Salad Days: Salads for Damp Places

Some fetching lettuce 'Freckles' seen at the rather special  Easton Walled Gardens earlier this week
I thought it would be a good idea to start with the above photo more as an encouragement to me that it IS possible to grow lashings of salad outdoors this year.

It's been so wet over the past few weeks, and once again most of my leaves have been eaten down to their stumps by the hordes of voracious slugs and snails which have invaded my salad area. I know I'm not alone -  I've seen too many moans on Twitter about the problem!

So I'm about to try a different tack with my salad production and turning my attention to those leaves which don't mind wet feet. It probably means we'll get a heatwave now, but hey, that's a win-win situation, right?

Growing
  • Watercress - you don't need loads of water as commercially available seed can be grown successfully in damp soils. I grow mine in a big pot and make sure the drip tray is kept well topped up. Other #saladchatterers have grown cuttings taken from bagged supermarket watercress in various buckets and bowls. Reported success is variable, but I think it's worth a try until my sown seed starts to produce...
  • Other members of the watercress family, such as land cress are also worth a try and can be grown in the usual way
  • Sorrel - recommended by Cally at Country Gate Gardens
  • Mint - likes to be kept moist. I'd only use a few leaves as a 'garnish' in my salad owing to its strong, distinctive flavour. Does anyone have a good recipe for salad which includes mint for us to try?
  • So far our salad grown this way looks like it's going to have lots of sharp, strong, or peppery flavours. Can you add to the list?
Foraging

Chatting to Carl Legge this week confirmed that foraging in damp places (assuming you have somewhere suitable) might be a better prospect than trying to grow your own and keeping things damp. He offers up a new (to me anyway) edible plant: golden saxifrage - the opposite leaved version, or this one, which has alternate leaves. Both inhabit the same kind of damp places.

Others to find:

  • Dandelions - not really a plant specifically from damp places, but it still seems to be thriving everywhere despite the rain. I could start a new campaign called Eat Your Lawn with mine ;)
  • Samphire - as well as a salad ingredient it's also delicious cooked like asparagus and dripping with butter :)
  • Comfrey doesn't mind it damp and can be substituted for spinach as well as making your comfrey tea!
  • Water mint - as a substitute for the garden mint noted above
  • Wintercress - a wild substitute for cultivated land cress
  • Ribwort plantain - young leaves only, so it's really only a candidate for spring foraging. It tolerates damp rather than liking absolutely waterlogged conditions and is another candidate for Eat Your Lawn
  • Can you add to the list?

Now it's your turn. How's your salad progressing this month? Write a post on your blog and leave a link  in Mr Linky below (NB to the post itself, not to just your blog name, so we can find it easily)

Comments

  1. NevilleB22 June 2012 at 17:33

    Just enjoyed a salad for lunch at a a favourite pub that uses seasonal ingredients - baby broad beans (shelled)with crumbs of fresh sheep's curd and finely chopped mint in a light vinaigrette served with a couple of slices of light and airy focaccia with massive holes! delicious, I've used goats curd myself which has a a slightly stronger taste, or you could use the mint with small pieces of feta

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mark Willis22 June 2012 at 17:36

    Re using Mint in salads: why not make some Tabbouleh, with bulghur wheat and lashings of Mint and Parsley?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Julieanne22 June 2012 at 17:47

    For some reason, I've had no problem getting plenty of salad leaves from my favourite HSL, Bronze Arrow. And the Franchi green and red lettuces are doing wonderfully too. I think the slugs were busy with other things like attacking the french beans, and have totally left my lettues alone. #blessed

    ReplyDelete
  4. VP22 June 2012 at 18:39

    NevilleB - that sounds delicious. I must give it a try, thank you :)

    Mark - welcome! I've only ever used parsley in Tabbouleh. Mixed with mint sounds great!

    Julieanne - I think my problem is they're in an area on their own, so there's nothing else around to tempt them away. Definitely a lesson learned...

    ReplyDelete
  5. ediblethings22 June 2012 at 21:30

    I haven't managed to get it together to do a post for the chat this month, but I am looking forward to reading everyone else's.

    I love mint. Of course, the classic is mint tea, which helps use up a lot of stems at once. Where I live, many of my neighbours just use the mint, and no black tea.

    My go-to salad for mint is a Nigel Slater one, with radish, cucumber, spring onion, mint and flat leaved parsley: veg cut chunky, except the spring onions,which are finely sliced; use the whole parsley leaves and roughly torn mint; mix together in a salad bowl; crumble over some good quality feta; then dress roughly with a glug of red wine (or homemade blackberry) vinegar, a larger glug of good ev olive oil, and some pepper. Very, very good. It's always a hit when I serve it at parties.

    I think I saw that one of the chefs on the Great British Menu used the dried flowers of the ribwort plantain. Has anyone else used them like this?

