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Baby greens is big business. Out there
on California farms there are $200,000 machines that delicately mow 3 inch
tall greens before being packed and shipped to all corners of the country
where they land in high-end restaurants in addition to your local grocery
store which now also offers bags of "yuppie" mix. What used to be a hip and
expensive trend (at $14/pound) has now surpassed the use of head lettuce when
it comes to preparing salad greens.
What is best? The crunch and juice of a mature head of romaine or the
fluffiness and tenderness of a spring mix? Of course the answer is neither or
both... I love using both in the kitchen and therefore I grow my greens both
ways. Time wise, the mix comes first. It is right after asparagus, the first
crop you can grow in spring, besides over-wintered plants. It takes a
direct-seeded mix 5 to 7 weeks in early Spring to grow (from mid-March to end
of April). But for the more relaxed folks (or less bent on the commercial
end), it will take you only 3 to 4 weeks if you start your seeding in early
May.
The "before" picture on the left was taken on March 20. The mulch has been
pulled down and the irrigation line put in. The soil has been lightly raked to
get rid of surface debris. Seeds have been sowed heavily on either of the hose
and covered with a dusting of perlite and peat moss. The seed "tracks" are
then packed in with the tool you see or anything with a flat side (like a long
piece of 2 by 4), re-mulched lightly and watered by hand just that first time.
One warning about hand-watering lettuce or any small seeded crop: do not water
with the jet falling down directly on the your bed, it could scatter the
seeds. Instead use a "rainfall" method where the water from your garden hose
goes up in the air first before falling down. After that, put your bed on
daily drip-irrigation: 30 minutes daily at about 1pm, unless it rains. Lettuce
and greens like constant moisture. For best results, cover your bed until
early May with a floating row-cover as seen on the "after" picture on the left
of the bed. Thus protected, your greens will grow faster and prettier and will
not be shattered by heavy rainfall or hail. The result as seen on the same bed
pictured on April 24 is a lush blanket of greens ready to go to market or land
in your kitchen.
A real fun part of green mixes is their unlimited variations. I often tell my
clients to buy one bag from each grower and do some comparison tasting at
home. Kind of like buying 3 or 4 different bottles of wines. Mine is changing
constantly, but I tend to always include my following favorites: red salad
bowl, buttercrunch and paris-cos for lettuces, green kale, mizuna and arugula
for other greens. I found that colors (red, shades of blue and green, etc..)
and size (not more than 3 inches) are critical for visual attractiveness and
palatability. I also love adding a few splashes of bright multicolored
nasturtiums when there are available in the garden.
You may grow your mix till mid June (seeding time). After that it gets very
tricky and not worth your while as the heat weakens the plants . At that
point, if you are still up for a challenge, I recommend that you shift to
heat-tolerant lettuce heads for your summer greens, but that is another
story...
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