As a regular reader of this addictive forum, I noticed several people have been asking about herbs. The last thing I want to do is turn this into a gardening forum, but if anyone has any advice on growing chilli peppers I'd be grateful. I use a lot of chillis in my cooking and was thinking about buying a couple of plants but I'm not exactly blessed with green fingers so am hoping they are easy to keep alive and whether they need any special care?

Many thanks

Chillies are very easy to grow, you need a green house/conservatory to start them off. I am growing two types this year, Hot chillies (forgot name!) from Sutton Seeds and some seeds from my kitchen cupboard, removed from whole dry chillies. both are growing well. I had loads last year, only grew from dry chillies in my spice box. So I never know what I am going to get. The plants do need warmth, I have just put mine out now and will bring them in if the weather is cold again. Last year, my plants were destroyed, snapped near base, when there was a heavy storm. They grew up again, but chillies were quite late.

Good luck

I grew some chillis last year too; kept them in the conservatory and they grew very well - they don't seem to need much in the way of care, and even survived my fairly terrible watering regime (which is basically, adding water when I remembered to - usually when I noticed they were wilting!)

I did put a couple of the plants outside, but something kept nicking the chillies before I picked them - I can only assume there's a squirrel around here with a real taste for chilli!

Thanks guys!

I think I'll give it a go - after all, nothing ventured nothing gained!

never grown chillies but I'd guess they are similar to tomatoes which even I managed by using the contents of one of those grow bags tipped into a large rectangular planter on the (inside) windowsill... just put sticks in for them to grow up.... I had beautiful sweet tomatoes right in the kitchen...

Steve