We're pleased as punch that Rich and Nick, aka Two Thirsty Gardeners, will be sharing their green-fingered knowledge with us on a regular basis. You can look forward to practical tips, tricks and cooking ideas galore – from collecting seeds and planting, to soil care, home brewing, delicious recipes and ways of preserving surplus vegetables and fruits... So let's introduce them...
Rich was raised in the Midlands, "surrounded by factories, houses and the occasional grass verge", and one of his earliest memories was stirring his Gran’s elderflower wine with a large wooden spoon. Nick hails from a village in Gloucestershire and had green-fingered parents who grew a large part of the family diet in their garden, and brewed many "weird and wonderful alcoholic concoctions" in the garage. So it wasn't surprising that, after Rich moved to the South-West, he and Nick became fast friends.
The duo began making their own cider in 2008, "pilfering apples from anyone with a tree and brewing them in Rich’s garden shed". This year, they acquired "a neglected, overgrown allotment plot strewn with litter and without a patch of bare earth in sight". As befits a duo who call themselves Two Thirsty Gardeners, the first thing they planted was an apple tree…
Two Thirsty Gardeners chronicles their battles with slugs, weeds and other nasties, as they attempt to produce a fresh vegetable harvest and, needless to say, turn some of the fruits of their labour into alcohol! And we're going to join Rich and Nick on their journey...
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