I was doing some research on Winter Purslane and Mache for including them in my insensate frame for next fall / winter horticulture and found a ejaculate fellowship in ( of all place ) New Mexico . It is calledwww.gourmetseed.comand hails out of Tatum , NM and you’re able to buy these items and more from them . Mache is fairly coarse but I have n’t heard about Purslane ( except the godforsaken sort that grows here ) . So let me babble a slight about these two winter crop that have been grown in Europe for centuries .
Mache ( French Corn Salad)-picture from gourmetseed.com
Mache-(Valerianella locusta )
Mache (French Corn Salad)-picture from gourmetseed.com
This bon vivant greens is also know as corn salad and lamb ’s lettuce . It has been civilize from France since the 17th century . Mache was identify because it ’s foliage resemble the shape and size of a lamb ’s clapper ! It is one of the few green that can handle our winters ( like spinach ) . It grows in a rosette if you plant individually but most just broadcast the ejaculate ( like you would for mesclun ) in an area to make a carpet of leaves as they are very small . Growing humbled to the ground , it is harder to reap but it has a nutty , sweet flavor deserving the endeavour . To harvest it , just take a knife and switch off it off below the leaf level being measured not to injure the delicate leaves and wash well . you’re able to eat it alone or put it in with other salad greens but employ a light-colored vinaigrette or even lemon yellow juice and a petty fossil oil - it is too touchy for large fecundation . They say you’re able to steam it like spinach plant but it is too small for me to do that . I grew this many long time ago under row cover in raise boxes and it did well but grew very slow in our winter but when Spring arrive it was ready and I belong out one twenty-four hour period only to discover the wimp had escaped and raided the garden and they eat on all but a few leaf of my Mache ! The few leaves go out tasted marvelous so I hope they delight it ! It like colder weather condition so I may judge again this former spring as it claim 6 - 12 weeks till harvest but much longer if it pass into winter . Mache does n’t like to be quick . Maybe I ’ll sample it when I plant more spinach in former March and again next descent .
Winter Purslane ( Miner ’s Lettuce)–picture from gourmetseed.com
Winter - Purslane-(Montia perfoliata )
Winter Purslane (Miner’s Lettuce)–picture from gourmetseed.com
This is not to be confused with the purslane weed that grows baseless in New Mexico and throughout the U.S. I will indite the next post on that one ( Portulaca oleracea ) because it is interesting too but for now I want to focus on this motley . This winter William Green is also known as Miner ’s Lettuce or Indian Lettuce and is plentiful in Vitamin C. It was eaten by former mineworker to ward off Scurvy . This wonderful wild K is used in Germany and other European countries for it ’s tender untested leaves . It is used as an gain to mesclun and other salads or steamer like spinach . You pick the leaves when they are unseasoned and sensitive . Most people plant this in fall because it handles the winter so well . I believe I will stress this in my cold physique next fall . I have n’t done a cold frame in years until this yr , but am love seeing the spinach , oakleaf lettuce and chard in it . It ’s prissy see to it something green in the dead of wintertime and hopefully if they pull through this wintertime , I will get an early crop of some grand greens and now that I ’m arouse again about fall / winter gardening , I will unquestionably engraft some Mache and Purslane next year . You might consider it too .
