The traditional Christmas vegetables consist of Brussels sprouts, carrots, chopped cabbage or savoy, swede, cauliflower, roasted parsnips and onion, so don't dally in getting everything organised.

You will need to beg some brassica plants and get on with planting them up as early into July as possible. Most of the seed catalogues complete their despatches by the end of June as this is deemed the ideal planting time. Certainly July is perfectly acceptable but they will need puddling in and an eye kept on their watering requirement until established. As aphids, root fly and caterpillar will all be active, plus the usual pigeon damage, then cover with fleece or environmesh immediately after planting. July plantings of a midseason Brussels sprout (Revenge, Trafalgar, Bosworth, Diablo) will give you good sized tasty buttons for Christmas and well into the New Year. Similarly cabbage and savoy (Tundra, January King, Siberia), which all hold well in condition during the cold winter period. If you like a taste of Purple Sprouting and cannot wait till March / April then look out for 'Rudolph' which can be ready for Christmas, as you would expect with a name like that. Fresh white cauliflowers for Christmas is more of a gamble, although some of the late October maturing varieties (Cassius, Skywalker ) planted out in July could well do the trick. Certainly the Romanesco, those delicious spirals of lime green conical heads, have a later maturity and some frost tolerance, and the newer breeding has mildew resistance as well (Gitano is an excellent variety).

Try a late sowing of Swede (Magres, Brora, Invitation), roots will be smaller but as most of the newer breeding have mildew resistance then success should be more likely, and they are fully winter hardy so you can lift as you want them, or clean and store them in polyproplene nets in the garage. Turnips (Snowball, Green Globe, Manchester Market) will grow and fill out more rapidly than swedes, although their taste is not to everybodys liking.

If you want delicious roasted parsnips and onions then you will have to buy these for your Christmas lunch. Late May is the final but optimum sowing time for parsnips to obtain canker free, white skinned smaller and more succulent roots. Onions from sets need planting in mid March/ April. You can obtain overwintering sets from late August to either plant promptly or anytime up to mid October, although the later the planting the smaller the eventual bulbs. Maturity is the following June/ July, at a time when fresh onion bulbs are unavailable.

Maincrop sowings of carrots in early July is getting a bit late in the season unless a really good Summer ensues. Early June is the optimum sowing time (Autumn King, Flakkee, Bangor, Red Cored Chantenay) for those big but juicy roots for winter stews and casseroles as well as Christmas dinner, and which store so well over the winter months.

Trench celery and celeriac also add taste to winter salads, as well as on Boxing Day with the leftover turkey, and making a delicious turkey and celery soup with mashed potato thickener. Absolutely gorgeous. Again you'll need to order those plants in 2007 for a May planting as July is too late.

Leeks (Musselburgh, Snowstar, Argenta, Autumn Giant) are best planted in dibbed holes and puddled in during June but if you can obtain a few plants then July is not too late.

Probably the best roasting potato variety is King Edward, although you will find Desiree, Cara, Estima in many outlets. Next year grow a few maincrops yourself , planting from Early April up to late May, once the soil has warmed sufficiently. You can't beat your own home grown spuds.

There is a lot of media attention on 'growing your own new potatoes for Christmas'. This is difficult in the truest sense of the word. Certainly the specially cold stored, short dormancy tubers (Carlingford, Maris Peer, Nicola) once delivered from Late July soon spring to life once planted up in warm soils or in containers. No need to chit them, just plant them and watch them develop. Planting should be completed by mid August outdoors, or end of August in a tunnel or greenhouse. Later plantings are more likely to fail. Blight is the serious scourge outdoors, and soil pests can be come more prevalent as Autumn progresses. Tubers form quickly and golf ball sized tubers can be ready in 11 weeks, which is nowhere near Christmas. Usual procedure is to cut back the haulms and leave the tubers in the ground until required, then you can dig a few fresh 'new potatoes' for Christmas to go with your roasted ones.