Vegetables
Vegetable can be as delicious as they are decorative. The vegetables listed below can be harvested in three months or less after planting and often have dramatic forms or colourful parts.
Vegetables for a Garden in a Term
- Courgettes
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Sow indoors in April in 7.5 cm pots, keeping them on a bright window sill before planting them outdoors in May. Courgette fruits can be harvested at 10-15 cm long. For quick fruiting, try parthenocarpic varieties. These do no depend on good weather and/or bees for pollination and, therefore, fruit earlier. Parthenocarpic varieties include ‘Cavili F1 Hybrid’, with creamy white fruits, and ‘Parthenon F1 Hybrid’, with dark green, glossy fruits.
- Rocket
The variety ‘Sky Rocket’ can be harvested in 25-30 days from sowing. The irregularly-shaped leaves have a peppery taste and are delicious in salads and sandwiches.
- Radish
Sow from March through September in a cool, moist position and thin out excess plants early, allowing the remaining plants to grow larger. Harvest in 5-8 weeks. Varieties include ‘Scarlet Globe’ with round, scarlet roots and white flesh and ‘French Breakfast’ with cylindrical, crimson roots and white flesh.
- Spinach
Sow in March through May and thin early to allow the remaining seedlings to develop. These can then be harvested in 4-14 weeks, depending on how large you would like the leaves. The seedlings that have been removed during the thinning process can be used in salads or sandwiches as ‘baby leaves’, which are especially tender and flavoursome. Varieties include ‘Bloomsdale’, a classically shaped, green spinach leaf, and ‘Bordeaux’, a pine-tree-shaped, green leaf with striking red stems
Idea for Discussion
When is a perceived vegetable actually a fruit? (Hint: a courgette is actually a fruit.)