    ReplyDelete
  6. Donna@Gardens Eye View23 June 2012 at 12:50

    Unfortunately my veg post with salad fixings is 2 weeks away but I do like this post. We are besieged by slugs so it is good to hear there are some alternatives.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Anonymous23 June 2012 at 19:13

    My Cos Freckles lettuces planted in the middle of the garden are progressing marvellously due to wetness of weather, but other lettuces nearer to walls and fences have been happily gobbled up by slugs and snails. relieved not to have had to water during hosepipe ban, but wonder if tomatoes will ever grow taller than a foot let alone fruit!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Liz24 June 2012 at 06:17

    Isn't Freckles lettuce fabulous. I use heaps of mint in my salads. Other than tabouleh, which is my favourite salad of all time, try beetroot mint & feta, or pumpkin, orange, mint & quinoa. REcipes for both are on my blog.

    ReplyDelete
  9. VP24 June 2012 at 11:01

    ediblethings - sounds marvellous will give it a try when NAH's away next week 'cos he hates beetroot and I love it! Do you have a fave recipe for blackberry vinegar?

    Donna - I'll look out for it and add to the list :)

    OOMS - my toms are shivering too but just checked and they're trying to flower!

    Liz - your recipes are fabulous thank you :)

    I've had so many good ideas for using mint, I can feel a blog post coming on. Will link to everyone who's contributed :)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Annemieke Wigmore17 August 2012 at 13:08

    Re the slugs: I have found that any red salad is less attractive to them than its green equivalent. Slightly less attractive to me too :-( , but always better than nothing!

    ReplyDelete
  11. VP23 August 2012 at 08:11

    Annemieke - welcome! Interesting observation re red lettuce leaves being less attractive to the slugs. I wonder what that is - slightly more bitter perhaps?

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

I love hearing from you and welcome thoughtful conversations :)

Comments aiming to link back and give credence to commercial websites will be composted!

Your essential reads

That blue flower: A spring spotter's guide

Image
Spring is a prime time for blue flowers and my daily walks currently have several from the same plant family* lining the local footpaths. As I walked past the Donkey Field the other day, I overheard some children ask their parents** what the pictured blue flower was. It reminded me it's often mistaken for those other familial blues and this time was no different, as they said it was forget-me-not, instead of the green alkanet it actually is. As well as similar flowers, most of these plants are hairy in their nature, flower around the same time, and favour damp, shady places. Many of them are great for pollinators too, especially bees and this week's warm weather has certainly drawn them to these flowers. This makes it even more likely for these plants to be mistaken for each other and it's a great opportunity for me to put together a spotter's guide in case you find the same flowers on your outings. Staying with green alkanet, the key features which set it
Read more

Jack Go To Bed At Noon

Image
Last year this rather exotic looking flower appeared on mine and several other allotments for the first time. Having been stumped (again) by Mr Allotment Warden as to its identity, I rushed home to find out what it was. It's salsify, aka the marvellous Jack Go To Bed At Noon - named as such because its flowers always close by midday. Here you can see both open and closed flowers - making it seem even more exotic and alien than in the first picture. I think this must be the cultivated version because the flower in my Francis Rose Wild Flower Key looks exactly the same in form, but is bright yellow in colour and called meadow salsify . Its other common name is Goatsbeard, which must be a nod to the fantastic dandelion-like clock which forms the seed head. With 'parachutes' like those shown above, who knows how far our plotted plants came from. I rather like the photographic dissection of the seedhead found in this link . Salsify is edible: its lateral shoots and fl
Read more

Red Nose Day - Gardening Jokes Anyone?

Image
The nation goes ever so slightly bonkers on Red Nose Day - hurrah! Previously, it's been very easy to join in - usually via a dress down day at work plus lots of people up to mad things at the station and in the office. Everyone smiling for once - it's a real feel good day and all in a good cause. This year's different - every day's a dress down day for me now - my friend L suggested yesterday that perhaps I could have a dress up day instead and whilst that's a good idea, I confess that ballgowns and tiaras don't really feature in my wardrobe: scruffy student's always been my favourite look. So my Red Nose Day contribution for this year is to compile a list of gardening related jokes. For each one (clean ones only please) you leave in the comments below, I'll make a donation of 50p to the cause. Here's a few for starters just to get you warmed up: Q Why do potatoes make good detectives? A Because they keep their eyes peeled. Q What did the grape
Read more

Salad Days: Mastering Lettuce

Image
I've decided one of my salad challenges for this year is to grow as many lettuce varieties as I can, ready for the publication of my planned Factsheet* later on. The idea is to grow as many of the Tried and Trusted lettuce varieties last year's Salad Challengers helped compile, then provide a visual guide and as many lettuce facts as I can muster. So far I've found around half of those listed**. Then naturally whilst I was out searching - because such is the way with seeds - a number of other varieties found their way home too ;) A couple of weeks ago I sowed 22 varieties***. Just the simple act of sowing them has me intrigued. Why are some lettuce seeds black and others white****? They split into about half white to half black in my sample and as far as I can tell it's nothing to do with whether they're a type of cos, iceberg, or whatever. I sowed them indoors and popped them into a propagator on the windowsill. The soil's too cold outside for sowing
Read more

