The purpose of the Kitchen Garden when initially built was to supply a range of fruit, vegetables, herbs, spices and flowers for the cook and kitchen at the main house Meldon Park. In addition this garden produce was also made available to the local community as they didn’t have the facilities, time or in some cases the skills to grown some of these important foods in order to maintain a healthy diet.

Five a day is not a recent phenomenon. Back in the 1800’s it was also vital that the correct diet was eaten and this was before we had the luxury of supermarkets providing year round produce, this garden was the nearest equivalent to our modern day supermarkets.

In 2001 when my Family and I moved home from Lincolnshire we were inundated with fruit and vegetables from the garden, far more than we could eat. From the excess my wife Emily started an honesty box scheme at the drive gates which grew in popularity. At the time we were faced with a Kitchen Garden and greenhouses requiring renovation and were keen to not let it fall into disrepair. Our aim was to return the garden back to its former glory and to produce crops that were originally grown there thus providing seasonal produce for our own kitchen and for the general public. After much planning and project managing we eventually re-opened in July 2007.