The brassica family (again)

Exploring the Brassica family and how many of the plants I grow is a topic I have written about here and here.  Last week I wrote a third piece on this group of crops, which can be seen in its entirety at feedthedatamonster.com.

(What is feedthedatamonster.com? A collection of researchers who write about interesting science-y stuff.  Go take a look!)

Bolted brassicas

Right now the greenhouse is filled with bolted, flowering brassicas.  Most brassicas have yellow flowers.  Arugula flowers are totally different in color - they are cream colored with red viens.  They do have the same number of flower petals and stamens.

Brassica florets are tasty when small, but once the stems elongate and the flowers open they are tough.  Last year I have enough tat soi flowers to eat in a stir fry. This year I let everything bolt.    Brassicas tend to bolt quickly in this greenhouse because there are so many plants in such a small area.

Varieties, clockwise from top left: wasabina, arugula, mizuna, tat soi, chinese pac choi, tokyo bekana.

What did I plant? Telling apart sprouted greens

Does this happen to you?  Do you plant things and forget what they are?  I certainly do! (See vates kale.) It's pretty easy to tell what family salad greens are in based on their cotyledons.  You might not be able to tell what variety is growing, but at least you'll be able to tell the lettuce  and spinach apart.

When lettuce sprouts it's small and cute - the bunny of the salad greens.  The cotyledons spread wide open on the soil surface.  Red varieties of lettuce will change color if it's warm and sunny. 

Spinach cotyledons are long and slender, forming a 'V' shape.  

All brassicas have heart shaped cotyledons.  This includes leafy greens and cole crops (cauliflower, cabbage etc).  The picture above shows tokyo bekana, kale and scarlet frills.  Cotyledon size varies between varieties, and so some brassicas make good microgreens.  Broccoli, although not a salad green, is a good example.

Members of the beta family, including swiss chard and beets, are also good microgreens because their stems are often bright colors.  I've taken a lot of photos of them because of this.  Their cotyledons are oblong with a slightly pointy tip.

Baby brassicas

The brassica's are growing despite the cold and dark.  Tokyo bekana plugs are in the back ground and pak choi is in the foreground.

Radishes

Occasionally I get asked if I could grow other crops besides salad greens.  Of course other fruits and vegetables can be grown in greenhouses, but most of them require things that I can't provide.  Like extra lights, actual warm temperatures (the 40 degree greenhouse is pretty cold!) and way more space.  Most crops grown for their flowers (broccoli), roots (carrots, beets) or fruits (tomatoes, cucumbers, squash) all need more soil and space to grown than mere salad greens.  So, it would be better to grow them in the ground, or in giant buckets on the ground, than on top of greenhouse benches.

Radishes are the one crop I've thought of, and tried growing like salad greens.  They are in the brassica family (as most wintergreens seem to be) and are crunchy but not yet spicy.  The spice will come with age.  I think they are a variety called 'crunchy royale' and they only took a month to get this big.  The leaves are edible, but are a bit prickly so I prefer not to eat them raw.  

Wasabina

Since the baby greens in the variety trial are big enough to distinguish, it's time to look at each of them in greater detail.  Today's green: wasabina!

I ordered these seeds from Kitazawa Seed Co.  Mainly because of the name, but also because I ordered everything described as 'cold tolerant.'   The seed company describes wasabina as:

"This light green serrated leaf mustard brings a delicious, spicy, wasabi-like flavor to a salad mix of baby leaf greens. The large, tender mature leaves are ruffled with curly edges and are best cooked. Very cold tolerant."

So far, the leaves are serrated and have fine hairs on the edges and veins.  The hairs aren't prickly like those found on old mizuna leaves.  So wasabina would be ok to add in a salad mix.  Right now they just taste like a mild mustard green and aren't spicy at all.  Probably the spiciness will increase as the plants mature.

Baby vitamin green

Information on vitamin greens seems to be the number one thing people are looking for when they come to this blog.  So I planted a few of my coveted seeds a few weeks before starting the variety trial to see what they were all about. 

Right now my plants are at the four leaf stage, which means they are just about perfect baby size for salad mix.  The picture above shows leaf number three and the beginnings of number four.

I tried a leaf and it tasted - green.  That might sound anti-climatic, but vitamin greens are known for being tender greens without a strong mustard-y taste.  Below is a seedling from the variety trial.  You can kind of see little hairs, or spines on the edges of the leaf.  I'm hoping these will disappear as the plant gets older, but I'm not sure yet.  Since the days are so short now they  won't be ready to harvest (and eat!) for a few more weeks.

Patterns of the mustard family

I continue to be enthralled with the brassica family because it contains so many of our vegetables.  Even if you don't eat vegetables you should be interested in brassicas because you probably a) season meals with black pepper or b) eat canola oil.  The brassica family doesn't only contain vegetables.  Lots of other plants make up Brassicaceae, some of which you've probably heard of or seen growing on the side of the road.

Ever seen drifts of yellow flowers on the side of the highway mid-spring?
They are probably yellow rocket (picture from gobotany.newenglandwild.org)

First though, how to tell if a plant is part of the brassica family?  Look at the flowers.  All flowers in the brassica family (also called the 'mustard' family just to add confusion) have 4 petals and six stamens.  The picture below shows how four of the stamens are tall and a two are short.

Picture from "Botany in a Day: the patterns method of plant identification" by Thomas J Elpel

What other plants are in the brassica family?  A list of all genuses found in New England has been complied by the New England Wildflower Society.  Domesticated varieties included horseradish, watercress, radish, turnip and (my favorites) arugula and mustard.  If you're a gardener you might have alyssum, sweet-alyssum, wallflower or baskets-of gold in your flower garden.

Sweet alyssum from gobotany.newenglandwild.org

Baskets of gold from gobotany.newenglandwild.org 

Lastly, Dyer's Woad (Isatis) is not found in New England, but is a noxious weed in western states.  Woad is used to make blue dye by extracting indigo from it's leaves.  Small amounts of the dye are produced in the UK and France for craft dyer's.

Photo by Steve Dewey, Utah State University, www.forestryimages.org

Pak choi - a green for next winter season

I'm getting together a list of greens to try out during the next winter growing season.  Pak choi is definitely on the list.  The greens on the left of the picture above are variety of pak choi called joy choi (tatsoi is on the left).  Pak choi part of the Brassica rapa var. chinensis group.  Originally we didn't think it would be a very good baby green because it forms heavy heads.  It seemed to work out in the tray above and grew faster than the tatsoi!  The stems were thick and crunchy but the taste was mild.  Pretty much exactly what I want to be eating in the middle of winter.

The brassica family

Many of the greens I grow come from the huge brassica family.  By no means is this 'family tree' of brassica's complete.  It's mainly the greens I have grown, the greens I'd like to grow, and some other branches that are substantial/important.  Have I gotten anything wrong?  Anything you would like to see added? 

tree picture