Red leafed chicory

Chicory flower

These plants do well in most soils and like full sun to semi-shade, are easily grown from seed and become bitter once the plants start to flower and go to seed. But before that happens you will get months of delicious and healthy leaves.

Chicory Cichorium intybus is a herbaceous perennial that grows from a strong tap root with large leaves. Blue flowers appear on long stalks in the second year. It is frost and drought tolerant, and makes a good winter salad crop in cooler regions. Young leaves have a delicious slightly bitter flavour. Older plants are eaten as vegetables. Some varieties are ‘Red Treviso’, ‘Palla Rossa’, ‘Catalogna Emerald’. Endive Cichorium endiva is closely related to chicory, grows in the same way and is a useful cool season salad plant. The flavour is mild, nutty and less bitter. Some varieties are ‘Pancalleri Fine Cut’, ‘Blonde Full Heart’, ‘Moss Curled’.

Landcress

Mitsuba

Landcress Barbarea vulgaris is a tough biennial plant that self-sows around the garden once established. The glossy green leaves have a strong, hot mustardy flavour that combines really well with mild lettuce leaves.

Mitsuba Cryptotaenia japonica is a perennial that grows as a leafy bush to about 70cm. The delicate leaves have a flavour between angelica and parsley.

Mizuna lime and ruby streaks

Purple orach with lettuces

Mizuna and Mibuna, Brassica rapa subsp. nipposinica are annual or biennial plants that grow in a dense clump to about 50 cm. The leaves are bright green and deeply indented (mizuna) or long and tapered (mibuna). They have a fresh mustardy flavour and are high in vitamin C. Some recently released varieties with more deeply indented leaves are ‘Green Elk’, ‘Red Streaks’, ‘Lime Streaks’

Orach Atriplex hortensis can grow to over 1m with either red, white or green leaves. Red is the most common. Young leaves and stems are eaten in salads. Self-sows readily.

Perilla

Rocket

Perilla Perilla frutescens The most common form of this annual has ruffled purple leaves. The leaves have an earthy, spicy flavour and can be cooked or eaten in salads.

Rocket, arugula, Eruca sativa is an annual that can grow up to 70cm when in flower. Sow seed where it is to grow, it will self sow. Rocket does best in cooler weather and has a delicious, pungent flavour. There are now several varieties with broader leaves and a milder flavour.

Wild rocket Diplotaxis tenuifolia is a perennial that grows as a low bush with yellow flowers. It is very drought tolerant. The flavour of the leaf is similar to rocket, but stronger and nuttier.

Wild rocket

Corn salad has mild, almost melt in the mouth leaves

The lovely autumn days entice me into the garden where I have been madly weeding and cutting back the prolific summer growth. I love this time of year when the soil is still warm, so plants are still growing, but the intense heat has gone. Two plants that come into their own now are corn salad and landcress. These are both annuals (landcress is sometimes biennial) that self sow around my garden providing salad greens right though autumn and winter.
Corn salad (Valerianella locusta) is also known as lamb’s lettuce, and has a delicate very mild flavour with soft leaves that almost melt in the mouth. The leaves are pale green and rounded and grow in small clumps. You can pick the leaves individually or cut whole plants just above the ground, they will re-shoot. Plants only reach about 30cm in height. There are cultivars with golden, extra large and darker green leaves. Grow corn salad in temperate and cold regions from seed sown in autumn, winter and spring—in hot weather it goes to seed almost immediately. I find that mine goes to seed in spring, then disappears until autumn when the plants appear again in a dense clump.

Lancress has a hot, spicy flavour, perfect for winter salads

In contrast landcress (Barbarea vulgaris) self sows in summer and plants appear again in odd corners all over the garden all year round, but most prolifically in autumn. Landcress is also sometimes called winter cress or yellow rocket and is easily grown from seed planted in autumn and spring. It’s a tough, undemanding plant that grows as a rosette of dark green leaves from which stalks, with smaller leaves and a profusion of yellow flowers, grow in summer. It can grow as tall as 70cm when in flower.
Both corn salad and landcress will grow in most soils as long as they are well drained, and they like open sunny or semi-shaded positions. Landcress has hot, spicy crunchy leaves, similar to watercress, that are high in minerals and vitamins, especially vitamin C.
Salad
One of my favourite cool season salads is made by combining these two leaves, the mild, soft corn salad leaves beautifully compliment the strongly flavoured cress, add the last of the summer’s tomatoes, or later in the season gently fry some leeks and stir them in, delicious! —PW