Mustard greens are an easy-to-grow spring plant that loves cool climate. Mustard greens are additionally scrumptious, lending their zippy taste to salads when the greens are younger and stir-fries once they’re mature. The next 5 mustard greens are top-notch. Give them a attempt within the spring and luxuriate in their piquant taste and productive yields.

1. Crimson Large

The usual for purple-leaved mustard varieties, Crimson Large produces gigantic leaves which are deep purple with medium inexperienced veins. Prepared to select on the child stage at simply 25 days or the full-leaf measurement in 45. Their spice is unforgettable, and their beauty within the backyard can’t be beat.

2. Ruby Streaks

Prized for its lacy, comfortable leaves, Ruby Streaks has purple-tinged leaves with inexperienced mid-ribs. It’s additionally an amazing mustard inexperienced selection for late-summer planting. Child greens are prepared to reap in simply 20 days from seed, the flavour is gentle with a tangy chunk.

3. Inexperienced Wave

The extremely ruffled, shiny inexperienced leaves of Inexperienced Wave look a bit like kale, however their taste is much extra spicy. Inexperienced Wave cooks fantastically and holds up within the pan. Extremely productive and able to harvest in 45 days as mature mustard greens. This is among the most bolt-resistant mustard varieties available on the market.

4. Dragon Tongue

One other wine-colored mustard selection, these giant leaves are crunchy and crinkly with white mid-ribs. Drop-dead attractive and flavorful, this can be a selection that’s a bit on the gentle facet in comparison with some others.

5. Tye Dye

Quick rising with extremely serrated, feathery leaves, Tye Dye makes a surprising decorative when combined with flowers and foliage crops in containers and raised beds. Plant extra seeds each few weeks for a steady harvest.

Tips on how to Develop Mustard Greens

All of those mustard varieties are easy to develop by immediately sowing the seeds into the backyard as quickly because the spring soil might be labored. About 4 weeks earlier than your final anticipated spring frost, plant the tiny, spherical seeds one inch aside and a half inch deep. Area rows eight inches aside.

Mustard inexperienced seeds germinate shortly, so that you’ll be thinning the seedlings inside two weeks of planting. Skinny the crops till they’re about 4 inches aside, on middle. Use the thinnings to boost salads and sandwiches. In the event you’re going to reap your mustard greens as child greens to be used in recent salads, there’s no must skinny the crops as they gained’t be rising to maturity.

In the event you don’t intend to reap them as child mustard greens, permit the crops to achieve maturity. Leaves might be harvested one by one by breaking or slicing the outer, most mature leaves from the plant however leaving the rising level intact to resprout. Or, you possibly can harvest the entire plant by slicing it off at floor stage simply above the soil and utilizing all of it within the kitchen.

Mustard Greens & Warmth

When summer time’s warmth arrives, mustard varieties will bolt or go to flower. When this occurs, the leaves flip both very spicy or bitter. When the harvest ends, pull the crops out and toss them within the compost pile, or depart the flowers for pollinators. Ultimately, seed pods will kind and dry on the crops. These seeds might be allowed to drop to the bottom the place they’ll re-sprout within the fall when the climate cools once more. The seeds can be collected and saved for replanting the next spring. The ensuing crops might or might not be the identical selection because the guardian crops, relying on whether or not the variability is open-pollinated or hybrid, however there’s an excellent probability they’ll be flavorful and properly price rising.

This text about mustard greens was written for Pastime Farms on-line. Click on right here to subscribe to Pastime Farms print journal.