About

Welcome to The Edible Flower Garden

How it began – Maddocks Farm Organics

Stuart and I uprooted our family in 2002 to move to Devon as a direct result of watching far too many episodes of ‘Escape to River Cottage’! The lifestyle change after more than a decade of living and working in London was literally a breathe of fresh air and I set about establishing Maddocks Farm Organics, offering small scale seasonal organic vegetable boxes. With Stuart still commuting to London and our littlest Imogen not yet at school, it was an extremely challenging time.

Over the next twenty year Maddocks Farm Organics went from strength to strength become the first certified organic edible flower farm and the first on line edible flower show selling direction to the public. We have won numerous awards and pioneered a place as only edible flowers specialist that has an organic licence. We haven’t looked back since moving to Devon and are delighted with the recognition our products have achieved. Our Seasonal Flower Salad Bags were recognised with a Highly Commended Organic Award in 2009 and our Herb Flower Salad was Winner in the 2012 Soil Association Food Awards. In 2013 Jan was made a Soil Association Food Hero which was a great honour and in 2014 was a finalist in the Organic Innovations Awards. 2016 saw us become runners up in the Organic Industry’s BOOM Awards for the most Innovative Organic Business. In 2017/18 we won Organic Industry’s BOOM Awards for Best Fresh Produce in the UK. And it is fitting that in what was to be our final year 2021/2022 again we won best organic Best Fresh Produce in the UK and overall organic WINNER OF WINNERS.

We could not have done this without the fabulous team  we surrounded ourselves with and are indebted to them from the bottom of our hearts.

How it continues – The Edible Flower Garden

Stuart’s stroke and subsequent health issues were a wake up call and the catalyst for change. We reevaluated our priorities, sold our beautiful farm and are scaling down to a more manageable half an acre near the sea on the beautiful East Devon coast. Soil Association certification is not viable on a garden scale but Jan is organic through and through and whilst we may not be licenced any more we are completely upholding every organic and sustainability principle and regulation that has been in our DNA for the past two decades.

Growing organically on a garden scale and on a coastal site with simply terrible soil and huge boulders under every fork brings a whole new set of challenges and opportunities and Jan intends to share this journey and teach people how they can transition a new or unloved plot into something beautiful, organic, sustainable and wildlife friendly. She would love to teach you too.

Jan. The mastermind behind Maddocks Farm Organics. A touch gobby! Scares most chefs. Loves gin and a french accent.

Insanely proud to be a Soil Association Organic Hero. Gets increasingly sweary as the season progresses

Long suffering Stu. So called because Jan frequently abuses him to this degree but its amazing how restorative a pint of Otter Ale can be. Gets time off for good behaviour to go fishing…. Has a real job as a philatelic expert.

Some of the fabulous crew that worked at Maddocks  including Nigel the toad who does fabulous work on slug patrol and Lily the Jack Russell who shamelessly photobombs every magazine picture or TV show. Oh and our esteemed and much loved two legged fabulous picking team. xxx