Looks good enough to eat

Long-time fashion designer Sally Browne's patchwork signature patterns also take the form of an edible garden in her small backyard, writes Nikki Fisher.

SALLY Browne refers to herself as ''a visual person'', so it follows that her vegetable and floral garden is as beautiful as it is edible.

Her South Yarra home is surrounded by cafes, restaurants and produce markets but she says she still loves to grow her own food.

"It's the joy in the toil, the constant surprises, the health aspect of eating organic food knowing how it's been grown, and it's also the meditation of planting and the absolute thrill of harvesting,'' Browne says.

''For instance, I'd never grown Jerusalem artichokes and then when I did that crop gave me so much joy. The flowers were magnificent. It was like a small sea of beautiful miniature sunflowers and then underneath came the tubular Jerusalem artichokes. I explored all these wonderful French recipes of roasting them or turning them into soup. The whole circle from the planting to the flourishing and harvesting and eating, it's a beautiful cycle.''

The cycle starts in her kitchen with the vegetable scraps she saves for her worm farm. ''The worms do their work, then I get my hands dirty and use that soil to sow seeds in my greenhouse, then the seedlings graduate to the garden,'' she says.

Browne says her food garden keeps her mind on the scarcity of water: she collects rainwater in a 2000-litre water storage sac that fits under the house.

Browne's first experience of a home vegetable garden was in Moorabbin, where she grew up.

''My parents always had a vegie garden and chooks. Then when I moved out of home and my children were little, we dug in a trampoline and I used the soil from that to start my own vegetable garden,'' she says.

Despite an early start, Browne says what she has now in South Yarra is still ''a huge experiment'' for her. ''I don't read gardening books and I break all the rules - I've had some shocking disasters but the majority are really fabulous surprises,'' she says.

She doesn't, for instance, pay much heed to planting instructions. ''I plant things very close together,'' she says. ''I like to eat things from when they're very young to when they're fully grown, so I take the middle of the middle lettuce out and the bed doesn't look empty and as they get bigger they've got room to spread out. My tips for growing vegetables are to make your own rules and plant as closely as you want to - it's a good way of leaving no room for weeds!''
Her current planting includes an abundance of leafy, crisp greens: soft lime-coloured butterhead lettuces contrast with deep-green spinach and rocket leaves, Lebanese cucumber and flat-leaf parsley (yes, salad is always on the menu). Snow peas are favoured for salad or stir-fry or eaten straight from the plant. Beetroot and rhubarb have been planted side by side for their matching colour; broad beans, tomatoes and corn climb the back wall alongside the passionfruit vine and fig tree. The far side of the garden, where there's room to stretch out, is dedicated to pumpkin, with floral beauty courtesy of roses and snapdragons.

Browne doesn't spend her weekends toiling in the garden, either. ''I set a few hours aside once a fortnight,'' she says, adding that she now saves time on food shopping and preparation. ''It is quicker for me to throw a piece of chicken or fish or steak on the barbecue then tear out whatever herbs, lettuce, cucumber is growing, give that a wash and a chop and there's a meal - 10 minutes, straight out of the garden, I couldn't do that if I drove to the shops.''

Sally's easy, high-protein barbecued tuna, grilled asparagus and 'this and that' salad.
INGREDIENTS

500g fresh asparagus
Lettuce and spinach leaves
Baby broad beans
Snow peas
Chives
Italian parsley
1 tsp sesame seeds or 1 tbs roasted almonds
1 avocado
Snow pea shoots
Any additional salad ingredients you love or have available in the garden
1 garlic clove, crushed
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons avocado oil
1 egg
2 tuna steaks
LSA mix (ground linseeds, sunflower seeds and almonds)
METHOD

■Preheat barbecue.

■Break woody ends off asparagus spears, rub with olive oil, grill and set aside.

■Prepare ''this and that'' salad: wash lettuce and spinach leaves.

■Layer leaves with raw baby broad beans, snow peas, chopped chives and Italian parsley. Add sesame seeds or roasted almonds.

■Top salad with sliced avocado, snow pea shoots and anything else you love.

■Make dressing: whisk garlic, balsamic and avocado oil.

■Beat egg, dip tuna steaks in egg and then roll in LSA mix.

■Barbecue tuna for two or three minutes each side, arrange with asparagus and add dressing.