A brief, invaluable guide to the art of growing vegetables around the year and saving money in the process. Vegetable Growing is a practical guide to frugal allotmenteering, including planning your plot, looking after the plants, and practical tips for keeping your costs down, such as clever ways of making freebie alternatives to common growing tools. An additional handy section offers advice on which fruit and vegetables will save you the most money, as well as a season-by-season guide and ideas for boosting your savings with foraged and wild food. Written by Jonathan Stevens of the Real Men Sow blog, who recently embarked on a mission to find out how much he could save by growing his own fruit and vegetables on a half-sized allotment plot.

Jonathan Stevens took on a redundant allotment plot in 2007, and has been keeping a blog, Real Men Sow, about the process as he learns the hard way what works and what doesn’t.