Celia Brooks Brown

Eliminate food miles and grow your own!

This book couldn't have come at a better time for me. My husband and I recently expressed an interest in having an allotment, and we had just started to clear the garden and try it out there. So although we don't have an allotment as such, the main idea of this book is still the same for what we need. We are growing fruit and vegetables in order to be more organic and economical aware. Top that with eliminating food miles and supporting sustainability and this book has been our bible lately!

In a way it is a less formal "how to" book than I am used to, but written with plenty of good advice as though th
is is Celia Brooks Brown's diary about her North London allotment, which is great to read and check to see if you are doing the right things at the right time of the month. Not much on pests and disease control, but then that is not really what this book is about and there are other books that go into depth on that side of things if that is what you are looking for.

I really like the additional features like the index at the beginning of each month, which quickly pinpoint
1) what is suitable to grow indoors or under glass,
2) outdoors direct in the soil,
3) in containers,
4) the harvesting month and
5) recipes and other information and their corresponding page numbers.

Incidentally, the inclusion of recipes in this book is something I found particularly pleasing. I've grown fruit and veg before, on a smaller scale than we are doing now, but it's not always just 'how' to grow that I need, especially after harvesting quite often when you
get too much you don't know what to do with -- it's what to do with so much we also need help with!

Finally, I do like the way Celia reuses materials to keep expenses down. I've saved so much money by supplementing expensive items for my own versions, this book has been a blessing in disguise.

Overall: Whether you are growing fruit and veg at home or you own an allotment, this is definitely a fun book for you!
… (mais)

I have been a vegetarian for over 12 years and struggled with my weight for even longer. I have tried every fad diet, and many doctor prescribed diets. I lost weight, but I quickly got bored and resented the constant restraint I had to live with and gained it back plus. I wanted freedom to eat food. I found this diet program when a friend forwarded me a video that showing the program and how it worked to lose weight and help rebuild the body.(Eat, Fast and Live Longer, Dr. Michael Mosley BBC) I have been on it for over 6 months and lost significant weight, I feel fantastic, I have energy and I don’t feel controlled by a program. I enjoy the fast days, I feel like I’m rebuilding and cleaning my ‘house’. It has been a little bit of a struggle to find vegetarian dishes that fit in easily. I spent a lot of time searching and calculating my days calories and nutrition. Then I saw this book, and I’m became a happy girl.
Fast Days, you are hungry and you don’t need to be standing in the kitchen fussing with meals. There are 300 calorie meals ( about), servings sized for 1-2 servings and they are quick, 30 minutes or less. The nutritional information is included, making it perfect. The Thai Salad Wraps with Tofu, and Eggs Poached in Red Pepper Sauce are my favorites. Every recipe I tried has been very tasty and satisfying. There is also a selection of “Flavor Bombs” to add to Bam ! to your feast. The Green Lightning Salsa is so good I could eat it everyday on just about anything.
This small book is packed with easy quick planned dishes, making it easy for fast days. I plan on keeping ti handy and buying one for my friend who got me hooked on this program that works so well for me.… (mais)

The New Urban Farmer by Celia Brooks Brown, who is described as an accomplished professional cook and a cookery writer, is an account of her gardening experiences that takes the reader over the course of a year from the sowing of seeds to the finished product on the dining table.

The book is divided into the four seasons, and within each season by the month. For each month there is a useful chart showing what to plant and where, and also what to expect to harvest; the chart also includes references to appropriate recipes and other information to be found elsewhere in the book. The main tasks for each month are briefly explained, and each month concludes with a few recipes. The book is well illustrated, there are colour photographs on virtually every page, but in the main they show what the plants look like at various stages of growth, there are very few that are explanatory or show specific techniques.

Typical of the scope of the book, there is scant information on composting. Ms Brown provides little about how to build a compost heap; and for example she recommends adding eggshells without qualification, although does warn against the potential problems of composting tomatoes.

The text is rather chatty in style and at times quite vague, "get a nice big patch cleared and nourished" does not mean a lot; how big is "nice", and what is meant by "nourished"? Similarly: plant the tomatoes out "if it is sufficiently warm", but what is sufficiently warm, a novice would surely have little idea? Generally the instructions are lacking in detail, OK for an experienced gardener, but possibly not sufficiently clear for the beginner. As I doubt that this book would appeal to the experienced garden, it raises the question who is it directed at? which brings us back to what this book really is, it is in essence a record of one gardener's year in the garden, of what was grown and what made it to the table.

There is a comprehensive index, but finding precise information is not always easy, often one has to search it out from the general text, this can be a little irritating if all one wants is the facts.

The presentation is lively and the layout consistent. But the main text is perversely printed in a light grey, making reading a trifle difficult. The New Urban Farmer makes for an interesting and friendly read, I would hesitate to recommend as a guide for the serious gardener, but for someone contemplating taking up growing fruit and vegetables it could provide a real impetus for them to get started, and for this alone, if nothing else, it has value. However once started the novice would need to seek out something that is more detailed and informed.… (mais)