Letter N The A to Z of TV Gardening

Hello. Welcome to The A to Z of TV Gardening

where we sift through all your favourite gardening programmes

and dig up a bumper crop of tips and advice

from the best experts in the business.

Flowers, trees, fruits and veg,

letter by letter they're all coming up a treat

on The A to Z of TV Gardening.

Everything we're looking at today begins with the letter...

Here's what's coming up.

Dominic Littlewood goes naked gardening.

Once a month, people come here to enjoy the scenery,

throw their clothes off...

..and not get told off for it.

Christine Walkden finds out about naturalistic planting.

This looks like you just get a packet of flower seeds and go...

-It's not that?

-There's an awful lot more involved than that.

And the traditional nut is making a comeback.

My very first cobnut.

Shame on you! You should have had them before!

That's all to come on today's show.

But first, let's look at a plant that we all love to hate.

Especially when the sunshine is out and you've slipped a pair of shorts on!

Our first N is for nettles.

If you're one of those gardeners who's scared of them stinging you,

James Wong is here to show that you can overcome that fear.

As an ethno-botanist, nettles are fascinating to me

because they've been used by so many cultures for so many different things.

From medicines to foods to textiles.

One thing I've never heard them being used for, however,

is for entertainment, but that's exactly what happens

at the World Nettle Eating championships

where they're eaten raw and stinging. And I'm taking part.

The championships held for the last 12 years at The Bottle Inn pub in Marshwood, Dorset

has attracted competitors from around the world.

However, it started from rather more humble beginnings.

The legend goes that two local farmers decided to settle a dispute

over who had the longest nettles on their land

and the loser would have to eat them.

From this, the championships were born.

But if I'm to stand any chance of succeeding, I'll need some help.

And who better to turn to for advice than one of today's judges and the current world record holder.

So, Simon, you're a true veteran. What do I need to do to prevent myself getting stung?

-Commitment.

-OK.

It's a psychological test for you.

-OK.

-OK. And to focus.

That's really important. So, pick a leaf and see how you get on.

-And stick it in my mouth?

-Stick it in your mouth.

OK. Ouch!

-When you go for that leaf, go with commitment.

-OK.

I'll show you. Pull it off so you've got the complete leaf there.

-OK.

-Give it a go.

-That's all kinds of manly.

-OK. No fear.

-That's half OK.

Now make a little parcel like that.

Put it between two fingers and put it in your mouth. Don't touch your lips.

Lips are very sensitive.

That's a lot easier than I was expecting! I didn't sleep last night because I was thinking about...

What flavours are you getting there?

Tastes a bit like cabbage. Watercress?

-Right.

-Stings your fingers more than it stings your tongue.

OK. You've got to hold that thought in your head, OK?

-OK.

-That's the happy thought you have to stick with.

-OK.

-When you get to the bigger leaves, which you'll have to eat

because there's no choice. You'll be given a two-foot length of nettle

and you've got to take all the leaves off that stalk

and put them in your mouth and eat them.

For my record, I actually ate 76 foot.

Which is 38 stalks.

-What are my chances?

-I think you did moderately well, shall we say.

A first timer, I reckon by the end of the timed hour,

if you've eaten ten stalks, that's 20 foot,

I'll be very impressed.

'So Simon has set me a challenge.

'Maybe a little ambitious, but I'll do my best.

'I've resigned myself to the fact that I'll get stung a lot today.

'But there's a good reason for these weeds being so defensive.

'Stinging nettles have evolved to protect themselves from being eaten by animals

'and each leaf contains a layer of hollow hairs

'which are similar to hypodermic needles.

'When they penetrate the skin, an acid is injected,

'causing painful stings lasting for a few minutes to up to 24 hours.'

If you do get stung by nettles, Mother Nature often has a remedy to hand.

It's found in the simple form of a dock leaf.

The leaves contain chemicals that are alkaline

which help neutralise the acid sting of the nettles.

They remove pain and help reduce inflammation.

All you need to do is break off one,

crush it up so you get the juice out and rub it on the affected area.

It will get to work quite quickly.

But there's so much more to nettles than their nasty sting.

