Flowering cabbage and kale look good enough to eat
… and they are – the plants are sometimes used as a strongly
flavored and brightly colored garnish or cabbage substitute for
soups and salads. Kale has looser and more coarsely textured
foliage than the more compact cabbage, which has more rounded
leaves.
This week begins a new weekly feature, Plant of the Week, by San Jose-based consulting horticulturist and arborist Tony Tomeo. In it you will find information about a variety of flowers and plants you can grow at home or purchase from local garden stores.
If you have a flower or plant you’d like to know more about, contact Tony at (888) 226-9191 or ww********@*****************ng.com.
Flowering cabbage and kale look good enough to eat … and they are – the plants are sometimes used as a strongly flavored and brightly colored garnish or cabbage substitute for soups and salads. Kale has looser and more coarsely textured foliage than the more compact cabbage, which has more rounded leaves.
Some flowering kale has leaves that are lacy with intricate margin patterns. Foliage of both is bluish green at the base, with white, yellowish white, pink, pale purple and pinkish purple margins. Color is best in full sun and after the first frost.
Like their vegetable relatives, flowering cabbage and kale can be planted about now, but instead of getting harvested in winter or spring, they can be left in the garden until it is time to plant warm season annuals. They are biennials that will eventually bolt and bloom, but their tall flower stalks are unremarkable amid their basal foliage as it begins to wither.
Flowering cabbage and kale grow slowly from small cell packs, so they should be planted while the warm season annuals are still blooming. Unlike warm season annuals that have the advantage of increasingly warm weather to accelerate growth, flowering cabbage and kale grow slower through their season as the weather gets cooler. They can be planted among warm season annuals to outgrow and replace them as the warm season ends. Eventually, the remnants of the warm season annuals can be pulled out from between the maturing flowering cabbage and kale.
Some garden enthusiasts prefer to plant flowering cabbage and kale later as larger plants from 4-inch or gallon pots after the warm season annuals have been removed. This technique is considerably more expensive but allows the area to be cleared for more uniform planting.
Tony Tomeo is a consulting horticulturist and arborist for New Image Landscape of Fremont. His weekly radio broadcast, “New Image Garden Report,” can be heard at 8:10am on Friday mornings on KSCO, 1080 AM of Santa Cruz. Have a plant or flower you want featured in Plant of the Week? Tony can be reached at (888) 226-9191 or ww********@*****************ng.com.
