This autumn the RHS Campaign for School Gardening is celebrating its 10th Birthday #WOW! The campaign has changed my life in so many ways – if it wasn’t for the RHS you probably wouldn’t be reading this blog!

So, I want to do a big shout out for their Big #SoupShare and wish them a Happy Birthday!

What is The Big #SoupShare?

The Big #SoupShare is a chance to celebrate the work you do in your school or community  garden, by harvesting crops, whizzing them up into a delicious soup and sharing it out. You can share your soup with the rest of your school or group, or hold a big celebration day and share the soup with family, friends and other members of your local community. I’m taking part in Operation Farm’s Big #SoupShare on 8th October 11-3pm at Hyde Park Community Orchard.

There’s 12 of us Operation Young Farmers cooking a 7 veg ‘n’ herb harvest soup on the Saturday and then on the Sunday we’re hoping to dish out about 500 portions of the soup  at our ‘appely ever after café’. There’s a big team of Op Farm volunteers helping to press about 250kg of apples and running harvest craft stalls too.

How you can get involved in the Big #SoupShare

Here’s a recipe for my Mum’s Green Soup, which has been a favourite of mine since I was really young. It’s a good way to use up veggies from your garden and here’s a good tip – my Mum got me eating soup by blending and then sieving it, that way I was eating lots of veg that was good for me and I didn’t even know it (some of us kids don’t like bits in our soup!)

So, first of all harvest your crops. Here I am harvesting the last of the courgettes in our garden. What have you got growing in your school or community garden? You could always ask other gardeners or allotment holders for any of their surplus veggies.

Then wash, peel and chop your veggies

Cook ’em in stock and seasoning, using plenty of home-grown herbs like bay leaves and mint.

Big #SoupShare

and finally, the best bit…..serve, share and eat! #BonAppetizer !

The Big #SoupShare runs from 2nd-8th October; there’s bunting, invites and poster templates on the website – click here to find out more and I hope you too can join in at your school or community group and have a souper time!!!

Happy Birthday to the RHS Campaign for School Gardening and thanks for all your hard work getting kids like me to get involved in gardening

Next week’s blog will be all about the RHS Campaign for School Gardening can help to teach and inspire more kids to give gardening a try. Have a great week folks!