Start with approachable crops and learn how to choose vegetables that suit your space, light and patience.
Beginner gardens fail most often because they try to grow too much. Five is plenty. Here are five vegetables that reward patience more than they punish mistakes.
1. Lettuce
Fast, forgiving, grows well in partial shade. Sow every two weeks and you will have leaves all season.
2. Radishes
From seed to harvest in thirty days. Perfect for a quick win.
3. Peas
Cool season crop that climbs on a simple trellis. Plant twice: early spring and again in autumn.
4. Spinach
Nutritious, shade-tolerant, and happy in cooler months.
5. Dwarf beans
Heavy croppers that fix nitrogen back into the soil they grow in.