DISPATCHES FROM THE FARMRSS

Mighty Mizuna

Monday, March 01, 2010
A new crop of mizuna has emerged in the last week. We've been growing this zingy Japanese mustard green since we started farming as we've always known of  and enjoyed it from mesclan salad mix. Mesclan is a mixture of baby salad leaves and flowers petals frequently used in restaurants, especially for garnishes because it's so attractive.


Loose-leaf mizuna at our market stall

Mizuna is used a lot in traditional Japanese cuisine with soups, hot pots, stir fries, steamed or as salad. It has a mild mustard flavour and is a member of the brassica family, like bok choi and broccoli. It has mid-dark green, serrated leaves and can be harvested when the leaves are quite small (perfect for loose leaf salad) or left to grow larger making it more robust for cooked dishes. It's a 'cut and come again' type plant like rocket but eventually it goes to seed, so we have to try to keep the crops overlapping to ensure a steady supply over spring-autumn. 

We find people often mistake it for 'wild' rocket because of the serrated leaves, but in fact they look very different next to each other...the mizuna serrations are much pointier and more numerous per leaf and aren't quite as darkly coloured.


Mizuna currently in the field

We mostly use mizuna for lovely fresh salads with a tang! Most of our customers buy it for the same purpose.





Recent Posts


Tags

GM Foods heritage tomatoes Angelica Organics lavender harvest organic industry Joel Salatin Heritage Beetroots Blumin Lake House blog zucchinis Fertiliser bird scarers organic pest control Australian garlic organic weed managment backyard poultry organic farmer, website, blog, sharing seed raising garlic sales online Worldwatch Institute The Chefs Table zucchini flowers capeweed ABC Delicious Produce Awards 2010 shallots GE foods green manure crop organic tomatoes seedlings Vic Central Highlands Weather Spa Country garlic harvest Monsanto Andrew Blake, Blakes Feast Corn Dollies Rocambole home grown tomatoes garlic update Matt Wilkinson garlic braids rocket heirloom vegetables organic garlic Angelica Organic Farm Spring Melbourne Farmers' Markets Golden Shallots Ethical eating mulching Farmers' Markets organic vegetables Snow Pope Joan cafe Angelica garlic harvesting Sunflowers Boroondara Farmers' Market Swiss Italian heritage Jerusalem artichokes new season garlic heirloom ABC Delicious magazine old fashion tomatoes Andrew Blake soil food web Blakes Feast Catering Winter Warmers Japanese Mustard Greens culinary herbs website Tonia Todman relocalisation sharing organic farmer Daylesford bok choi Summer produce Genetically Modified Seeds Pigs Will Flog Community Blog Vogue Entertaining and Travel Produce Awards herb bouquets Lavandula rain Food ethics Barbara Ross heirloom tomatoes garlic bulbs open pollinated Irrigation home made preserves Daylesford-Macedon Harvest Festival 2011 eschallots Daylesford Victoria Christmas 2009 new season mesclan salad Compost Organic chickens lavender farm Cool climate veg growing cucumbers VFMA roses and herbs autumn produce soil preparation garlic plaits Victorian Farmers' Market Association Accreditation

Archive