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Arugula. General.
Wild Arugula or Cultivated Arugula.
Both are a wonderful addition to a salad, but are also good cooked with
pasta or in a fritatta. Cultivated arugula has a nice pungent taste which gets
‘hotter’ as the plant becomes more mature and also in the summer.
It is ready in 35-40 days. Wild
arugula, by contrast, is slower growing (50-55 days), is a bit more pungent, and
is more cold hardy. Both, however,
will survive a zone 5 winter in the unheated greenhouse. Culture.
Direct seed @ 4-5 weeks before the last frost date.
Scatter seeds in a well prepared bed (30-60 seeds per square foot).
Tamp seeds firmly or cover them with a thin layer of sifted compost and
tamp well. Keep moist until seeds
emerge which should be 3-8 days, depending on temperature.
Begin harvesting when they are 3-4 inches tall by pulling individual
plants, thinning out your planting. As
they get a bit larger, you can just cut an entire section about ½ inch above
the soil line with a sharp knife. Taste
becomes sharper as the plants mature and the temperature increases.
If you allow them to flower, you can still eat them, but they will be a
bit hotter. Succession plant every
2-3 weeks for a continuous harvest. If
you grow in four foot wide raised beds, an 18 inch
section should provide you with plenty of arugula for 2-3 weeks. Disease/Pests.
For all practical purposes, no pests or diseases bother arugula. Storage/Use. Use to spike salads. Cook with pasta – wilt arugula in some good olive oil with a clove or so of minced garlic. Add pasta about a minute or two shy of being al dente. Add a ¼ cup or so of water or broth, cook until the pasta is done. Add salt & pepper if desired. A nice grating cheese goes well with this. You can also cook arugula in a fritatta along with some chard or spinach or just by itself. To store, rinse and store in the crisper section in a plastic bag. Basil General.
Basil is one of the essential Italian herbs and is very easy to grow.
Genovese basil, with 2-3 inch long dark green leaves, has a spicy
fragrant taste. Use for pesto,
sauces, and general cooking. Lettuce
leaf basil has a larger leaf (4-5 inches), is lighter green, and has a sweeter
less intense taste. Use fresh in
salads, on crostini or bruschetta, or for general cooking.
Both plants grow 18-24 inches high.
Picollo has a small almost round leaf, an intense basil flavor, and grows
in a round bush shape. Culture.
Basil is a warm weather plant and can not take even the slightest frost.
Basil likes a well drained moderately fertile soil with good sun.
It does very well grown from transplants, but you can also direct seed
it. For transplants, start about
5-8 weeks before the last frost date. Put
5-6 seeds in a 4” pot covered with a thin layer of vermiculite or fine
compost. When the plants are about
two inches high, either transplant them to individual containers or thin to
three plants and let them keep growing. Set
out basil (or direct seed) about the same time you put out tomatoes.
Space plants about 12 inches apart and keep well watered. Basil will grow well in containers. Use at least an eight inch pot with a good fertile soil for
container grown plants. Disease/Pests
Nothing much bothers basil. Even
a woodchuck won’t eat them, so you can plant them outside the fence. Harvest & Use. Harvest by pinching whole sections of the plant. This will encourage branching. Pinch off any flowers that begin to form. You can be quite aggressive with harvesting, since the plant will regrow quickly. Sometimes it is useful to plant a second group of basil in early to mid July. Your initial crop will be a bit ‘woody’ by mid August. You can dig this second group up before the first frost, cut them back, pot them up and bring them inside and enjoy a few more months of fresh basil. Use Genovese basil in fresh tomato salad, pesto, general cooking, herb fritatta; use lettuce leaf basil in salads, on crostini, as a ‘wrap’, or general cooking; use picollo where you want a really intense basil taste. To store, rinse and store in the crisper section in a plastic bag. You can dry basil, but it really does not have the same flavor. To store for cooking over the winter, try blending it with some water and freeze in ice cube containers (put them in a plastic bag and store in the freezer once they have frozen in the ice cube container. Parsley General.
Our Gigante de Napoli is the classic Italian flat leaf parsley. Use fresh to flavor just about anything. Culture.
Fertile soil produces the most abundant yields.
Parsley is slow to germinate and may take up to three weeks outside.
Direct seed or use transplants. For
direct seed, sow three seeds/inch in rows 12-18 inches apart, beginning about 4
weeks before the last frost date. For
transplants, sow 3-4 seeds per container beginning 8-9 weeks before the last
frost date and keep moist until germination.
Set transplants @ 6” apart in rows 12” apart.
Parsley is extremely cold hardy and will often winter over without
protection. In zone 5 it will
survive in the unheated greenhouse so you can have parsley all winter.
You can also dig up a plant or two after the last frost, repot it, and
bring it inside. Harvest/storage. Clip leaves with a knife or scissors, rinse and store in a plastic bag in the refrigerator.
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