Your Warm Season Greens

[digitS']

Endive might be easier to find in the stores. I've tasted endive. It has been used, like parsley is often used, fresh and to add something attractive to the plate by the restaurant. I didn't care for endive but I don't eat uncooked greens, often.

Long ago, I realised that if I wanted more leafy greens in my diet, cooking was the way to go. This revelation came from living with my Ex's grandmother through one summer. She made a wilted lettuce salad, not by drizzling hot bacon fat over the bowl of lettuce but by taking a big head of leaf lettuce and tossing it in the skillet!

I was eating a huge "salad" when she did this. The lettuce cooked down in an instant. These days, I try to limit the bacon fat but life can't be all about limits . Less of this really should be balanced with more of that .

Radicchio is in our markets. I'm not a fan. Once again, I haven't eaten it any way but raw. These three chicory family plants are out there. Why deny ourselves a taste test?!

Just like anyone, I tire of one veggie or another. I'm surprising myself in recent summers with still enjoying broccoli ... if I'm not careful, I'll be eating broccoli, 12 months outta the year! But, it may be all the bok choy that I'm taking from the greenhouse through the winter. Yeah, I'm cutting down on the store-bought broccoli in those months. Yeah, fresh is best - my summer broccoli tastes like a different vegetable from what I can buy in the stores.

Steve

 

[lcertuche]

I love wilted salads too. This is the way Daddy had us make salad when I was young. I kale wilted with a little onion, garlic, a drizzle of balsamic vinegar, a tsp. of Dijon mustard, and finally a few drops of Sriracha sauce. Yum!

 

[digitS']

...the worms ...

Worms!?

I try my very best not to have the caterpillar of the cabbage butterfly in my food!

Recent years, I've used spinosad. It will also kill flea beetles. Unfortunately, it doesn't kill aphids. One thing I'm liking about the 2016 growing season is how few aphids are around here.

Aphids usually can't take a shower of insecticidal soap. But, I've had to come back with neem oil spray for another salvo at the green critters! Then, I might soak my broccoli in a sink full of hot water.

Steve

 

[digitS']

I love wilted salads too. This is the way Daddy had us make salad when I was young. I kale wilted with a little onion, garlic, a drizzle of balsamic vinegar, a tsp. of Dijon mustard, and finally a few drops of Sriracha sauce. Yum!

Oh.

That sounds good!

Steve

 

[so lucky]

I use the salt soak for cabbage worms, too.
Welcome, @Icertuche. Glad you joined us.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I soak my broccoli in water with a handful of salt in it to drive the worms out. Is this how you get them out before cooking?

I do that too but I find it doesn't get all of them and does nothing for cocoons. Cocoons aren't that big of a problem on broccoli, you can see them, but they can be a problem on kale. In addition to soaking in salt water I cut the florets fairly small and look really closely. That gets most of them.

@digitS' , I didn't mean to ignore your question, I got distracted. Of course I sometimes have leaf miners and aphids, aphids especially on the black eyed peas. They can show up other places too but they really like the purple hulls. The leaf miners are usually not that big a problem, there are a few but not that many. Since they are so small they don't add that much protein so I normally just don't use those leaves. I can't recall ever treating anything for leaf miners.

 

[digitS']

I can tolerate some loss. Break off a leaf and drop it, here and there.

Leaf miners aren't a huge problem except in the spinach, early. If every leaf is damaged, the crop has been destroyed. I'm not growing food for the pests.

Spinosad is recommended by the age extension agencies for leaf miners. It slowed them down, at least, the one time I tried it on spinach. Long enuf, the plants could grow more, undamaged leaves.

Steve

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

Yeah, fresh is best - my summer broccoli tastes like a different vegetable from what I can buy in the stores.

Steve

The first year I planted broccoli it was a great success. Like you, the taste was so different, so good. I tried again and did not have as much luck and I do not have a lot of room. Fall broccoli? I did try the purple sprouting and planted in the fall that was to over-winter and have broccoli early spring, but the neighbor rabbit, Snickers, ATE ALL OF IT!

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I always have leaf miner damage on spinach, except this year. I had the spinach planted in fall and I planted some in Feb. I had that box covered and the spinach grew and I cut it to eat before any leaf miners. Later, they came and did damage and I threw leaves out and harvested the rest and made room to plant something else. I am going to try fall spinach.

 

[digitS']

That Snickers!

I didn't think that we could get broccoli thru our winters @Gardening with Rabbits . Maybe, if not having sub-zero is our new normal. Trying to leave bok choy results in about 90% winter kill and 10% which is badly damaged and bolts immediately.

We don't seem to have enough time between cooling down and frosts for me to grow lettuce in the fall! It didn't make any size the two times I tried it. Without Asian greens, my starvation month would come in November!

Okay, maybe it wouldn't .

Steve