Topic: What's new?

[Beersmith]

I'm a complete sucker for novelties.  Over the years I've tried so many.  Yes I've tried cucamelons, asparagus peas, goji berries, salsify, jerusalem artichokes, kalettes, and many many more. Usually with a degree of disappointment, although I love salsify I cannot eat it due to the effects on the digestive system.  But somehow this season inspiration has fled. My crops are all very conventional this year. I had intended to sow some yellow rattle seeds into my bee patch where grass is beginning to out compete the wild flowers but forgot they needed to be over wintered to ensure germination. So nothing new at all.

Is anyone trying anything new or unusual? Please share!!

[Deb P]

I’m a bit like you, previously grown rats tail radishes, parsley peas, par-cel,Egyptian walking onions……blue potatoes,bright red potatoes, black potatoes……J wouldn’t try any of them again! I do try new ( to me) tomatoes every year, get seeds from specialists and the HSL but have a short list of favourites I grow every year now…..

[JanG]

I’m still open to trying new things but have given up on many of the things mentioned. Cucamelons are OK but just didn’t get round to eating many. Walking onions seem quite difficult to manage and when you grow annual onions aren’t particularly appealing to eat. I still grow kalettes but this year didn’t get round to eating many. There was always actual Brussel sprout or kale to choose, and they got quite a lot of aphid in the end. I do grow and enjoy coloured potatoes and keep the seed potatoes from year to year. I like Heidi Red etc. Salsify has  never given me a substantial enough root to bother to do much with, but I love the flowers so I let the odd bit self-seed. I love Jerusalem artichokes but ruinous on the digestion so currently trying to get rid of them totally - the odd bit still pops up. I’ve acquired a goji berry bush but no fruit yet, and sprawling but not looking promising. I love trying new varieties of much loved vegetables though - tomatoes, beans, peas, peppers especially, and still likely to try entirely new crops out of curiosity and fascination as much as anything else.

[saddad]

I agree with salsify, love the flowers but never anything to eat. Scorzonera (?) was more useful but don't grow any longer. Have a small clump of Good King Henry but again never eat any. Buckler leaf sorrel is worth growing. Russian Tarragon was a thug and not as good as the French. Achocha is a decorative nibble... and like Deb the HSL is great for "new" tomatoes and climbing peas and beans..

[Beersmith]

Expanding on my comment about my bee friendly patch, can anyone confirm if my idea is sensible.  It is an area about 5 metres by 5 metres, with some hazelnut shrubs surrounded by wild and bee friendly flowers. I leave it to do its own thing, only making interventions to prevent anything becoming dominant. But it has gradually been getting more grass that seems to be stronger growing than the flowers.  I thought that yellow rattle would parasite on the grass and weaken it allowing the flowers to grow stronger. Does anyone know if this will work? 

Also something I had not considered is if the rattle could weaken the hazelnut shrub roots. Maybe not such a good idea?

[Harry]

Is anyone trying anything new or unusual? Please share!!

Well, slightly novel are Egyptian Tree Onions and okra..... and just for my low beds, some Paris Market Carrots that grow round like beetroot. The tree onions are very hardy and easy to grow, ( supposedly) yielding small onions above ground and spreading out on their own.
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[Tiny Clanger]

I also try to grow something new each year - my list tallies with yours almost word for word!.  This year its Mizuna!  No! Dont like it - yet another non event. I have better luck with different varieties of well know items.  Particularly potatoes.  Last season I tried Sarpo Mira for the first time.  Lifted main crop in in October, cooked first sample  early November - didn'y like them much.  Kept through to Jan - what a difference and we are only just finishing tham.  They've kept amazingly well and have improved with the keeping.  Dry for mash but with the addition of milk/cream and butter... we are well impressed! 

I shall still be daft enough to scour the catalogues next season for a "must try" novelty though

[IanDH]

As with others have tried a long list of novel varieties - not too many retained.

Have kept Chilean guava - bit of a faff but very late fruit with great flavour.  Boysenberry - lovely flavour - just don't keep much past day of picking.

Last years experriment - lingonberry - they have put on a bit of weight but no real success with fruit as yet.

This year new to us is Japanese wineberry, growing well  - nothing else to report as yet.

It's all in the anticipation!

[Obelixx]

I planted a male and female sea buckthorn last year, mostly for the birds but I took cuttings so I can make a hedge/windbreak for the north side of our veg plot.  Only 2 have survived but I can try again this year.   No fruits yet but we'll get there one day.

This year I sowed garlic kale in April and it took a while to germinate and get to a size I could pot on and then it turned cold.  They'd started bolting before I could get them planted out so not a huge success.  I might just stick with PSB and cavolo nero.

I'm finally growing some red spring onions from seed after years of trying and failing - sown in modules in the polytunnel this time.

I always try some new tomatoes.  This year I've bought just one each of 13 plants from a chap who grows heirlooms.  This year the new ones are Black Pear, Black Zebra, Big Zac, Carbon, Montmaurin, Joie de la Table, Noire de Tula and Valence.  Repeats are Red and Yellow Pears and Rose de Berne.  I've also sown Rosella and San Marzano which I've grown before and new ones - Ildi, and Moonglow.   We like tomatoes, big and small, coloured and red, fresh in salads, cooked in tarts, part dried for bruschetta and pizzas and puréed down for soups and stews.

