Last week I made myself a little herb garden in a pot. I love herbs, I use them all the time in cooking, or just to add to a sandwich or a salad. The only thing is, I really struggle to grow them from seed! Everyone always tells me how easy they are, but I just can’t seem to make them happen.
I think for me, I just struggle with the conditions they need to survive. They scare me a little! So creating a herb garden in a pot seemed like a good challenge for this year.
I bought a little pack of herbs from my local garden centre for £10. It was money well spent purely because I don’t have to fret over trying to germinate a tonne of teeny tiny seeds!
HOW TO CREATE MY HERB GARDEN IN A POT
- Choose a pot that sits comfortably on the windowsill. Long rectangular ones look lovely, but smaller terracotta pots would work well too.
- Make sure there is good drainage holes. Herbs hate sitting in water.
- Add a layer of small stones in the bottom of the pot, this will encourage further drainage.
- Fill pot with peat free, multi purpose compost. It’s a good allrounder.
- Plant herbs together thinking about size and composition. Think about the pot in the same way you think about your flower borders and place bigger ones in first then fill the space with the smaller herbs to create interest.
- Water in well and consider mulching the top of the pot to ensure they don’t dry out.
A WORD ON MINT
Mint is a territorial herb and will overtake any pot of raised bed you put it in. Just like strawberries, they are experts at creating more and more of themselves until your entire garden is full of the stuff!
Mint also changes the flavour of other herbs, particularly other mints (such as peppermint). It comes in a huge amount of flavours too! Try googling strawberry or even pear mint! Ideally, it needs it’s own pot. If you are desperate to plant it in a border, keep it in the pot and simply bury the pot into the ground. That way it can be kept under control!
HERBS IN MY HERB GARDEN
So what herbs are in my beautiful little herb garden? These are some of my all time favourite herbs and ones I always come back to when cooking:
- Chives
- Sage
- Thyme
- Parsley
- Oregano
Though chives will happily grow into a huge plant if even the right amount of room, I use it a lot and wanted it to be close to my kitchen so I could simply snip a bit off whenever I need to!
I also have rosemary growing in two different places in my garden because I can not get enough of the stuff!! I use it whenever I roast veg or potatoes and just love the flavour it gives to a simple dish!
What herbs do you grow?
