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Gary350
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GREENs, what are you planting for salads?

I planted, Bibb lettuce, Romaine Lettuce, Red Russian lettuce, Salad bowl lettuce, Endive, Arugula, Parris Island Lettuce, Lolla Rossa Lettuce, Kale, Napa, Bok Choy, Broccoli, Rainbow Chard, Red Chard, Marjoram, oregano, Parsley, Cilantro, Thyme, oriental mix, turnip greens, mustard greens, radish. They are all planted in a long 3' wide row. All of these are good in salads. Some are good in coleslaw. Some are good cooked like spinach. Some seeds say, germination in 7 to 14 days, mature in 75 days, that will be July it will be 100 degrees here then. I also have most of the same planted in 2 gallon pots I can keep them in the shade during hot weather. This is my spring garden experiment. I hope they live through the summer and I have good salads in the Fall. NO spinach it always bolts first sign of hot weather waste of garden space but I love spinach.
Last edited by Gary350 on Mon Mar 27, 2017 5:13 pm, edited 2 times in total.

pepperhead212
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I always plant my greens indoors in small pots, then about three weeks later put them out in a double row, with T-tape down the middle, for later watering, then I cover with a light fabric, to keep rabbits off. Helps with bugs too. I plant several lettuces, bok choy, komatsuna, senposai, kohlrabi, tatsoi, chard, perpetual spinach (another chard), and misome. This year I'm trying tyfon - a green that is supposedly heat resistant ...I'll find out. The variety of komatsuna is supposed to be heat resistant, too.

Most of those Asian greens are ready for first harvest in 30 days from transplant, and are really pushing up on that fabric I covered them with!.

My perennial herbs are up out there - chives, tarragon, marjoram, sage, mint, thyme- but the parsleys and several basils are started inside. Later, dill will get direct seeded, and I'll try cilantro, but never have good luck with it outside. I always grow herbs in windowsill boxes on my deck, and it's great having them at my fingertips, for those salads.

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rainbowgardener
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Since my garden space is limited, I just get packets of mixed lettuce seeds that have a whole variety of red and green loose leaf lettuces. Besides the mixed lettuces, I am also growing spinach, kale, cabbage and broccoli.

I don't know if it counts as for salads, but I also have all the herbs Dave mentioned, mostly in containers on my deck, some mixed in with veggies and flowers in the ground. Red and green basil, lavender, sage, thyme, cilantro, chives, parsley, oregano, lemon grass, lemon balm, anise hyssop, mint ...

gumbo2176
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With our weather getting warmer by the day, lettuce is out of the question now and won't be doable until early fall of this year. I do have 2 varieties of kale and 2 varieties of Swiss Chard, along with collard greens and some beets that I can use the leafy tops in salads. As far as lettuce, it's just a quick visit to the supermarket for the next several months for it.

Dirt
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I'm going to keep it simple this year. Mesclun and spinach. Radish and turnip greens we'll just come by naturally as I thin. Herbs are chives, sage, parsley, Sweet and Genovese Basil, oregano, thyme.

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digitS'
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Gary, I don't know anything about Red Russian lettuce and Lolla Rosa is just a pretty catalog picture to me :) . You may want to try a Batavian (Summer Crisp). For several years, I have grown Nevada and it holds up well in hot weather. None of the lettuce crop is around after awhile even with some succession planting.

I put quite a bit more emphasis on stir-fry veggies than salads.

Pepperhead, you have several I grow each year. Tyfon might be something you like. I've only had it for 2 different seasons. It would probably be better in a salad than mustard, which it looks similar to. For all that mustard-look, it's really mild flavored!

I'll have chard this year after being convinced as a kid that I didn't like it. I've grown it as an adult - confirmed that I don't like the heavy stems. Of course, I could cut the stems out of the leaves but that thought didn't occur to me then :). And, I've grown turnips but haven't like them as a root veggie. And, I don't think I ever ate them as a green. How about that? Well, I've got one especially for greens (Nozawana) and 2 varieties of chard with thin stems! Perpetual spinach (chard), I've grown before so I knew I liked it. Verde de Tagio was in my garden last year. Good stuff! And, like all the chards, it lasts well in hot weather. This year I have Kitazawa's Japanese chard to try. Aaand, there's a green-leaf, edible amaranth. I tried some purple last year and the plants were really tiny; hopefully this variety will be more usable. The purple seemed to like hot weather and would hardly grow in the Spring coolness.

Steve

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rainbowgardener
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I somehow forgot to mention the chard, even though it is my favorite thing to grow! :)

pepperhead212
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Thanks for the tyfon info, Steve! I'm always looking for heat resistant greens. The senposai - cabbage x komatsuna cross - is a good one, and Johnny's seeds Win-Win bok choy is the best of many varieties I have grown, and this is the first year in a long time that I have not grown another variety side by side for comparison.

I started growing a lot of chard years ago, when I started seeing it as an ingredient in many of Rick Bayless's recipes. As in many recipes, these would call for discarding the stems, but I would save them, and cut them into 1/2" slices, and put them into things like Thai curries, or sometimes stir-fries, in which the flavorless stems are in them more for crunch, and why waste all that fiber? They do loose the crunch quickly, however, so instead of putting them all in the Thai curry, I'll just set some aside for that meal, and add some to that, and let sit a couple of minutes, then add to heated up leftovers a handful at a time.

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Gary350
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I learned several years ago Red Chard has the best flavor of all the chard's and is the most heat resistant and is the easiest to grow and very resistant to insects. I was always told not to eat chard stems but your idea of chopping them for stir fry is something I will try. Stir fry veges sound much better than lettuce crops I need more stir fry plants?. Crops like, chard, beets, carrots, will not germinate 80 degrees or hotter, they do best at 60 degrees. In the past I often plant a second crop Aug 15 but few seeds will not germinate when it is 100 degrees so I have to germinate the seeds inside the house where it is 70 degrees. Sometimes seeds germinate at 100 degrees if planted in full shade.

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rainbowgardener
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https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/vi ... rd#p331308

Is a thread where I posted the Recipes for a Small Planet recipe for Bean Cheesy Chard. It is a stir fry variation with rice and beans and uses the chopped chard stems in the stir fry - cooked separately from the leaves. It is yummy!

And yes, chard (I usually grow rainbow chard) is extremely heat (AND cold) resistant. The chard that is in my garden right now was planted a bit over a year ago. It went through frosts and then all through the extreme heat and drought we had last summer (I did keep watering it and it did get kind of sad looking for awhile but we had like three solid months where the temps were over 90 every day) and then all through winter and now it is looking vibrant and robust! It will bolt this summer and then I will replant.

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jal_ut
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Gary350, nice list of greens. I usually grow leaf lettuce, chard, beets, radish and spinach.



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