TURN UP THE HEAT WITH MUSTARDS & ROCKETS

Salad leaves are always a healthy addition to the home grown menu. Winter and spring are a good time to grow mustard and rocket seedlings for harvesting for fresh salads. They lend a hot, peppery flavour to green salads or sandwiches.

There are a number of different mustard types available as seedlings, including Red Giant, with large reddish leaves, Mizuna with deeply dissected green leaves and the oriental Tatsoi used in Chinese dishes. There is also the attractive green leaf Green Wave with frilly edged foliage. Both salad rocket (Eruca sativa) and wild rocket (Diplotaxis erucoides) excel in the cooler weather conditions.

Plant out fresh seedlings at 3 to 4 week intervals as the plants grow quickly and soon exhaust themselves or else they start to go to seed. Fresh young foliage is always the most desirable. These richly rewarding and nutritious plants can be integrated into the flower garden, where they lend contrasting foliage colour and texture.