Although at today's competition, the nettles are eaten raw,

when they're chopped or dried, the sting completely disappears

making them perfect to be used in traditional medicine

or eaten as food, as they contain 40% protein,

more than any other leafy vegetable.

Humans aren't the only species to find nettles useful.

Up to 40 different types of insects lay their eggs specifically on nettles

because the stings help protect them from predators.

And even though I feel a little guilty about depriving insects of their protected habitat,

I don't think I can use it as an excuse to get out of the competition!

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for turning up.

Please, competitors, join us up here. Please come on.

'I'm starting to feel quite nervous.'

Brace yourselves. Brace yourselves.

Five, four, three, two, one, and go!

'The aim is to eat as many nettles as you can in one hour.'

It's basically like a salad eating competition.

Except the salad bites back!

The more you eat, the more the dye from the nettles turns your tongue black.

I'm way behind. I've got a new technique, though. Check it out.

If you do that, they all come off pretty quickly.

So they're neater then.

So you can get clean stems, but you've also got to eat the damn things.

I'm going to do ten, cos that's the challenge Simon set for me.

-Five, four, three, two, one!

-That's it!

Hooray!

'Thank goodness that's over.

I think it did pretty well. Hope the judge agrees!

-You've got four.

-I should be proclaimed the winner!

-Six disqualified.

-Excellent.

So I think I've eaten about ten stems. Not bad going.

About 20 foot of them.

Except the judges don't consider any of these are good enough.

Because there are little bits of leaf left on them.

So I've only done four stems,

but that's eight foot high, taller than I am.

That's not bad. First timer. Never know, next time I may beat them.

Haven't even got a black tongue yet!

Today's joint winners, Mike Hobbs and Mel Lang

ate 46 feet of nettles each!

Astonishing!

I had a brilliant time today.

Even though I'm disappointed I had six stems disqualified.

But nettles can have other uses.

We stay with James as he helps teenager Alice

with her hay fever allergy.

It's really important that hay fever sufferers consult their doctor

but I think I've got a traditional plant-based treatment

that might have something to offer, too.

I'm going to show Alice how to make a tea from the humble stinging nettle.

Alice, it couldn't be easier.

I'm going to hand you a suitably glamorous pair of pink gloves.

Most people know what nettles look like,

but if in doubt, there are two species that look quite similar.

One is the dead nettle, with these white flowers.

It's completely safe to eat, but doesn't have any sting and doesn't have the properties we're after.

It's these babies over here. As soon as you touch them,

you realise they do sting.

All you've got to do is snip off a couple of bits.

Pop them in a bowl. You don't need that many, either, to make tea.

Research published by American and Italian scientists

suggest that nettle extract could help reduce the symptoms of hay fever.

Many sufferers find that drinking nettle tea does help.

That's all we need, I think.

I don't always head out to the countryside with teapots and cups.

You can make this at home, or buy it in quite a few large supermarkets.

All you need to do is give them a good rinse. We've done that already.

Just get it in there and chop them up.

You can do that with the same secateurs you used earlier.

No need for a chopping board. Want to have a go?

Are they good for you?

Nettles are full of all different types of minerals.

Once, they were commonly eaten as a vegetable.

Once you boil them up, the sting completely goes away.

They only sting when they're raw.

All you need, if I can do this without stinging myself,

is about that for a pot of tea.

That's about two spoons, I think.

All you need to do is leave this for about five or ten minutes,

just until the water starts to be tinged with the green.

You can already smell the flavour start to kick in. What do you think?

-Quite strong!

-What do you think it smells like?

Like vegetable soup.

Have a go. See what you think.

I promise it won't sting you.

Is it better than you expected it to be?

I thought it was going to be horrible, but it's quite nice.

'I'm not sure she's convinced!

'But I think used in combination with conventional medicine,

'that tea is really worth a go.'

Now to a real beauty.

Named after a Greek youth who, according to myth,

was so good-looking, he fell in love with his own reflection.

N is for narcissus.

Here's Sarah Raven, finding out about an unusual way

of planting them.

Chris Bailes has developed a fantastic system of growing narcissi from seed.

I'm slightly dubious about the idea of growing bulbs from seed.

