Final round up of Winter Salads

The warmer weather we had a couple of weeks ago has sent the last of the winter salads bolting skywards. It was time to dig out my favourite winter providers - Texel Greens and Corn Salad (Lambs Lettuce) - this is the last pic of the salad jungle.

I couldn't bear to waste all that lovely home grown greenery but separating leaves from tough stalks would have taken about a week so I put the lot in a pot with some gently fried onions and stock and boiled for about 15 mins before sieving it to get the stringy woody stalky bits out - it made a huge amount of the most delicious and beautifully green, soup.

Other winter stalwarts that faced the chop were spinach (which also made the pot).

Winter purslane (which also made the pot) - and look at those amazing little flowers forming out of the centre of the leaf!

And finally red ribbed dandelions, which while looking lovely didn't taste the same (to me at least) and will not be making a comeback in winter 2010.

Getting busy in the Tomato house

I find it almost impossible to throw a living plant away - even if it is a teeny weeny seedling, it's got potential. And if it hasn't got much potential then it's worse because it's a challenge. So as a consequence I soldier on with far too many and often feeble, seedlings in pots. Plus I don't thin out enough.
So this year I'm cutting right back on the number of seeds of each variety being sown.

Last weekend I sowed in (what was supposed to be) rows of 10 which however on second counting turned out to be rows of 11, the following:
Aubergine - Black Beauty
Sweet Pepper - California Wonder
Tomato - Gardeners Delight (2 rows)
Tomato - Sungold (1 row was in fact the entire pack of seeds)

All tamped down and labelled up - waiting to be finely riddled with John Innes Seedling compost to barely cover and into the Propagator they'll go.

Then had a bit of fun with our Eco-Pot Maker making some individual pots out of Saturdays paper - I was getting about about 8 large pots out of a single sheet so reckon I could make about 1400 large pots from a single paper - not bad value for money and they will all compost themselves into the ground! I planted up 11 (well I can't break the pattern now) Asparagus Pea seeds, making a neat and measurable little hole with the Dibblet. I've never grown this veg before but supposed to taste like a cross between, guess what - asparagus and peas.

Finally - I couldn't sign off without sharing a pic of our beautiful snowdrops - what an unexpected delight for us down south in March!

Oh - and another pic of a delicious side salad of picked leaves -just look at the variety and all over-wintering uncovered (except on the worst jack frosty nights). Just in case you were wondering - the leaf top centre is torn - not nibbled....

Photographic Progress of Winter Salads on Valentines Day

Here is the current state - photographs in order are: Texel Greens, the runaway winner - delicious and keeps coming, a dead cert for next winter, Corn Salad, doing well and an interesting sprinkler for salad bowls, Lettuce Valdor - now thinned out and over the last couple of weeks has started to grow central leaves - will be interesting to see how it compares against spring sown lettuce, and finally Burnet. No picture of the Purslane as approx 2 weeks after the picture taken in November, all traces of it disappeared overnight. Mystery. Oh and forgot to include the land cress - which in size more matches the cress of  my first childhood horticultural foray than watercress, but we will watch this space for a growth spurt.

Progress on Winter Salads

It's been a while since our last update and some things have been growing well and some things have been, well, stationary!
The star of the show has been the Texel Greens - a jam packed Planter full of them. They have been cut day after day to make, amongst other things, the chicken salad sandwiches so beloved of my son (there is chicken in there I promise - just hiding under the generous portion of Texel greens....). A delicious, distinctive, not too peppery flavour and totally frost resistant.

Talking of frost resistant - it's a rare thing for us in Poole to get more than a degree or so below freezing and even rarer to get real, proper snow (not like the stoical folks up at our factory in Sheffield who all own decent snow boots and can drive in the stuff without crashing!). However this winter has broken all the norms and we have had to resort to desperate measures - bubble wrap. Does the job but looks hideous. Hmm, surely we can come up with something better than this....

Something Jumping in our Winter Salads

Maurice and Doris (resident cats) are the prime suspects for the skullduggery in the Planters......suspicious hollows in the middle of the planters, squashed seedlings.....arghh, whats a gardener to do?
One roll of galvanised netting later, cut simply into squares and bent around the willow weave and all crops secured. I can report there has been no further activity since!

Winter Salads are Growing

Should have posted this a little while back....these pictures were taken mid November after the seeds had been in for 3 weeks. A huge difference between the rates of growth. Have already started using the lettuce Valdor thinnings in salads. Golden Purslane looking a bit weedy. Texel Greens looking very promising!

Winter Salads

Can it really be possible? Salad leaves all winter through? Well it has to be worth a try.

A quick scan of the seed company catalogues will give you more choices than you can shake a stick at. I decided to plump for mostly 'cut & come again' leaves with one heart forming lettuce - the king of winter lettuces - Lettuce Valdor (seeds shown above).

I filled four Home Allotment Willow Planters with John Innes no 3 and topped off with a couple of inches of no. 2. The John Innes compost system is a long standing favorite of gardeners - they are soil based composts which unlike peat ones (or peat substitute) are much easier to 'wet' again if you have (shock horror) let them dry out. There's a different 'number' for each stage of growing - I picked no.2 to help the seedlings get off to a good start and layered it on top of No. 3 which the established roots will grow down into.

The no. 2 was sieved through a potting riddle to get rid of any big bits - imagine a tiny seedling trying to push one of these boulders out of the way.

At last the sowing - I broadcast the seeds, sprinkling them all over the surface of the Planters, rather than planting in lines as you might in a traditional veg patch.

A firm growing platform is best for seeds - I used a tamper to gently compact and level the surface of the soil before covering the seeds with a thin layer of riddled compost.



Labelling (variety and date) - almost the last thing on the list - and so important for tracking which varieties do well and how long they take till you can start eating them.

Finally, watered my new crop-to-be and with a bit of luck, Bob'll be my uncle.

For the record, this is what went in the planters:

Herb Burnett: Will grow to 30cm and has a fresh cucumber taste. Leaves can also be used as a tonic tea, said to be good for the skin.

Lettuce Valdor: Actively loves the cold. A butterhead variety said to be the King of winter lettuces - should be ready for harvest by early spring.

Land Cress: I've never even heard of this before - apparently tastes very much like watercress but with a smaller leaf. Likes cool, moist conditions and should be ready to eat in 8 weeks!

Golden Purslane: Green leaves on beautiful red stems. Use as a salad leaf when young (8-10cm high) or allow to grow bigger and use the stems in stir fries.

Corn Salad: A lamb's lettuce that should grow prolifically over the winter. Pick a few leaves at a time from each plant.

Texsel Greens: A fast growing leaf developed from Ethiopian mustard. Tastes a bit like spinach - actually can be cooked like spinach if you let the leaves mature a little.