Complete novice with empty veg planter(s)

Hello all
Apolgies for the long post, trying to include any relevant detail...
I am completely clueless about gardening in general but we have just had two new brick planters built, one is a border type planter and one will be a veg planter. I'll start a seperate thread for the border with this being the edible section

It's a brick planter, part will be in shade over winter due us being on a hill and adjacent to a high partition wall on the south side. Garden is more or less West facing.
The planter is roughly 9' long, 18" wide and the growing medium will be about 18" deep over heavy clay and rock. The clay bay can hold water for a while before slowly draining so I was thinking about adding some small drain holes in the walls.

Planter is currently completely empty so the first question is what do I need to fill it with for general veg growing? (probably carrots, potato or whatever is suitable for our location)
Guy down the road had a sleeper planter kit delivered and had about half a ton bag of soil left over so I've got that for starters. I don't have the forum privilege to post a link to the soil I have but it's this stuff
bstopsoil co uk /product-range/hortloam

When I remodelled the lawns, I had a nightmare with topsoils contaminated with all kinds of rubbish, I'm trying to keep it healthy and organic for the family so happy to pay for a quality growing medium.

Next question is what sort of veg should I be looking to grow as a novice and when do I start introducing some crops?

Pics below (hopefully)
Cheers- Chris

 

Hello and welcome to GC forums. Do you have drainage holes in the bottom?or make some in the sides at the bottom.
I'd use a multi purpose compost and grow what you will eat, but some crops it's too late.
But you can sow these, here's a video

 

Hi @ChrisWales , welcome!

The planters look brilliant, very neat and smart.

I'm leaving the soil and drainage questions to the experts, but regarding what to plant:

What do you like to eat? Personally I wouldn't use such a premium, limited space for anything that supermarkets sell cheaply such as potatoes or common carrots, but would focus on things that are either relative expensive (for me that's beetroots- I love them), or best just picked from the plant (tomatoes, berries, herbs), or fun varieties not available to buy at humane prices.

First of all you could plant herbs you like to eat, they are modest plants and can be shuffled about when other things start taking place. You can plant container grown perennial herbs now, chives, thyme and marjoram are readily available. They could go into the corners or edge, leaving the centre for taller plants. Creeping thyme is very attractive and a bee magnet.

If you have kids, strawberries are a must. Wild or "Alpine" ones can be grown from seed, start in March and you'll have tiny, lovely fruit all summer. The plants are mostly evergreen so look good throughout the winter.

Outdoor tomatoes and patio chillies are great and easy to grow from seed in spring. Personally I prefer tiny baby plum or cherry type of toms, they are the tastiest when picked fresh. When it comes to chillies, the world is your oyster, check the chilli growing threads in this forum and prepare to become addicted

Dwarf fruit trees could be fun, I have never grown them but the concept is brilliant.

A container is a restricted space so look for dwarf varieties and plants recommended for container growing. A 2m tall tomato plant would get blown over in the first gale.

Once the container is filled up, sow quickie crop seeds in such as radishes (still plenty of time to get a harvest this summer), lettuces and rocket for leaf harvest well into winter. Or sow hardy annual flowers to be transplanted in the spring to flower where you like them to free the space for your edibles.

And lastly, growing edibles doesn't mean that you are restricted to edibles only in the bed. Why not plop in some cheapy crocus bulbs that will flower well before the spring weather allows veg planting outdoors?

Please do keep us posted on your journey, looking forward to see your planters coming to life.