Kitchen gardens to visit

The National Trust has over 100 walled kitchen gardens, all brimming with crisp vegetables and luscious fruit.

Once the aristocrat's larder and status symbols, the kitchen garden now provides us with a pleasurable place to visit and learn about traditional food production techniques.

We work with the Heritage Seed Programme to maintain a library of seeds to keep alive heritage varieties - fruit and veg grown by our ancestors which are now difficult to find.

Here are just 10 of our kitchen gardens to whet your appetite:

Barrington Court, Somerset

Espaliered pears in the Kitchen Garden at Barrington Court, Somerset

Unusually, this kitchen garden was established in the 1920s and the produce is now served in the restaurant.

Beningbrough Hall, North Yorkshire

The Kitchen Garden at Beningbrough Hall, North Yorkshire

This walled garden boasts a vinery containing two fine grapes bred by its 19th-century Head Gardener, Thomas Foster.

Buscot Park, Oxfordshire

Although they now contain ornamental borders, take a look at the near-circular walls from the adjacent hill.

Clumber Park, Nottinghamshire

See for yourself what vegetables Victorians and Edwardians ate, including oddities like yellow beetroot.

Felbrigg Hall, Norfolk

Vegetables in the kitchen garden at Felbrigg Hall, and the dovecote in the distance

Although the dovecote is the focal point of this walled garden, it also contains a fine potager and resident chickens.

F enton House, London

Vegetables in the kitchen garden at Fenton House, London

A miniature 17th-century kitchen garden, with glasshouse, rows of vegetables and mini-orchard.

Knightshayes Court, Devon

Gardener with wheelbarrow full of freshly picked vegetables in the kitchen garden at Knightshayes Court, Devon

It took three years to restore this 1ha walled garden, which now produces a wide range of vegetables.

Llanerchaeron, Ceredigion

A volunteer gardener with cabbages gathered from the kitchen garden at Llanerchaeron

Find out about organic food production and the history of this 18th-century Welsh gentleman's estate.

Tatton Park, Cheshire

A classical 17th-century lead planter in the Tower Garden at Tatton Park, Cheshire

The largest restoration of a kitchen garden in Britain, where lost skills and traditional methods are being revived.

W impole Hall, Cambridgeshire

A colourful August display in the walled garden of Wimpole Hall, Cambridgeshire

A staggering 60 varieties of tomatoes can often be viewed here, along with gherkins, chicory and endives.