It just feels like it's so easy to do, the other way.

So is it really worth it?

It is. I would say it, wouldn't I, but it is worth it.

We've been growing our own here now

for about 20 years.

So we've got a little conveyor belt system going.

And every year now, we get some.

You have to wait that first three or four years, but now they're coming through every year.

It's delightful. The little capsules will split open

around May or June.

Having separated the seed from the capsules,

we then will sow it, typically, very soon after we collect it.

You can leave it until early October,

but they need to spend a whole winter to break their dormancy,

-because they will be coming up...

-They need a cold snap.

Whatever.

These are sown into our normal seed compost

but into what are unfeasibly deep pots.

It seems rather odd that something so small needs a pot this deep.

But in the wild Narcissus grows in moist meadows

in the upland regions of Portugal and north-west Spain.

So this retains the cool moistness that they appreciate

but we put in around about 25% of super-coarse Perlite

-which keeps it beautifully open.

-Yeah.

-So it's moist but not boggy.

-Absolutely.

One just broadcasts the seeds thinly over the surface,

a very light covering of the same compost

and then a layer of coarse gravel

to stop the liverworts and mosses strangling the poor things at birth.

They then go into a cold frame.

They actually spend all their lives in the nursery in cold frames.

Two years they'll spend in the seedling pot

and then around about July, August, in their second year,

we then pot them on into small containers,

five or so bulbs per container.

Here you can see them being grown in the modular way

in our normal potting compost then.

And these containers are then kept again for about another two years

as they gradually grow to flowering size.

So these are four years old.

And they're ready for planting out.

Absolutely. They're hot to trot.

-What you want to do initially in an effect that looks random.

-Yep.

-Natural.

-And we will use the bulb planter in the classical way.

Take out a nice plug.

Should be at least the depth of the pot, a bit more if you can get it.

-So I just literally plop it in the bottom there.

-That's right.

Do I want to compact it down or just leave it?

No, what we do is we take into account the fact that these are young bulbs

and they can find it difficult to pierce thick turf.

So we actually take the top layer off.

We lose that.

And then we just crumble the soil and that just refills the hole.

You've almost lost the plant as you can see, immediately.

Everything else will grow across. It will all knit in.

This is meadow, this isn't fine turf,

so the finish is perfectly acceptable.

So as well as these chaps, are there any other species of narcissus that you do like this?

Yes, we're doing Narcissus Bulbiconium.

The lovely hoop-petticoat one.

How wonderful. So this whole area is just a carpet of colour

-all the way through the spring.

-It certainly is, yes.

-Well, I think you've convinced me!

-Pleased to hear it!

It's not just spring flowering bulbs from bulb,

but seeds. Sounds like a jolly good idea to me!

That looked like hard work. And you could argue that our next pick

also involves a great deal of effort.

Even though the results don't really show it at all.

This N is for naturalist planting.

Christine Walkden is meeting Mark Bishop,

head gardener at The Garden House in Devon,

to find out if it's really that demanding.

-Hi, Mark. Nice to meet you.

-Hello. Hi.

-So what's this area?

This is the original part of the garden.

It was started by Lionel Fortescue in the 1940s.

And over the 50 or so years, it's come to the stage

where it needed to be replanted.

So it's left me with a very interesting project.

I'll say! What were the Fortescues like?

Lionel, particularly, he was a schoolmaster at Eton.

I understand he was quite feared among the pupils.

If you misbehaved, the chances were

he'd get you to weed some of his garden.

What a fantastic way to get your garden weeded!

I think it worked!

'The legacy of the Fortescues

'is a garden that combines huge variety

'with an uncompromising approach to the growing of the best specimens possible.

'The Garden House has also developed a reputation

'for ground-breaking garden ideas.

'A big and growing trend is naturalistic planting.

'With this approach, it's not about military-style lines of plants.

'You let nature take its course

'and let all the flowers intermingle.'

This is one of my favourite parts of the garden.

-This is the cottage.

-This is what they talk about naturalistic planting, isn't it?

It is. And it's anything but natural, I can tell you.

So how much time... This looks like you get a packet of flower seeds, and go...

-It's not that?

