Veg bed, where to start!?

[Cluckycluck]

I've recently moved house and now have a large raised bed that I'd love to make use of but have absolutely no clue where to start!

Can someone recommend some simple, easy to care for fruit/veg to plant to start me off? Ideally I just want to start with things that can be planted straight in the ground. I've never done any form of growing before so I'm a complete beginner.

I would start by thinking about what you actually enjoy eating - no point growing it if you don’t like it! I also consider a kind of cost/benefit ratio of how tricky something is to grow vs how expensive it is to buy. So if something is easy to grow at home, but expensive to buy then it’s definitely worth growing.
Raspberries are very easy to grow, but you won’t get fruit until the second year (they will then fruit every year). If you like soft fruit, gooseberries, redcurrants and blackcurrants are also fairly simple.
Rocket is great as the slugs don’t like it and it will keep going all summer if you keep harvesting it. I’m a lover of beetroot and find that very easy - you just plant the seeds directly in the ground and then thin out the seedling. Courgettes and squashes can be bought as seedlings from garden centres or started off in seed trays, but they take up a lot of space so don’t plant many. Spinach and Swiss chard are also very easy and can be sown directly in the soil. Runner beans are another one that’s simple to grow, but quite expensive to buy.

I recommend spinach beet, runner beans, courgettes and salad bowl lettuce. All very reliable in my fairly haphazard veg garden. Get Huw Richards Veg in one bed book for tips

The Grow Your Own Group on Facebook is excellent. 2 tomato plants, some spinach, lettuce and courgettes are all very simple to grow. You don't need to start sowing seeds until mid March at the earliest, but prep the soil by weeding, then digging it over and adding a bag of compost for nutrients.

I've just bought the Huw Richards book. It's really clear about what to do/plant each month and very simple to follow. It's easy to become overwhelmed with advice but this book cuts through the complexity which is ideal for someone starting out.

(I'm not really a beginner but have had a few disasters in the past so thought I'd have a read to try to increase my success rate).

We got our first raised bed last to year. Cucumbers, tomatoes, courgettes and peas were easy and successful. But some need to start off in pots but that can literally be a few pots on a windowsill.

Thanks all. I've just ordered the Veg In One Bed book some hopefully that will help get me started.

For things that are compact and won’t overgrow everything else in one bed

Beetroot - the mixed colour ones are nice
Radish
Spinach
Salad heads
Mangetout- little wigwam needed but only grow about 1m high max
Parsnips - if not gravelly

Beetroot - the mixed colour ones are nice One of the delights of home veg growing is beetroots that don't leach dark purple everywhere.

Chard - like spinach, but difficult to find in the shops. They have broad central ribs, also worth eating, sometimes in a range of colours - white, yellow, orange, red.

Sugar snap peas - like mangetout, but you pick them when the peas have developed, so you get a bit more crop for your money.

We’ve had great success with beans, radishes, courgettes, spinach and parsnips. Lettuce we just buy a supermarket ‘live’ pack and plant that out for the summer.

Carrots were pointless as they were so gnarled and twisted you had to peel them to death to get the earth off and a bag is so cheap.

Aubergines and butternut squash I didn’t have much joy with but friends have.