Seasonal Produce

A cobnut is a cultivated variety of hazelnut, just as a Cox is a cultivated variety of apple. We have enjoyed wild hazelnuts from time immemorial. They’ve been grown in gardens and orchards since at least the 16th century.

Cobnuts are delicious fresh on their own. They can also be eaten with other ingredients, such as in a salad; some people like to eat them with a little salt. If they are to be chopped, this is best done shortly before eating them, as they do not keep well once they have been cut. Cobnuts are also excellent roasted, which brings out their flavour. Roasted nuts can be eaten on their own, or used whole, chopped or ground to flavour pasta, meringues, fruit crumbles, cakes, cake toppings etc.

This late summer fruit is great in many recipes: stirred into a fool, stewed to make jam or slow-cooked into a sauce to serve with meat. Modern cultivated damsons (such as the Merryweather variety) can be eaten raw when ripe, although there is about as much stone as there is flesh. In general, they're best cooked, which brings out their sweet, spicy flavour.

A versatile green that's great for stir-fries. It has a generally sweet flavour with a hint of mustard. Dwarf bok choy are more leafy than the regular bok choy and it goes without saying that they are also a lot smaller.  This crop is actually grown all year round in our Essex glasshouse.

Scotch Bonnets are a type of chilli pepper, they are generally extremely hot, scoring on average 100,000 - 350,000 on the SVU scale. We are currently growing these chillis from our own glass houses; they are looking really good!

Sloes (Blackthorn) are very small, green-fleshed, inky-skinned, wild plums with an acid flesh and bitter skin. They’re commonly found in hedgerows in England, Wales and Ireland and make a fabulous jam.