-There's an awful lot more involved than that.

This is a framework of perennial plants

and also a mixture of annuals that self-sow themselves in between,

but we also repeat the sowing later on

to get a second flowering, if you like.

-So you're trying to extend that season.

-Yes.

The season of the cottage garden, ideally, should go from the beginning of May

right through till the middle of October.

How would you start off a garden like this?

The first thing would be to choose your perennials very carefully.

Nothing too chunky.

You wouldn't have dahlias, you wouldn't have dahlia leaves in here.

Things with thin stems that wave around in the breeze.

The odd grass. Things that are really good stalwart perennials

that will go on year after year without too much attention.

-Yes.

-And then also in-between them,

you choose a selection of different annuals.

Poppies are the obvious things.

We've also got California poppies here which get up and just do it.

They come up every year and providing there's a bit of spare ground,

they'll occupy it.

But you have to remember to fork over the space between your perennials.

The empty pieces of ground.

Because if there's poppy seed in the soil or even corn cockles,

these are plants of disturbed soil,

so you get the self-sowing as well.

-So if you don't do it, they don't come up?

-No.

Do you have to dead-head any of this stuff to keep it going? Or do you just let it go?

We don't do a massive amount of dead-heading here

because we do want certain things to seed around.

For example, there's a Geranium Sanguinium in here.

We want that to seed around

because it's such a fantastic plant and it varies.

Because we're gardening in a very naturalistic style,

we want the plants to vary as well.

And we certainly don't dead-head the poppies.

We go round every day sometimes and collect the ripe seed heads

and just literally chuck them around like this!

'I've got a real sense of why the garden is so innovative.

'A quest for perfection that can be traced down the years

'from the head gardeners to the original owners.'

If you want to find out what you can achieve in your garden,

here's a good example from former gardener of the year

Diana Guy.

When I saw this garden and realised I had a bank,

I thought, "This is it.

"I can do an amazing wildside bank

"with naturalistic planting."

We've only actually been here 22 weeks.

We started the garden on the first day of March

and I have to tell you everything you see around you

bar just the odd clump of hemerocallis or whatever,

has actually been planted since that date.

We started off by getting in diggers

to clear away overgrown areas of which there were quite a few.

And I also brought with me part of my extensive collection

of hellebores from my previous house, Welcome Thatch.

And they all had to go in the ground fairly promptly.

So it was go, go, go, from the very first week, really.

When we moved here, clearly the tropical plants weren't really going to fit in

with a garden that's so rural with such a lovely rural background.

So I thought naturalistic planting, using drifts of natural things,

that's the way to go.

That's going to be one of the key elements as I develop this garden.

The winner is...

..Diana Guy.

'In 2004, when my name was called out

'as the winner of Gardener of the Year,

'I have to tell you it just felt amazing.'

It felt as if I was literally walking on air.

It was particularly poignant for two reasons, really.

One was that it was my sixth attempt to win.

And sadly, it was the year that my mother died

and so I felt a little twinge of sadness

that she hadn't witnessed that,

but it was partly that, really, that helped me to win

because she died in April and I threw myself into making my garden look as good as I could that year.

It had been a real rollercoaster year for me.

And then to have that announcement made, it was just wonderful.

It's quite amazing what you can achieve when you're that determined.

Really inspiring.

Still to come:

nuts, naked gardening,

and what happens in your garden at night time.

But first, we're visiting a garden that belongs to the poet Pam Ayres

for a quick look at one of her favourite plants.

Our next N is for Nepeta.

One of the things I really like about my garden

is that whenever anyone comes to visit,

they always say, "Oh, what a lovely lavender walk."

Actually, it's not lavender at all.

It's Nepeta, otherwise known as catmint.

Which, in my opinion, is a much better bet than lavender.

I like lavender, but it gets very woody.

It ages very quickly, it seems to me.

Whereas this has got a very long season.

Like lavender, it's a very good attractant for insects.

When the flowers are finished blooming, you just go over it with the shears

and it all comes up again in these lovely pale green cushions.

The leaves smell lovely and herby

and it blooms all over again, so it's got a nice long season.

And in my opinion, it knocks spots off lavender!

