Medwyn Williams and his legendary display may be absent this year, but his retirement has opened the way for a new approach.

Vegetables at Chelsea

"Ten years ago, when we had the large onions, no-one ever asked what they taste like," says Susan Robinson, of veteran Chelsea exhibitors W Robinson's. "Now they do – that’s the difference."

Their silver-gilt winning stand is about as different from Medwyn Williams's stacks of giant vegetables as it’s possible to get. Great pots of smoky purple chilli plants in three varieties - 'Orozco', 'Filius Blue' and 'Tricolour Variegata' - give a fabulous jungly effect. There’s a massive broad-leaved courgette, 'Tromboncino', snaking up the side of the stand. At the back great piles of yellow and red sweet peppers jostle for place with one of the few traditional vegetables there - a stack of onions, but small, normal-sized ones. The emphasis on plants, not produce, is quite deliberate.

"It's nice looking at a bean, but what does the plant look like?" says Susan. "Is it a dwarf plant? Is it a tall plant? It’s so much better if you can show the gardener what happens and how it will grow."

It's all part of a steady movement away from exhibition vegetables, and towards growing for taste and texture. Pippa Greenwood, broadcaster and vegetable enthusiast, is fully supportive. "Much as I was fascinated and impressed by what Medwyn did, I think veg growing is, and should be, something which normal people can achieve normal results in," she says. "And the Medwyn Williams sort of vegetable gardens with super-perfect, super-sized crops is quite unrealistic."

Geoff Hyde, of the National Vegetable Society, believes this change of attitude should also be reflected in more traditional vegetable shows. "People these days are much more interested in vegetables without pesticides than in perfect vegetables. But the criteria for vegetable showing is perfect vegetables," he says.

For Pippa, producing vegetables only for show simply misses the point. "I don’t want them to be inspirational and aspirational," she says. "I want them to be something you do, and want to do more of, because for me that’s what veg growing is all about - something that gives you an immense feeling of satisfaction."