I was watering the carrots today and noticed a fairly big rogue weed had taken hold in there; when I bent down to pull it I saw that it was no ordinary weed - it was a New Zealand spinach plant. Sort of ironic, because last year I tried to actually,
purposefully grow that plant from seed in a container, but they never grew well (too small a pot I think) and I wound up tossing the whole planter. Right where this one had sprouted too. It's one of those plants whose seed location is a bit difficult to decipher, and I discovered only as I tipped out the plant to the ground that it actually made some, though none seemed mature. Anyway, this species has been around for awhile and there are always seed packets for it on the shelves in the spring, but it really doesn't seem popular. I don't know a soul who eats it. Okay, maybe one, but they eat all kinds of weeds so that doesn't really count.
It occurred to me that I should put it aside for dinner and actually cook & eat it - something I've never done though I did grow it once many years ago. (It resprouted the next year that time too.) I had water boiling for the corn on the cob, so I rather carelessly threw the whole stem of the spinach in the pot with the corn. I expected it to taste like cooked grass - or worse. There
must be a reason no one eats this. I have no idea where the courage came from, I've avoided trying it until now. It didn't cook for long, maybe 3 or 4 minutes and I pulled it out, plunked it on my plate, added a pat of butter and s & p. Closed my eyes for added courage and took a bite. I couldn't believe it. It was wonderful. The texture was actually superior to spinach, spinach tends to really shrink right down, but this maintained a bit of substance. The flavor wasn't as strong as spinach, which has a bit more of an oxalic acid bite I think, but this was still pleasing. A milder but good tasting green - which can't be said of either spinach or chard. I'm not a huge greens person either - I add kale to the soup, chard too, and I love fresh lettuce but I don't do much beyond that. Herbs I guess. (I've tried turnip greens and bok choi and I didn't detect any taste in either of those.) I don't like to grow spinach, delicious as it can be, because it bolts so darn fast. New Zealand spinach can apparently go all summer long with no change in taste or texture.
So, I may grow this again on purpose, only in ground not a container, so that I can get it to it's maximum size. I checked out it's nutritional profile and it looks pretty good!
New Zealand Spinach (Tetragonia tetragonioides) or tetragon is a leaf vegetable, grown for its edible leaves and can be used as food or an ornamental plant for ground cover. It is native to New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Chile and Argentina where the flavor and texture resemble spinach.
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