Well said, Pam!

Now coming up is an exotic plant

but it's one that can be seen growing in the wild in this country.

N is for Nymphaeaceae.

Water lilies, to you and me!

Monty Don will plant a few later on,

but first, here's Carol Klein with all you need to know.

They take their name from the Greek word for Nymphaea,

a water nymph, mythological creature,

who lived in rivers, streams, ponds, lakes.

It's these beautiful flowers

which inspired some of the most celebrated paintings in the world.

Claude Monet's Les Nympheas.

The Water Lilies.

Of course, his water lilies were in his pools and ponds at Giverny.

They were cultivated varieties.

But those lilies, and all our water lilies,

have their roots firmly in the wild.

You'd hardly believe that this exotic looking plant

is indigenous to the British Isles.

It's one of only a couple of species

that we have as wild flowers.

It's an extremely vigorous plant.

When it's left to its own devices,

it will just take over any stretch of water it can find

and cover it with these great green pads

and these exotic white flowers.

Think of water lilies and you imagine a whole array of colours

that goes far beyond yellow and white.

This is down to the life's work

of one passionate Frenchman.

Joseph Marliac devoted his life to the water lily.

Using wild species as his starting point,

he developed and hybridised over 110 new cultivars

in a kaleidoscopic range of colour.

Here at Bennett's Water Garden,

Jonathan Bennett knows all about how this incredible colour range was developed.

What did he start off with, then?

I believe he started off with the wild white alba lily.

-Yeah.

-And he also imported the Mexicana Yellow from South America.

I think that was the magic ingredient.

The plants that he got together there were capable of producing seed

in the climate he brought them together in.

It was in the south of France, a lovely warm climate.

Look at this! Isn't this beautiful!

Yeah.

You must love them, too, Jonathan.

Yes, I've been working with them for so many years now.

If you have to throw the plant away because it's in the wrong place, it's a weed,

you have to save the flower and pop it in water, cos it'll carry on opening for a few more days.

It's such a beautiful thing. There you go.

-It's a beautiful colour, isn't it?

-Such perfection.

What are their roots like?

Apart from being ugly?

The chunks of rhizome down there

and fine roots that spread right out through the mud.

In this situation, they're spreading miles away.

Bring in the food, extracting nutrients from the base.

And the leaves, they make a contribution, too.

They're the food factory of the plant.

The unique thing with aquatics is they're taking air down to the roots.

There's not much air down in the mud.

-And the stems have got these little...

-Tubes.

-That's it.

So it's not just photosynthesis.

It's dragging air in, as well.

Which one is this?

This is a Marliac one, too?

Yes. This one's called Hermine.

It's almost brilliant white

and it's grown for the unique thing about the star shape of the flower.

And lovely apple-green leaves.

Something tells me this is a special favourite of yours.

I've got this in my garden pond at home.

-That's a really good recommendation.

-Yes.

-And you've got the pick of how many?

-About 180 varieties! Yes.

-This is Escarboucle.

-Escarboucle. What a lovely name.

It's difficult to say. It's a slow grower

and it doesn't produce many side-shoots.

So therefore, it won't fill a pond up so quickly.

Joseph Marliac's breeding programme continued apace.

But he needed somewhere, a broader platform to exhibit what he'd achieved so far.

The opportunity arose when, towards the end of the century,

in 1889,

the World Fair was held in Paris.

He took his water lilies there and showed them off to huge public acclaim.

One of the people who saw them there

was the painter Claude Monet.

He fell in love with them.

He wanted to grow them, but more than that,

he wanted to paint them.

But just imagine what those paintings of Giverny would have been like

if it hadn't been for the work of Joseph Marliac

in creating this wonderful range of beautiful colours and forms.

In fact, they might have contained only white and yellow water lilies.

Thanks, Carol.

Now let's join Monty Don who's pulled on his waders

to tell us more about these wonderful aquatic flowers.

When I planted these water lilies...

..I set them up on layers of bricks

because the idea is to have the water lily foliage

just sitting on the surface.

If you've got deep water and a short plant,

it's obviously not going to happen. They'd be completely submerged.

