Grow your own

You don’t need to be a gardener or even have a garden to grow your own for a Big Lunch. There are plenty of plants and veggies which are perfect to grow in a pot on the window sill or wherever there is some space and light! All you need is compost, something to grow things in and enthusiasm to give it a go!

Some of our favourite things to grow ready for your Big Lunch are:

Tomatoes – perfect for growing indoors if you don’t have any outdoor space
Lettuce – like the speedy salad lettuce seeds included in the Big Lunch pack!
Get yours now
Spring Onions – tasty in salads or quiches at any street party!
Peas – especially fast ones such as ‘Early Onward’, ‘Feltham first’ and ‘Mange tout’ varieties
Carrots – An old year round veggie to add a crunch to your Big Lunch

Download our Veggie-table to find out the best times of year to grow these delicious veg varieties, and learn some tricks of the trade to simple, fun growing!

There's also some fantastic charts and calenders available which are perfect for working out what fruit and veg are in season, so you can enjoy them when they are truely at their best! Love Bristish food has a great What's in Season chart and Eat Seasonably's interactive Calendar is really fun to use.

Landshare have also shared some of their expertise on our Growing Tips pages, for anyone wanting to grow all year round.

Ready, steady, grow.

With the London 2012 Games coming up just after The Big Lunch you could run window boxes down your street in red, white and blue and if your crops aren’t ready in time for The Big Lunch day, why not share them with your neighbours when you celebrate the Games? There are lots of green-fingered ideas to help you and your community get your gardens, streets and local spaces ready for the London 2012 Games which might inspire you for your Big Lunch too.

Green Growing

Don't have the time or money to buy plant pots? Utilise some of those unwanted household items by giving them a new lease of life as a pot to grow something tasty in for your Big Lunch; the wackier the better! Steve Burrell, from Eden Projects Horticulture team, shares his three top tips to growing in unusual items:

Drainage
plant roots will rot if waterlogged, so if your container has limited or no drainage then put a layer of gravel/stones with some charcoal in the bottom, and only water when needed (if the surface of the compost feels damp, its ok)
Compost
If you’ve spent nothing on the container, then spend on some good compost. The plants need all the help they can get in an unnatural environment.
Size matters
For example, root crops (e.g.carrots) need more room, so wellies are better than trainers; whereas small plants or rapid growers/early harvested (like our Big Lunch lettuce) will survive with less root room.

Make your own Pot

If you are going to grow your own plants from seed you don’t need to waste money on expensive plastic seed trays or peat pots; make your own out of newspaper! The finished pots are quite sturdy and will break down quickly once they've been planted in the soil. What’s great about them is they are so cheap and easy to make:

Lay a full sheet of black and white newspaper flat. Don't use shiny, coloured paper as it may contain heavy metals.
Fold the paper in half lengthwise twice to form a long, narrow strip of folded newspaper.
Lay a glass on its side and place it on one end of the strip of paper. Roll the newspaper around the glass. The glass is used only as a form to roll the paper around. About 1/2 of the strip of paper should overlap the open end of the glass.
Push the ends of the paper into the open end of the glass. This step doesn't have to be neat and tidy; just stuff the overlapping newspaper into the glass.
Pull the jar out of the newspaper pocket so you have the newspaper pot in your hand.
Push the bottom of the jar into the newspaper cup, squashing the folded bottom to flatten. This step will seal the bottom of your pot. Once the pot has been filled with soil, the bottom will be secure.
Pull the jar out and you have a finished paper pot.

Eden Project's 'Growzone'

The Growzone at the Eden Project is a garden full of crazy containers like Cinderella’s red dancing shoes brimming with Cress, Snow white’s silver handbag loaded with ettuce andPeter Rabbit with his pot of Parsley.It’s amazing how much you can grow in just about any container … Beans in boots, Toms in tubas, Thyme in teapots, Lettuce in lampshades, Peas in potties, Strawberries in straw hats.

Why not encourage your neighbours to give it a go? You could even hold a competition to be judged at The Big Lunch, like 'the tallest sunflower', 'the weirdest-shaped vegetable' or 'wackiest plant pot'? If you do, we'd love to see the photos! Email: yourstories@thebiglunch.com

Here are Growzone pollinater Dave’s 3 top tips to Big Lunch growing:

Cress / Sprouting Seeds - about 1 week

Just soak some sprouting seeds overnight and lay them on a piece of damp tissue or cotton. Keep them moist and ‘hey presto!’ Wash and eat with salads and sandwiches.

Leaf salad – about 3 weeks

Fabulous, free with your Big Lunch Pack and deliciously tasty! Just use a container of your choice like an old hat or leaky watering can and pop in some compost. Sow a mix of leaf salad seeds and throw in some rocket as well. New leaves will keep on growing so you will have a constant supply for your salads.

Pea shoots - about 3 weeks

If you love peas, why not treat yourself to the best bit, the shoot!Just sow some pea seedsthickly in a big container – like like an old washing up bowl, tub or bucket – full of potting compost.Scatterabout 1 cmof compost over the top and watch them grow over the next three weeks. Pinch off the growing tip,including the little leaves and eatstraight off the plant or with salads. They're lovely!

Don’t forget: you can keep on harvesting them, or leave to go to flower and eat the peas from the pods. Absolutely pealicious!!