet root. I rinse, cut of the tops and root and boil until soft. Then skin and slice up with salt/pepper and butter. The BEST taste on earth. I've also pickled several jars this year. GREAT VIDEO!!!

I love roast beets & borscht, but I’ve found my absolute favourite way to eat beetroot is Alys Fowlers beetroot marmalade preserve recipe! OMG it’s incredible & goes great with cheese, in salads, on top of meals. I actually can’t get enough of it! I also make a batch with fresh chilli in as I love spicy things & this year I’m trying it with golden beets, tarragon, ginger & cider vinegar; it’s become a staple of ours!

Beets are very good, I actually like the earthy flavor of the red ones! They are great fermented, pickled , roasted together with other root vegetables and the leaves are great in salads or sauteed. Very versatile. Thanks for sharing 🤗

Great video, I appreciate you not saying the same veg everyone else does. Some real unusual stuff. PS your website is awesome love the camp stove i can see you brewing some tea in the garden now. ❤

I often make a juice from beets and its sooo good. I also make pumpkin seed juice by boiling the pumpkin seeds with the membrane along with a carrot and a small piece of pumpkin then after that's cooled I blend it up and add some nutrient and or Malta and sweetener 😋

I have to second the real pleasure of making tea from your garden. This year I got some more unique medicinal herb starts from the farmers market, like hyssop and tulsi, and added it with our patches of mint, borage, calendula and chamomile to make really incredible fresh herbal teas. It's something I know I am going to be looking forward to each year.

Love the foraging point. I forage chanterelle and lobster mushrooms, blackberry's, Huckleberry's, and sorrel.

great vid. nettles should definitely be in the garden!

Great recommendations.

Mint, Chamomile and Stevia. Recently combined those that we grew and was blown away at the amazing flavor. Kids love it as well.

I'd like to add the humble parsley to be grown all year round.Easy to grow, winter hardy and about £1 a pop in the shops so, convenient to have in the garden. My chickens love it too.

I am glad you have mentioned foraging. 😁 A video on how to store food would be great.

Foraging is something I have done for years. elderberry can make good wine. this year I have spent time forgeing sweet chestnuts both greatly expands my diet with little cost. it also adds to my quality of live

Personally I grow and store 11 different varieties of Yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolius) and they give a harvest of 10kg tubers per plant, very good storage in my basement. They don't regrow like sunchokes but need to survive protected from freezing and they are very healthy.

Thank you so much His for the wealth of information you share, I truly appreciate it and feel I'm becoming a better gardener thanks to you. I am wondering how your winters and growing climate compares to mine, I live in central United States (Nebraska) in a growing zone of 5b?

Omg did this ep EVER resonate with me! I actually came to permaculture via foraging, which I’d done all my life, rather than gardening - just planted my first garden this year at age 60. I planted a LOT of native wild edible plants - including rugosa roses and nettles, hawthorn and serviceberry. Yep, my mint - and my lemon balm for tea too - grow in big raised beds of their own. As do my Jerusalem artichokes!

Thank you Hugh. I enjoy foraging locally, where I live in NZ for things like chestnuts when in season, watercress and versatile wild (medicinal) herbs like dandelion (also, the roots can be made into a substitute coffee). I find your videos super inspirational, very helpful and down to earth. All the very best to you and yours. Namaste 🙏🏼

Blue and Hubbard pumpkins are having a really fine texture and you can store them till springtime. There are so delicious recipes with peppermint, fried, Börek , Piroggi, or cakes, dips. Mmmhhh. And Sunchokes pickled with other vegetables as Tursi...