Open Daily
Garden Centre: 9am - 5pm
Cafe & Gift Shop: 10am - 4.30pm
Join our Team
Vacancy: Baker / Chef
The Café at Ashbrook is looking for an eager and reliable candidate with all round kitchen experience to join an enthusiastic team. Serving predominantly lunches, breakfasts, cakes, bakes and a range of hot and cold drinks, the Café at Ashbrook takes pride in offering friendly service and producing consistent high-quality food, using locally sourced and seasonal ingredients wherever possible. The café has a loyal customer base that continues to grow. It is situated within Ashbrook Nursery and Garden Centre on the outskirts of Arbroath.
The Role
The successful candidate will have all-round kitchen experience and should work well as part of a team in a fast-paced hospitality role. They must be able to follow in-house recipes to maintain consistency of product, while also having the freedom to exercise creativity to produce ‘special’ cakes, bakes, and mains for the menu. Main duties will include baking, daily meal preparation, cooking and plating of food, stock control, and assistance with menu planning, while being able to use initiative and work unsupervised. The capability to efficiently manage order ‘tickets’ is essential to ensure a high standard of customer service is maintained. High standards of hygiene must also be kept, with relevant protocols adhered to.
This role will be a minimum of 20 hours per week (more hours will typically be available) with a degree of flexibility required for changing shift patterns and holiday cover. Shifts will be daytime, with only occasional evening working necessary for one-off events.
Experience working in hospitality is required. Job specific training will be given.
Competitive rate of pay based on experience. Staff discount available including in the garden centre. Immediate start available.
If you wish to be considered for this role, please send a brief cover note and a copy of your CV to thecafe@ashbrooknursery.co.uk
'Potty About Primroses'
At Ashbrook Nursery we are just ‘Potty about Primroses’. We don’t claim to be ‘experts’, but we are certainly enthusiastic about these lovely plants which delight us from autumn through to summer.
Click the button below to read Anne's article written for the 'Garden Expert' feature for
Discover Scottish Gardens.
Defibrillator Fundraiser
A huge thank you to everyone who has donated to our defibrillator fundraiser. We have now managed to purchase a defibrillator which is now located at the entrance to our garden centre.
Our 'Panto Trail' was a hugely popular fundraiser over Christmas with lots of entrants to our competition, and an impressive number of you finding all the answers, and even finding extras which we didn't create! With so many full marks, we had to pick a winner based on most clues noted, so well done to Lucyna, Alicja, Robert & Marcin who have won a £30 Ashbrook voucher!
Our displays are shown in the gallery below.
Past Events
Tree Day Review
Thank you to all our wonderful stall holders, staff, and customers for helping to make our Tree Day a big success. With your generous donations, we managed to raise £450 for our chosen charity, The Learning Tree Partnership.
It was great to see so many faces enjoying all that was on offer, and exploring our new Woodland Wander. This is now a permanent feature at Ashbrook and you can explore it whenever you visit our garden centre or café!
Our competition winners were Maya Vance, Zander Keillor and Douglas Smith - Click the button below to see their entries.
Santa Live Christmas 2020
With lockdown preventing a 'proper' event, we had to embrace the wonders of technology to hold a live Facebook stream of Santa visiting Ashbrook.
Despite being behind a screen, Santa was still able to bring lots of joy to children and adults alike with a sing song, a story, and shout-outs to viewers that had made the nice list!
If you missed it, you can
Click Here to view our recording of Santa's visit.
Halloween @ Ashbrook 2020
With Covid-19 preventing us from hosting an actual event, we decided to organise a few fun competitions for our staff and customers this year. Our staff took part in a carving competition to help raise money for the The Learning Tree Partnership, and Kerri who works in our Cafe inspired a writing competion for our customers with her poem about our Halloween display;
The Green Witch of Ashbrook is back on her cart;
She’s here to find plants and she knows where to start,
Seeds, bulbs & soil & a range of home grown plants;
What beautiful colours you will hear her chant.
And what’s this…something new?
A café for a bite & a brew!
