over four years ago, we fulfilled our dream to design and grow an organic kitchen garden at the bell.  our plan was/is to supply the kitchen with delicious fresh herbs, a good variety of vegetables, a diverse selection of salad leaves, delicious spring and summer fruits and an array of picking flowers for the tables in the restaurant.  in may this year, we succeeded in achieving organic status!

essence garden design translated our initial ideas and, since then michele civil and her partner john tinklin have transformed it into a proper working kitchen garden. 

the bell's kitchen garden is divided into sections with a number of raised beds.  it has its own in-built natural water irrigation system fed by the spring in the orchard.  all our compost is organic and we only use organic kitchen waste.  michele rotates her brassicas and root vegetables but never digs the soil so as not to disturb the worms which are essential to keep the soil breathable and to maintain the chain of nutrients necessary to promote strong growth and the prevention of disease.  no chemicals are used at all and only natural methods such as the sprinkling of egg shells and companion planting are used to deter pests.  we are currently patiently pleaching the small fruit trees on the borders of the garden to ensure a maximum yield this year.

michele and our head chef rupert taylor work closely to ensure the garden works with the kitchen and this year she grew a number of exciting, peppery and spicy salad leaves, an interesting little gem squash plus a new sweet pea called champagne bubble - something very close to janet's heart!  all the bulbs and seeds are collected, stored and planted again for the following year.

we occasionally do kitchen garden tours and participated in the national garden scheme this year in early july.

we do a number of tours of the garden during the year when you can hear about how the garden started, how michele manages to supply good-looking,  tasty organic vegetables and fruit to a demanding (but very charming) head chef for the bell's busy restaurant.  most days during the summer  you can come along and buy  wonderful bunches of sweet peas, fresh strawberries, salad leaves, herbs and michele's delicious home-made jams and elder flower cordial which are all totally organic of course. are  available to buy from reception if you are quick. contact reception for details of garden tours.

kitchen news........

our kitchen garden has just been featured in  itv wales's  'a little piece of paradise' programme 3 with ruth wignal and bill lee.  janet talks about how the organic garden started, michele shows off all our varieties of crops and see how head chef rupert manages to persuade ruth that beetroot is delicious. to view the programme follow the link to www.itv.com/wales/