VPs VIPs: Derry Watkins of Special Plants

Image
Last week I had the pleasure of visiting Derry Watkins at her home, garden and nursery - the acclaimed Special Plants - just a few miles along the road from me. I first met Derry at one of her open garden days last year and was keen to find out more about her wonderful garden and running an independent nursery. She specialises in tender perennials and regularly goes on plant hunting trips to find new treasures, particularly in South Africa. As well as running Special Plants and opening her garden under the NGS scheme , Derry holds day courses at her nursery, hosts Special Tuesdays from April until September, lectures and has written a couple of books. How did you find your way from Connecticut to the UK? I'd started a biodynamic vegetable garden in Connecticut and we used to have people come along at weekends to help out. A particular young man turned up: he returned many times and at the end of the summer I married him. So it was all down to love? Isn't that the
Read more

#mygardenrightnow: heading into summer with the Chelsea Fringe

Image
Ahhhhhh, that's better! I love walking through dewy grass in bare feet, not that there's much in the way of grass on my back lawn this weekend. My wild and woolly lawn has morphed into meadow of sorts this month, which even NAH admits looks attractive*. It's also proved a great source for my Flowers for mum project so far, yielding self-sown perennial cornflowers, lamb's ears, and lemon balm in addition to the blooms you can see. These originated from elsewhere in the garden, the ox-eye daisies must have blown in from the A350 nearby. * = he got very stroppy about the weeds aka self-sown foxgloves in the lawn one year, so he's come along a bit since then. Skimble's demanding to say hello to you too. He does enjoy the patio when it warms up. If the embedded video doesn't work try this link instead. The Nectaroscordum are a revelation. I planted the bulbs around 2 years ago, but it's only this year they've bloomed properly. The bee
Read more

The Resilient Garden

Image
  Part of Tom Massey's Resilient Garden at RHS Hampton Court I've been pondering VP Gardens a lot lately. Last year's drought conditions set me off initially, then our harsher than usual winter combined with this summer's flip and flop weather means the thinking continues. It's a huge topic which I freely admit I'm struggling to get my head around. Tom Massey's Resilient Garden  at Hampton Court recently  tackled this topic brilliantly and was a timely interlude which gave me much food for thought. There he encapsulated the detailed research he'd found which informed both his show garden and book of the same name. I think it's one of the most important show gardens I've ever seen. It's clear the way I garden needs to change so that I have my own resilient garden. I haven't worked out the exact details yet, but Tom's book plus a couple of others (see below), alongside the rainwater management handout from the show garden's  sponso
Read more

Testing Times: Tomatoes

Image
  I've run a couple of tomato trials this year. The first is a revisit of the biochar trial with Oxford University I attempted some years ago (with a different organisation this time), and the second is a trial of a water gadget called Plantsurge which I was given to try at Malvern Spring Show earlier this year. Most of you have probably heard of biochar already and the claim that this inert, carbon-rich material can help soil fertility and plant health. The RHS information in the above link says results can be mixed, with reduced effects found in alkaline soils. This may help to explain the lack of difference I found in my previous trial as VP Gardens is on a lime-rich soil. Plantsurge is a different beast altogether. It's a strong magnet which is attached to a hosepipe as shown in the photo above. It's claimed that it softens water, with the result more like watering with rainwater. The higher nitrogen found in rainwater is thought to be beneficial to plants. Gardener
Read more

Chelsea Fringe 2014: Shows of Hands - Episode I

Image
The gloves NAH used to build the raised bed . The effects are L to R, top to bottom:  Original photo, Warhol, HDR, Green tint, B&W, Posterize, Boost, Cross process and Sepia Welcome to Shows of Hands - my Chelsea Fringe project for 2014! As you can see I've been having a bit of a play around in Pic Monkey for my first contribution. You're welcome to join in between now and 8th June 2014. The idea behind this year's project is to highlight the tool most precious to a gardener: their hands. How do I take part? It's simple. All you need to do is take a photo of hand(s) in a gardening context and then share it via your blog or other social media (such as Twitter or Facebook), then make sure I know you've done so. I've set up Mr Linky below for your blog contributions. The Chelsea Fringe photo on the right sidebar links to this post, so you can easily find it again when you're ready to add your contribution. If you share your photo on Twitter,
Read more

Make Use of Mildew

Image
On my garden patrol this morning I spotted some powdery mildew on a couple of my new Verbena bonariensis plants. I suppose it was almost inevitable as I prefer to grow my plants hard - this means no water for them unless they look absolutely desperate. This approach means plants root themselves more deeply and have a better chance of survival during spells of dry weather like we've had lately. However, it also means I run the risk of problems like today's, especially with any garden newbies planted late in the season. We've had a good drop of rain overnight, so this should help my plants survive. I'll mulch them later today to help lock in the moisture as it's water stress which encourages the mildew to take hold. I've also removed the infected leaves and sprayed the rest with a milky drink.* I'm also pleased to find there's a use for my infected leaves. Oliver Ellingham at Reading University has started a PhD - sponsored by the RHS - researchi
Read more