Perpetual Spinach (Leaf Beet)

Perpetual spinach also goes under the name of leaf beet, which reflects the fact that it is not a member of the spinach family at all. It is closely related to beetroot, but the leaves are very similar to spinach in taste. Dirty Nails grows leaf beet instead of spinach as he finds it an easier and more reliable performer in the veg garden. It produces lovely big green leaves in profusion, and is far less prone to bolting during hot, dry spells. Dirty Nails sows leaf beet in March for cropping throughout the summer and this week has sown another couple of 6 foot (1.8 metre) rows. He will protect these later sowings throughout the winter under cloches and they should provide useful greens until the spring.

Leaf beet seeds are small and knobbly, but large enough to handle individually. Dirty Nails sows his in a sunny bed, in soil that has been raked to a fine tilth. The seeds are sown thinly in drills, not more than ½ an inch (1½ cm) deep, and kept well watered. He allows a foot (30 cm) between rows. As the seedlings develop he will thin them out to 8 inch (20 cm) spacings.

Care needs to be taken when the leaves are ready for eating. Dirty Nails likes to cut them off as low down as possible with a sharp knife to avoid disturbing the roots, which can happen with heavy-handed snapping and tugging. Another plus for leaf beet is in the kitchen. Because the leaves grow upright from the ground and are not deeply ridged, they tend to be a lot less gritty than spinach. They are delicious steamed with or without the stalks, which take slightly longer to become tender.

Natural History In The Garden: Yarrow

Yarrow is a plant which flowers this month. It can be seen in gardens or just beyond as an escapee, blooming in patches. It bears dense platters of whitepetalled flowers with pale yellow centres. These are borne on stems rising out of thick, soft, slightly grey-green fern-like foliage. It is a deeply rooted, drought resistant member of the daisy family.

Anglo-Saxons referred to yarrow as woundwort, believing that a compress of yarrow and grease would heal puncture wounds and cuts. It was also picked and brought indoors to drive away evil and sickness. In olden times yarrow was thought to protect one’s heart from being broken by a lover.

Vegetable Snippets: Some Facts About Leaf Beet

Perpetual spinach is a selectively bred descendant of the wild plant, sea beet, which is a coastal species. Sprawling and hairless, it blooms from summer to early autumn. The display is modest, with numerous small green and yellow flowers adorning a spike which issues forth centrally from a bunch of thick, fleshy, spatula-shaped, red-tinged, glossy leaves.

Cultivation and refining of the wild forerunner began way back in the Middle East some 2,000 years ago. Perpetual spinach is a member of the goosefoot family of plants, and these have an important role in human food production worldwide. Other goosefoots include Swiss chard, mangelwurzels and a range of fleshy-rooted beets.

Each seed may give rise to a cluster of seedlings because leaf beet is ‘multi-germ’. This means that contained within one seed is the potential to form many individuals. In the best interests of growing your own greens it is wise to let them all pop up and have a good look at them whilst they are still tiny. The strongest, most handsome specimen can then be selected at this stage as the plant to nurture, and lavish with care and attention. All the others can be carefully pinched or pulled out, with minimum disturbance to the roots of the one that will eventually be eaten.