Moxie Gardener

Kale seeds ripening.

Here’s a picture of the kale plant that survived our Minnesota winter. As you can see, it’s gone to seed.

I’ve written about this kale several times before.

Here’s the post celebrating its survival over winter.

And here’s an update on its spring growth.

If you look towards the bottom of the flower stems in the picture at left, you’ll see the seed pods already formed. They look like horizontal twigs sticking out the sides of the stems.

What have I learned from this little experiment?

Kale plants will survive winter providing they are adequately covered.

You must remove the mulch in early spring, as soon as the weather begins to get above freezing. Otherwise, the leaves will wilt, become inedible, and the stem will become moldy. The entire plant will die.

Seeds will form and ripen by late spring, in plenty of time to plant for fall harvest.

The experiment will be repeated this year, using seeds that are forming right now.

But this year, I’ll use what I’ve learned.

Next spring, we’ll be eating fresh kale a month before the spring-planted greens are ready.

Last year's kale survived overwintering and is struggling to grow this spring.

Just a quick update on the kale I covered up to overwinter. I wrote about it here and again here. Then I finally conceded defeat in this post.

Was out expanding the garden today (more about that later). I happened to smell cole crops. I investigated a little further, then determined that while the kale plant I took pictures of earlier (see links, above) was indeed dead, there was another, smaller one that most definitely was not. The stems were still purple, and it looked like some new leaves were trying to unfold.

I got out my camera and took the picture above. At first I could really smell the cabbage, but then it became overcome with an onion smell, after I smashed the chives trying to get a close up of the kale.

I just may get an early spring mini-crop of kale from the lone survivor.

About the garden expansion: my son and friend today moved some of the monolithic stones that outlined my vegetable garden plot, thereby increasing its size by about one third.

(Note to all: the garden was pre-formed and outlined with monoliths when I inherited it a couple of summers ago. It hasn’t exactly been an award-winning producer, but I plan to change that this summer, providing I don’t break my arm again. But I digress.)

The garden is larger. Instead of three sides bordered with monolithic stones, there are now only two. One side borders a fence, and the other is wide open to the yard.

One of three kale plants I covered up to overwinter managed to survive into mid April.

The spinach seeds I planted a couple weeks ago in an old twelve gallon crock are germinating.

Lettuce seeds I planted last fall to overwinter came up and survived a late season snowstorm without my covering them.

I poked around the tarragon and found at least one bud at ground level trying to reach through the leaves toward the sunlight. I’ll leave the mulch of dried leaves on it until the nights reliably stay above freezing. I’d hate to have it survive winter, only to die from a late spring freeze.

I imagine the rest of my fall-sown greens will begin to germinate after we get some much needed rain.

Russian Blue Kale

Kale is the ancestor of all other vegetables in the brassica family:  broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, rutabaga, and collard greens, to name a few.  The kale varieties we eat today are at least two thousand years old.  Over the last two millennia gardeners have selected the anomalies growing in the kale patch and propagated them by natural selection.  We know these as broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, rutabaga, and collard greens.

The family tree for kale is essentially two branches.  Brassica napus species covers the Russian kales, rutabagas and canola (as in the oil).  Brassica oleracea is home to regular kale, collard greens, Chinese kale and the other brassica vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage.

Kale is like cabbage but without a head.  It is one of the most hardy of vegetables and some report it surviving temperatures down to 5 degrees F.

In fact kale becomes sweeter and much more flavorful after a couple of frosts.  To grow for fall, direct seed in garden 3 to 4 months before your first fall frost.  With a little protection from the cold you can harvest kale until December in most locations and even through the winter in southern areas.

Kale can also be sown in October for an early spring harvest.  Cover the little plants with straw before winter takes over the landscape.  Or if you prefer you can direct seed in early spring along with other cool weather greens.

Kales are true biennials.  To save seeds try one of the following methods.  Leave mature plants in the ground with winter protection, then uncover and allow to go to seed the following spring.  Another method is to dig and store kale plants with their roots in damp sand in a root cellar for winter and then plant out in spring and allow plants to go to seed.

Kale is becoming more popular as a vegetable and gardeners are cooking kale every way they can think of.  The Greeks and Romans couldn’t get enough of it.  Scandinavians simmer kale slowly for hours with cream, stock, salt and pepper and serve it with the Christmas ham.  The Irish mix kale with mashed potatoes and call it colcannon.  Even the so-called “ornamental” kales are edible.

Whether you grow it as a spring green to toss into green salads, lightly saute like spinach in late spring or plant for traditional cooked greens in fall, kale is delicious and packed with nutrition.  I’ve found it works in virtually any recipe calling for cooked greens.

I’ll let you know how my “overwintering” kale experiments turn out.