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- Choosing your site
Choosing the site for your vegetable garden carefully
The three rules to follow when deciding where to locate your vegetable garden
Orientation
Think about the amount of sunshine (e.g. tomatoes, aubergines and peppers) and shade (e.g. celery and leeks) each of the plants you have chosen needs.
Slope
A gently sloping plot is always better than a completely flat one. It should be able to drain naturally.
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Mineral salt content
The ideal soil contains around twenty mineral salts (sulphur, iron, manganese, magnesium, chlorine, sodium, copper, zinc, boron, molybdenum, cobalt, etc.). It is a good idea to get the soil in your garden analysed, so that you can make up for any deficiencies, for example by adding:
- crushed limestone to reduce acidity
- manure or peat (which is often enough to correct the soil balance, particularly for growing artichokes).
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Random tip
Cauliflower is such a tender vegetable that its cooking time has to be calculated to the minute: to avoid unpleasant odours, add a crust of hard bread to your pressure-cooker: it will absorb all the smells your nose doesn’t like!
Tip
Vegetables often contain more vitamin C than fruit. Cabbage and spinach contain more than oranges or lemons, and peppers have much more than kiwi fruit.