Adam Crofts

Next Level Veg Patch

£45
Level: Peer






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The difference between Peer & Expert levels

Both Peer and Expert levels provide:

  • Video lessons led by an expert tutor
  • Downloadable lesson notes
  • Practice assignments
  • Group learning in a 20-student online classroom
  • Lifetime access to videos, notes, and classroom

The Expert level additionally includes:

  • Personalized feedback and coaching from your tutor
  • Private messaging with your tutor
  • Certificate of completion
Level: Peer

Course overview

In this course, Adam embraces his love for rare and flavourful varieties, intelligent and low-maintenance growing techniques and thoughtful organic practices to guide you through growing ingredients that with not only enrich your cooking but will also inject beauty and joy into your garden space (no matter how large or small).

Adam will take you step-by-step through building and planting up your own raised bed. You’ll learn what you need to construct it, what soil you need to fill it, a time frame for when you should aim to build your raised bed. He’ll also give you endless inspiration for things you can grow throughout the year. You’ll also learn about companion planting and crop rotation.

Salad is a four-season staple at River Cottage and Adam will show you how he keeps us in leaves and exciting salad ingredients throughout the year, even in the depths of winter. Adam will also show you how to harvest salad leaves to maximise the return and guide you through a Four Season Salad Planting Plan.

Adam will also show you different herb varieties you can grow at home - looking at the pros and cons of different herbs, giving insight into the needs of different herbs in relation to sunlight, soil and water. He’ll also look at how to plant so you ensure you have a different herbs throughout the year and how to look after and pick your herbs in a way that ensures a healthy and abundant supply.

The final lesson touches on perennial vegetables, which are making a comeback. Not only are they very low maintenance (these are vegetables that you plant once but can harvest continuously for years thereafter), they’re also hugely sustainable and arguably, more nutritious than annual vegetables.

Once established, perennial vegetables can tap into water sources and soil nutrients annual crops, with shallower tap roots, can’t access. Perennial vegetables are also hugely beneficial for long-term soil health. Adam will look at options for putting perennials in the new raised bed and show you how you can grow perennial veg at home.

You'll learn:

  • how to make raised beds
  • growing salads through the seasons
  • growing perennial vegetables
  • harvesting herbs and vegetables form your kitchen garden

The course includes:

  • 4 on-demand video lessons - presented by Adam Crofts and River Cottage
  • lifetime access to the videos, notes and interactive class
  • flexible classes - join and learn when and where you like
  • downloadable lesson notes
  • practical gardening assignments (with tutor feedback available)
  • access on your mobile, PC, Mac or laptop
  • small interactive online classroom - chat online to students from around the world and share your creative ideas

Independent Cookery Schools Association approved

This course has been approved by the Independent Cookery Schools Association (ICSA), recognising the highest standards of training.

Time to complete the River Cottage veg garden course:

Every student is different but in general we think the whole course will take around 14 hours 40 minutes to complete including:

  • Video lessons: 2 hours 40 minutes in total
  • Course notes: 30 minutes per lesson
  • Your gut health recipe assignments: at least 2 hours per lesson
  • Interactive classroom time: 15 minutes per lesson
  • Tutor feedback review (Expert level): 15 minutes per lesson

You'll need:

The notes include details of materials and plants included in the course.

Ready to get started?

Just add the course to your basket above - choose the 'Expert' option for personal feedback from Adam on your gardening assignments.
If you know someone who'd love this course then give it as a gift - just tick "This is a gift" at the checkout.

Any questions? Contact us by clicking on the orange speech symbol - we'd love to hear from you.

 

Watch course trailer

Lesson summary

Create a raised bed
Adam will take you step-by-step through building and planting up your own raised bed. You’ll learn what you need to construct it, what soil you need to fill it, a time frame for when you should aim to build your raised bed (i.e. what time of year is best but also how to get around timing if you want to start now). He’ll give you endless inspiration for things you can grow throughout the year. You’ll also learn about companion planting and crop rotation.
Growing salad leaves throughout the year
Adam will take you through an astounding variety of different salad varieties you can grow throughout the year. As well as showing you how to grow different leaves throughout the year, Adam will guide you through harvesting salad leaves to maximise the return and he’ll also talk you through a Four Season Salad Planting Plan.
How to grow and harvest herbs
Not far from River Cottage HQ is one of the most exciting and largest organic herb growers in the United Kingdom. Adam pays them a visit their garden to be inspired by some new varieties. He’ll then comes back to River Cottage to show you how to create a Herb Spiral using some of herbs he sourced from the Organic Herb Trading Company. He’ll also cover the benefits of organic sourced herbs. Adam will also show you different herb varieties you can grow at home - looking at the pros and cons of different herbs, giving insight into the needs of different herbs in relation to sunlight, soil and water. He’ll also look at how to plant so you ensure you have a different herbs throughout the year and how to look after and pick your herbs in a way that ensures a healthy and abundant supply.
Perennial vegetables - the most nutritious, delicious and easy-to-grow veg
Perennial vegetables are making a comeback. Not only are they very low maintenance (these are vegetables that you plant once but can harvest continuously for years thereafter), they’re also hugely sustainable and arguably, more nutritious than annual vegetables. Once established, perennial vegetables can tap into water sources and soil nutrients annual crops, with shallower tap roots, can’t access. Perennial vegetables are also hugely beneficial for long-term soil health. They’re also amazing for maintaining soil structure and health (the American Dust Bowl is the result of perennial grasslands being replaced by fasting-growing, annual wheat crops). River Cottage is surrounded by pioneers in this area who champion perennial vegetables because they are more sustainable but also they offer some incredible flavours. Planting perennial veg is also one of the easiest ways to create an abundant, low maintenance garden. Adam will visit some of these farms for inspiration before heading back to River Cottage HQ to add some new plants to the perennial veg patch on the edge of the River Cottage Kitchen Garden. Adam will look at options for putting perennials in the new raised bed.