So by jacking it up, that gives it a chance to get the maximum light

and then as they grow, you can lower them down.

If I lift this one up here,

you can see it's well clear of the water.

I could drop that by about six inches.

As long as one or two of the leaves are floating on the surface,

the others can be below the water level.

Now, the base of the pond is sloping and it's quite slippery.

So I don't want to go falling over,

which I'm sure would provide good entertainment.

But not the desired effect.

Leave that to one side.

I'll set it down there.

And then grovel around under the water

for bricks.

I put the bricks inside a plastic container

so they wouldn't fall over and damage the liner.

There are two.

Two more.

Right.

See, that leaf is floating on the surface

as is that one and just about that one.

So that's perfect.

Still one brick to take out

and then it'll be sitting on the bottom.

I don't have to do that this year. It can stay all winter, if need be.

If they don't grow any more.

But that now will encourage it go grow more and get more established and spread out.

Thanks, Monty.

We try on this programme to cast a bit of light

over subjects that you come across whilst gardening.

But for this next item,

we're doing the exact opposite.

It's all about darkness.

This N is for Night Time.

On this piece, we're looking at a night-loving creature,

the moth.

So let's join Toby Butland

to check what's flying just outside your window.

As night fell over Greenacre,

keen moth catcher Dr Zoe Randle from Butterfly Conservation

brought along two traps.

One that captured the moths in a bowl beneath the light

and the other, a more Heath Robinson sort of set-up.

This is the low-tech option,

but again we're going to use a mercury vapour bulb

but if you wanted to do this at home without any hi-tech bulbs,

just put a white sheet out and put a torch out.

During the day, you see lots of butterflies drinking nectar

and pollinating plants along with the bees and day-flying moths.

But during the night-time, there'll be hundreds of moths out here

helping to pollinate your plants.

-What's this one called?

-This is a Brimstone moth.

Look at that. Absolute beauty.

Really lovely, and really well camouflaged

when it's in amongst the vegetation.

They're coming in thick and fast, aren't they?

Ah, I know exactly what this is.

-Can you see...

-It's like an owl!

And he looks like he's got flying glasses on.

-Yes.

-It's called a spectacle.

It's called a Spectacle because he looks like he's got big glasses on.

-A Spectacle!

-Yep. They're absolutely fantastic.

-How apt!

-Yes.

-Shall we see how the other one's getting on?

-Yes.

I can see them flying round.

Do you think we'll get any more in here tonight,

or is this about it?

No, we should get lots more. We'll leave the trap running overnight.

They fly at different times of night.

The longer we leave the trap out for,

the more chance we've got of catching different things.

I'm eager to see our catch.

Let's hope it's a good one.

-It was looking pretty good last night.

-It was, yes.

Wow.

I can't see anything, Zoe!

Look at that down there. Quick, let's get in there.

Are they likely to just flutter away?

Some of them will. Some are quite flighty,

so they will up and fly off.

Just check under there. No.

If we take this one off here.

So they hole up amongst the egg boxes.

They hide in amongst the egg boxes.

This is one that people will commonly come across.

This is the Large Yellow Underwing.

It's quite flighty and he's a big beast.

He's quite meaty, isn't he?

Is that the main difference between moths and butterflies?

No, there's no real difference between butterflies and moths.

They're all the same. It's an artificial divide.

Some people say butterflies have clubbed antennae,

but there's many moths that have.

Some say butterflies fly by day, and moths fly at night,

but there are more day-flying moths than there are butterflies.

As a gardener, you'll come across loads of day-flying moths.

So this Large Yellow Underwing you'll come across quite often

in the garden when you're weeding.

You won't see the moth at first,

but as you disturb it, it'll fly off and show you a flash of yellow as its underwings.

-So that's a common one.

-A really common one.

Common and widespread. Everyone will have them in their garden.

Now, this one here. See this one?

This is a... That WAS a Dun-bar!

The exciting thing about the Dun-bar

is their caterpillars are cannibalistic.

So if they come across other caterpillars, they'll eat them.

Look at that one.

Oh, yes. That's a Black Arches.

That's a conifer feeder.

It's probably come in from the woodland over the fence there.

-So the larvae feed on conifers?

