The best vegetables to grow in pots

A garden bed is optional. Renters, balcony gardeners and anyone short on space can grow a genuinely useful amount of food in containers, provided the pot is big enough and the watering is consistent (pots dry out much faster than beds). These crops handle container life best.

1. 🍅

   1. Cherry Tomato

   The best-value container crop: one large pot, a stake, and months of fruit.

2. 🥬

   2. Lettuce

   Shallow roots make it ideal for troughs and window boxes.

3. 🌿

   3. Basil

   A medium pot by the kitchen door beats buying a wilting bunch every week.

4. 🌶️

   4. Chilli

   Compact, ornamental and productive. In cool zones, pots can move to shelter for winter.

5. 🫜

   5. Radish

   Any container 15 cm deep works, and the turnaround is four weeks.

6. 🧅

   6. Spring Onion

   Pack them in tight; they crop happily at close spacing in a medium pot.

7. 🍓

   7. Strawberry

   Hanging baskets and pots keep fruit off the soil, away from slugs and rot.

8. 🌿

   8. Mint

   The one herb that should ALWAYS be in a pot — in a bed it becomes a weed.

9. 🥬

   9. Silverbeet

   A large pot supports months of cut-and-come-again picking.