Choose how you want to learn

Expert-level

Develop your learning further with marked assignments and personal tuition:

  • Start the course whenever you like
  • Tutor access for personalised assignment feedback & coaching
  • Certificate of completion and CPD learning hours
  • Online classroom with up to 20 classmates
  • Lessons with expert videos & notes
  • Group chat & direct message with tutor & classmates
  • Lifetime access to videos, notes & classroom

Peer-level

Get the most from shared knowledge and community study:

  • Start course whenever you like
  • Practise what you learn with your peers
  • Online classroom with up to 20 classmates
  • Lessons with videos & notes
  • Course assignments
  • Group chat & direct message classmates
  • Lifetime access to videos, notes & classroom
Portrait of Adam Crofts

meet the expert

Adam Crofts

Organic gardening expert dedicated to seasonal, sustainable produce for River Cottage.

Read more

Why choose Learning with Experts?

Start whenever it suits you, and immerse yourself in motivational lesson tutorials with expert guidance.
Enhance your learning and personal growth with lesson assignments. Each course includes an optional assignment at the end of every lesson.
Drop a friendly message or respond to your assignment feedback. Our world-class experts are just a click away, ready to help you!
Stay informed about your own progress and those of your peers, and take joy in celebrating achievements along the way.
Chat and share ideas with passionate communities of learners from around the world.

Frequently asked questions

What’s the difference between PEER and EXPERT levels?

At Peer and Expert level, you get access to the same core content and features:

  • Video lesson tutorials led by your expert tutor
  • Downloadable lesson notes
  • Option to practise what you learn with lesson assignments
  • Group learning within an online interactive classroom of up to 20 classmates
  • Lifetime access to videos, notes and classroom

If you choose Expert level, you get all of the above plus the following:

  • Personalised assignment feedback and coaching from your expert tutor
  • Opportunity to interact with your expert tutor through a private messaging system
  • Certificate of completion.
What is an online classroom?

Our online classroom has been developed to allow you to learn from our experts in a sociable environment alongside up to 20 other students. After each video tutorial led by your expert, you will be encouraged to practice what you have learned with optional assignments - these can be seen by the other students in your class, who are free to share their own thoughts and questions with you.

You will be encouraged to take part in an ongoing class discussion where you can discuss ideas, post images or work, and comment on each other’s assignments. It’s a great way to learn from other like-minded people who share your passion from all over the world.

This means not only do you benefit from people who are outstanding in their field, but also from a close-knit group of like-minded people whom you can learn alongside. Group learning has shown to greatly improve not just the experience of studying, but also how well you retain the knowledge, and we have built our classroom experience around this fact.

When can I start my course and how long will it take?

You can start your course any time within 12 months after receipt of your purchase confirmation email. Once you start, you’ll have lifetime access — meaning you can revisit the lesson videos and notes whenever you want.

Our courses are designed so that you can study at your own pace, some prefer to binge learn while others like to spread their studying over a longer period of time - it’s completely up to you. To give you a rough time frame, each lesson video is approximately 30-40 minutes long, and we recommend that you spend around an hour on each assignment.

How often can I speak with the Expert?

If you opt for the Expert version of your course, the time you have to interact with your tutor is limited to course length. You will have one week per lesson to chat to your tutor and to have your assignments marked, and during this period you can ask them as many questions as you would like.

To find out the length of each course, head to the product page and look at the Course outline to see how many lessons it contains. e.g. a four lesson course assumes that you will have completed the assignments within four weeks.

Your tutor interaction period will start as soon as you enter the classroom. If you find that you are struggling to complete the assignments in the allocated time or you wish to put this function on hold, just get in contact with one of the team via the support button and we will help you out.

Support and full FAQs

If you need any help with a course, be it one you’ve started already, or one you are looking to purchase, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our Support email address, or view the full FAQ’s here.

You can also use the orange speech bubble on your page to start a conversation with us.

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Awards and accreditations