[JanG]

I believe walking onions and tree onions are the same thing? I didn’t stick with them as I found them difficult to manage and tended to find we are annual onions in preference. Like Harry I’ve started to try Okra. It seems to need plenty of warmth, and the seedlings seem to have struggled this cold spring.  I did succeed in getting a few last year in my polytunnel.
I like Mizuna as a reliable over-wintering salad under cover, mixed with other more peppery mustards. I also grow a few Sarpo Mira every year. The flavour isn’t the most exciting but they’re very dependable both for their blight resistance and storage abilities.
I had a boysenberry but it grew to be huge and so was difficult to net to protect from birds. I enjoyed it for the first few years but in the end dug it up as the blackbirds guaranteed that I got no fruit to speak of from a very large bush. I have a young Japanese wineberry; the signs are already that it will take quite a lot of keeping in check.

[Harry]

I believe walking onions and tree onions are the same thing? I didn’t stick with them as I found them difficult to manage and tended to find we are annual onions in preference.

Yes. Same thing also known as Egyptian Tree onions. They produce bulbs at the top of their growth, which then droops to the ground and reseeds.
https://treeonions.com/
Though perennial, I doubt I'll get mucjh of a harvest because the bulbs are tiny. But the whole plant is edible onion.

Like Harry I’ve started to try Okra. It seems to need plenty of warmth, and the seedlings seem to have struggled this cold spring.  I did succeed in getting a few last year in my polytunnel.

I tried last year with no success. Too cold, probably.

[saddad]

Never managed to get Okra to flower/fruit.

[Deb P]

I only had three plants germinate, git them to flower, pretty hibiscus like flowers but tall scraggy plants, eventually had about three okra per plant, not even a handful! Didn’t try again…..

[saddad]

Andrew has convinced me to grow some Tomatillos for him this year. He wants to make his own Salsa Verde... saved some seeds from ones we picked up at Calke. Doing well and just coming into flower. Easier than the Jicama Phil insists on me growing.

[BarriedaleNick]

Tomatillos are a great cropper if you get some warm weather but they do tend to fall and sprawl everywhere.  I'm trying some purple ones this year to make some salsa purple!!!

[Vinlander]

Salsify:
If you rely on volunteers you'll never get anything fatter than a pencil - but that's because they seed in June.
If you sow any fresh seed you're going to get nothing better, (but truly fabulous purple-lilac flowers that sadly close at noon - still the most delightful edible ornamental).
It's best to sow them in Feb/early March in decent soil. More than 50% will be wider than pencils by Dec. Quite a few will be 15mm at the thick end.
I love them most in a roast - also celeriac, J.Arts, elephant garlic (whole), white-fleshed sweet potatoes; and spuds if there's room. That's why I prefer a small bird in a big tray of veg.

Close relative Scorzonera will produce bigger roots in their 2nd year but every root has always been damaged by then - basically the black skin is more work than the bigger root is worth - it's less work to scrub the root hairs off a salsify - even if they are sub-pencil size (baby veg anyone?).

Skirret:
Absolutely delicious - sort of a sweeter milder parsnip - unfortunately the pencil sized roots contain a 'string' so you either strip them through your teeth like a satay skewer or make mash and push it through a colander - brightens-up any soup or swede/squash/potato mash (and potato salad). Can be grown as a perennial.

I've also tried nearly everything doubtful - all the "asparagus substitutes" are rubbish, except hop shoots which are delicious despite not tasting any more like asparagus than the rubbish ones do...

Most spinach substitutes are very poor - the best one is New Zealand Spinach - but you need to pick a dozen leaves per mouthful. The wild version is smaller but less stringy so you can chop up the whole plant, steam it and eat it (same goes for chickweed - delicious). The French call it tetragon and it is everywhere in the Canary Islands and probably in bits of S.Europe too.
2nd prize goes to wild sea beet, 3rd to the other beet leaves, and wooden spoon to Swiss Chard - it's barely worth eating - except that you can pick it in winter when there's nothing else. Try (any) spinach as a puree on cooked cabbage - works like "gravy" to bring out the flavours

Skulpit:
Can be used as a salad or a spinach substitute (but the tiny leaves are too labour intensive - you'd be better stripping the whole plant), and weirdly it's quite glutinous too (but though it doesn't taste like okra some other veg can). Pink balloon Selene flowers.

Tuberous pea:
Black roots with white flesh. Genuinely tastes like sweet chestnut (without the bitterness) - especially raw. The black crop in dark soil is difficult to find, so grow in a lined trench of very light soil - the small tubers and strings you put back will survive the disturbance. Absolutely loves growing in a woodchip bin (and tumbling down showing pretty magenta flowers) - this also produces larger tubers with paler skin (is it camouflaging itself?).

I'll add some more later - may also list "don't buys".

Cheers.