-Yes.

I've seen a lot of these around

and wondered what they are.

This time of year, they're pretty common this time of year.

I have to say there's a lot of satisfaction to knowing what visits the garden at night.

-Definitely.

-Let's release them back to the wild.

-Yeah.

If we find some nice long grass and put them in there.

They can rest there until they're ready to fly again.

Let's do it.

Our next pick covers a range of different types,

some of which are common on trees in many people's gardens.

Some you're used to seeing in recipe books or supermarket aisles.

This N is for Nuts.

Here we're joining Julia Bradbury and Jules Hudson

on a specific quest for the cobnut.

Don't worry if you've never heard of it. You're not alone!

-Do you know what that is?

-A hop.

-Guess again.

-Don't know!

-Ever seen one before?

-No.

Do you know what that is?

Yes. It's a nut of some sort.

It is. Go on. What sort of nut?

-A cobnut?

-It is a cobnut! Yes!

Later on, I'll be cooking with cobnuts.

But first, Jules has been finding out why they're such a modern mystery.

With walnuts, Brazil nuts, cashews and pistachios

we all sort of know what we're getting.

But mention cobnuts and chances are, you'll draw a blank.

Which seems strange, since they are one of our oldest and most traditional types of nut.

A cobnut is really just a form of cultivated hazelnut

and we've been growing them here for about 400 years

in gardens and in orchards.

But nowadays it seems the great British public

have fallen out of love with them.

Or at least we had.

Now, thanks to a handful of passionate growers, they're making a comeback.

John Cannon is on a mission to put them back on the nation's dinner tables.

John, why do you think it is that very few people know about cobnuts?

I think basically the sort of people who enjoyed them in their youth have passed on.

The younger generation have so much food offered to them in the supermarkets,

they have forgotten or haven't had the experience of cobnuts.

But there is something of a resurgence now with them.

-Why?

-I think there's a big interest in food, real food,

unprocessed food, and the nut is coming into its own.

Cobnut orchards are called plants, short for plantation.

At the time of the First World War,

there were around 7,000 acres under cultivation, most of that in Kent.

But now it's down to just 250.

At this time of year, John takes on extra hands,

to help pick the cobnuts whilst they're still green.

Are they ready to go? How far off being edible are they?

People like them in two different stages.

One green, when they're crunchy, and these are very crunchy and sweet.

And of course the normal nut is regarded as a brown nut at Christmas time.

So if we leave these till they drop to the ground

and we pick them up or thereabouts,

they become storable to Christmas quite happily.

But this has to be eaten fairly quickly because it's fresh.

Can we try one? Are they ready to go?

Certainly you can, yes. They're ready to go.

-Look at that.

-That's the husk.

To crack it we put it lengthways so we don't crack the kernel.

-And there we have the kernel.

-So that's it.

My very first cobnut.

Shame on you!

Should have had them before!

Once the nuts are picked and sorted, they're packed and sent off to the shops.

These are Kent cobnuts, but there are many different varieties.

This is a decorative nut, a garden nut.

It's called Purple Filbert.

It's edible and quite sweet but rather small.

Here we have a French nut, a Fertile de Coutard,

normally known as a Barcelona.

It's more for processing.

It's got too much felt on it to eat as a dessert nut.

But it's a good processing nut and goes in chocolate and cakes and things like that.

-These are huge, John.

-These are an Oregon nut from America.

A Butler, which is quite a popular nut to grow now commercially.

It's good for cracking.

John grows more than 40 varieties here.

But these nuts are not just for Christmas.

You can use them all year round, and in a surprising number of ways.

Paul. Cobnut.

-Pork and a bit of...

-Black pudding.

-Black pudding.

-How do they go together?

-At this time of year, the green cobnuts have a really subtle flavour.

With the apples as well,

the beetroot, the idea is to get these fresh local seasonal ingredients

and just mix them together.

So, on the menu, cobnut salad. Should be interesting!

I'm toasting the cobnuts. Pan, bit of olive oil.

Nice and hot and smoking.

Turn the heat off, take the nuts

and throw them in the pan.

Let the heat of the oil in the pan just toast them off gently.