Homemade cakes & delicious coffee, yes witches like these too!
Get down to Ashbrook for a day of delight,
Just make sure the Witch doesn’t give you a fright!
We recieved over 40 entries and the Green Witch of Ashbrook had a terribly tough time trying to select a winner of a £50 Ashbrook voucher. In the end, 8 year old Rory Stott's entry 'Pumpkin and Ghostboy' was picked as the winner, and we had two runners up - Zayden Gallimore and Sarah Mills. Special mention must go to both Friockheim and Letham Primary Schools for supporting our competition with a number of scary tales, but thanks to all who entered and brightened up Halloween. The winning entries are below.
Pumpkin and Ghostboy
by Rory Stott, aged 8
Once upon a time, there was a sad little Pumpkin. He was sad because he never got picked for Halloween. The Pumpkin was small and round, but he wished to be big and scary and sit outside a house somewhere to scare all the people as they go by.
One night the Pumpkin was sitting alone when he heard a really scary noise. It was a loud banging and screeching. The wind changed and the nois got louder, then the Pumpkin heard a voice say “Hello, I am Ghostboy and I will help you become the scariest Pumpkin of all!”
Ghostboy helped the Pumpkin to be scary. He carved a face on him and made him twice his size and then taught him to make screeching ghost noises. “Now I will definitely get picked for Halloween!” said the Pumpkin, and he was right – the very next day he got picked.
That night, he sat on the doorstep waiting to spook all the people. The Pumpkin heard a scary noise and knew that Ghostboy was there. He asked Ghostboy why no one was scared by him. “It is because all the other houses have pumpkins too, so we need to do something” replied Ghostboy. Ghostboy picked up the Pumpkin and moved him all around. All the people ran away screaming because they had never seen a floating pumpkin before.
Ghostboy and the Pumpkin laughed out loud and the Pumpkin was finally happy because he had completed his Halloween mission and had made a new friend called Ghostboy.
Monster in The Night
by Zayden Gallimore, P7 Letham Primary
On Halloween night I got a spooky fright because I heard a bump in the night
There was no light, just a monster who was hiding and was eager to bite
The monsters shadow was big and frightening, I dashed under the covers as quick as lightning
As he circled my bed round and round, I could hear his claws scrape the ground
I peeked my head up from down below, to try and see my ferocious foe
I scanned my room, every nook and cranny, now out of sight I am worried he has gone after my Granny!
I got up from my bed to hunt the beast, only to catch him with a feathery feast
I back up slowly down the hall, but with no lights I trip and fall
For fear of being eaten I get up and run, for now the chase scene has begun
I made it to the kitchen where I grab a knife, but suddenly the monster sprang to life
He pounced at me with all his might, then ran and sat just out of sight
I turned to where the monster sat, only to realise the beast was just my cat
Halloween at Ashbrook
by Sarah Mills
With her cart led by the skull of a T-Rex
She started to bewitch and hex.
The hanging baskets shuddered and shook,
Everything was suddenly alive at Ashbrook.
The hoses became snakes, the statuary grew eyes
And out of the flowerbeds monsters did rise.
The trowels went digging all by themselves,
The gnomes in the gift shop walked off of the shelves.
The birdbaths bubbled with a ghastly green goo
As ghosts flew out of canes of bamboo.
Pots grew feet and trugs grew toes
And all manner of plants began to necrose.
Then the very next morning when Anne opened the store,
Everything was as it had been before.
The hanging baskets were still and did not shake.
The hose was not a ginormous snake.
The flowerbeds were all tidy and neat
And none of the pots or trugs had feet.
The birdbaths did not bubble away.
The canes of bamboo did not swing or sway.
All of the trowels were still shiny and new
And all of the plants and flowers still grew.
Only Anne was sure that when she passed the witch,
She saw one eye wobble and twitch.
Is she winking Anne thought for a little while
And why does the T-Rex seem to smile?
But do not take her word for it folks, see for yourselves and come to Ashbrook
For there is magic here if one does but look.
