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Despite persevering with growing beefsteak tomatoes last summer, I was once again severely disappointed with the results. I've grown them several times over the past few years but always found their yields really small compared to normal

Ask me to recommend just one vegetable crop to grow for great returns and it would have to be tomatoes. Which other crop can match it for variety? Whole catalogues are available, listing literally hundreds of different varieties of tomato seed

harsh sun. Organic gardeners usually refer to companion plants as those deterring pests in some way. Tagetes planted alongside tomatoes and crops is a good example, where the strong pungent scent of the tagetes foliage helps mask the scent of the crop

I've just picked, and eaten, my first home-grown tomato of the year – and it was delicious. It's actually a brand new outdoor bush variety, and yet to be named, but on my sunny patio it has even beaten the greenhouse crops to produce the first ripe

seed sowing. My sowing list includes greenhouse tomatoes, chillies and sweet peppers, plus a few half-hardy bedding varieties – all plants that benefit from early sowing and a long growing season.My plan for the week involves something of a spring clean

simply sold as 'sweetcorn', 'tomato' or 'white potato' when you haven't a clue what the variety actually is? We can be far more discerning, as both consumers and gardeners, choosing and growing named varieties of crops that have the flavour and eating

Things really move up a gear in May when you're growing your own. With a greenhouse bulging at the seams, I can't wait for the risk of frosty nights to pass so I can plant them outside.Tomatoes, courgettes, sweetcorn and other tender crops

eaten", or Tomato 'Gardener's Delight' - still Alan Titchmarsh's favourite. Or how about Carol Klein's choice of Beetroot 'Boltardy', which she describes as "always delicious … a joy as baby beets and unsurpassed as mature roots". The late John Cushnie

a plate offering more than green leaves, so a mix of colourful lettuce, red-veined beetroot, thinly sliced circles of white radish, red tomatoes and diced yellow peppers really hits the spot. You can really let your creative, artistic side take over

to cover fences, and are used to divide areas of the garden. I have a greenhouse where I can squeeze in about eight tomato plants, a couple of cucumbers, plus pots of aubergine, sweet peppers and chillies. And pots of strawberries too, as grown outside