A little bit of salt in there.

What that does is bring out the natural flavour of the nut,

and gives it a nice roasty flavour.

Oh, that's divine.

They're just roasting off.

Cobnut kernels also have nutritional benefits.

There's about the same amount of protein in six cobnuts

as there is in a piece of steak.

They're very rich in fibre, vitamin C and calcium.

And that's our salad.

Here we go.

Mmm! Mmmm! Mmmm!

All the flavours ping off one another.

The best thing is, it's a completely local dish.

It is absolutely divine.

The cobnuts have that lovely little crunch.

The pork is done to perfection. That's delicious.

And how about squash with a cobnut stuffing?

And cobnut and chocolate shortbread.

Its versatility is just one of the reasons

that the cobnut is making a welcome comeback.

And we've reached our final N today.

Would you Adam and Eve it?

That's a little cue to the subject matter!

Our final N is for Naked Gardening.

Here's Dominic Littlewood to reveal all!

Today is a day with a difference.

Because here in the heart of rural Wiltshire,

lies Abbey House Gardens.

And they're stunningly picturesque!

This was a Benedictine monastery 1,300 years ago.

So it's fair to say it's a historical and holy place.

But nowadays, once a month,

people come here to enjoy the scenery,

the gardens, have a picnic.

Throw their clothes off!

And not get told off for it!

It's a first for me!

Like me, you're probably asking yourself

why naked in the garden?

Let me tell you. It all started when naturists Ian and Barbara Pollard

bought Abbey House.

Being keen historians and gardeners,

they set about recreating this estate

to reflect the history of the site.

Tell me about the gardens.

We bought the place back in '94.

13 years. When we came there was nothing here.

The only bit of yew was that funny face. Not a bad resemblance!

Thanks a lot! OK. I can see where this is going!

I wanted to get the history of the place into the garden.

So we're walking along the side of my Celtic cross knot garden.

This is an open day with a difference, isn't it?

We've become known as the Naked Gardeners.

We found that naturists were emailing us saying, "If you garden naked,

"can we visit naked?" And we decided to offer one day a month

to allow people that opportunity.

What's the difference between a normal naturists' day and an open day?

A normal naturist event elsewhere

would be where everyone has to take their clothes off.

Here, it's entirely optional.

What could you do that would make me feel like getting my clothes off now?

We're not here to persuade you to take your clothes off at all.

What we are doing is giving you the opportunity.

-So I'm the odd one out with my clothes on!

-Afraid so!

You don't have to stay clothed.

I can't help feeling a bit awkward about letting people see me in my birthday suit.

Especially as it needs an iron!

You know what they say?

When in Rome, do what the Romans do.

That's what I did. I got butt-naked and mingled with the naturists.

Oi, do you mind?

I've got to be honest. I didn't enjoy it at all.

I felt very conscious of the fact

that I was looking at people, they were looking at me,

and I felt like covering myself up.

I can understand why Ian and Barbara do it,

but what I can't understand is why so many other people

travel so far to come and do it here.

-Where are you from?

-Coventry.

Everybody seems to be enjoying themselves, except me!

I never know quite where to look!

You find that people don't look anywhere apart from eye contact.

Most of the time. It's the feeling of freedom

that you can enjoy nature as nature intended.

I hope you don't mind me saying your hair looks like it's lost!

-Does it?

-It's all over your chest with none up there!

Why are you carrying towels with you?

At all naturist events, we carry towels.

We carry something to sit on.

Do you tell people at work about this?

-They'll all know now!

-They'll definitely know now, yes!

It's been a liberating experience, but I must be honest.

I'm not so sure I'll be rushing back to do it again soon.

One thing I have learnt, though.

This is not a place for voyeurs.

In fact, voyeurs are actively discouraged.

So if you don't have any hang-ups and want to get back to nature,

this could be for you.

Can I just interrupt. You haven't seen a pile of clothes anywhere?

No, sorry.

-Can I borrow one of your towels?

-No, bring your own!

Thanks a lot(!)

Well, he's shown everything he's got there!

And so have we, for today.

Do join us next time for more top tips on The A to Z of TV Gardening.

Goodbye!

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